Lamh Foistenach Abu!
Posted on 11/28/2009 4:25:51 PM PST by wagglebee
If Rom Houben's case proves anything, it is the arrogance of those who think they can pronounce upon the state of a patient's consciousness, and determine his subsequent fate--when humility should force them to admit they cannot possibly know what that patient may be experiencing.
Houben is the Belgian man who spent 23 years misdiagnosed as being in a persistent vegetative state when he was actually conscious and suffering from locked-in syndrome as the result of an auto accident. Locked-in syndrome means the individual is paralyzed, but retains full consciousness.
The misdiagnosis was discovered thanks to state-of-the-art brain scanning technology which neurologist Steven Laureys at Liege University Hospital used to discover that Houben still had activity in his cerebral cortex.
One has to wonder how many other patients through the years have been wrongly diagnosed as being in a coma or cruelly labeled "vegetables"-- a term which should be banished from the language as a reference point for discussing human beings.
Terri Schiavo's case comes to mind. Doctors argued for years over the level of consciousness they thought the Florida woman was capable of -- and their conclusions varied, whether they sided with Schiavo's husband, Michael, who wanted her feeding tube pulled so she would die or whether they sided with Schiavo's parents, who insisted she was conscious, recognized them and expressed emotions, including joy. Schiavo had suffered brain damage in 1990 after cardiac arrest, and she died in 2005, almost two weeks after her feeding tube was removed -- forcing her to undergo a slow death by starvation and dehydration.
Bobby Schindler, Schiavo's brother and executive director of the Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation, commenting on Houben's case, told ABCNews.com:"We are learning how unscientific the diagnosis is. It's completely subjective and we are using it to sentence people to death, and it's dangerous."
It is indeed dangerous. Had that gross misnomer "the right to die" been at issue in Houben's case, this fully conscious man would have had to undergo the agony of people debating whether he should be allowed to live, and he could have faced the agony of knowing he was being starved to death, unable to communicate with anyone to let them know there was indeed a fully aware person inside his paralyzed body. Particularly poignant was Houben's description, via a special keyboard and computer, of how he tried to alert his caregivers to his conscious state: "I screamed, but there was nothing to hear."
He characterized the day the misdiagnosis was revealed as a rebirth for him: "I especially felt relief. Finally to be able to show that I was indeed there."
The lesson from Houben's case--and reinforced, sadly, too late by Schiavo's case-- is that if doctors and courts must err, it should always be on the side of life, and on the assumption that despite all outward appearances, the "I" is "indeed there."
Exactly!
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Lamh Foistenach Abu!
This case is a far cry from that of Baby Theresa’s (sp).
Yes, he gets to live, Terri was MURDERED.
Aparently this man’s brain scan showed activity. When Terry Schiavo’s brain scan was made public it seemed as if much of the brain was gone.
Static brain scans mean nothing with regards to consciousness.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn12301-man-with-tiny-brain-shocks-doctors.html
THREAD BUMP.
Humans are never vegetables? Hmmmn...some of my colleagues and indeed some of the posters on this site make me wonder at that assertion...
There is an email going around and there will be tens of thousands (HOPEFULLY) dumped on their office this Christmas season.
They WILL open them because a lot of their mail is donations.
Take up their time and give them a massive headache
I just printed off an 8x10 MERRY CHRISTMAS Celebrate the Birthday of Our LORD JESUS and put it into a standard #10 business envelope so it wouldn't look like a card. I also used a security envelope so they couldn't see through and know there wasn't a check.
I suggest passing this great idea to EVERYONE in your email friends list... make this a CHRISTMAS the ACLU will never forget!
Their Address
ACLU
125 BROAD STREET
18th Floor
NEW YORK, NY 10004
They said she couldn’t feel pain so it was ok to slowly starve her to death.
But if she wasn’t feeling anything why was it “cruel” to keep her alive?
I have yet to hear an explanation for that hypocrisy.
My mistake, I misread what you wrote, I thought you were talking about Terri Schiavo.
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