Schiavo tapes: snippets, then not much

St Pete Times ^ | Nov 10, 2003 | Stephen Nohlgren

[george wythe]

She seems to smile at her mother's voice. Her eyes follow a shiny balloon. Asked to open her eyes, she arches her eyebrows as far as they will go.

These and other fleeting images posted on the Internet have turned the heart-wrenching case of Terri Schiavo into a constitutional showdown.

But such moments that suggest awareness - culled from four hours of medical examinations that were videotaped in the summer of 2002 - are rare compared to the times when Schiavo lies in bed, slack-jawed and seemingly unresponsive, her limbs stiff, her eyes vacant, her hands curled in tight contractions.

The St. Petersburg Times reviewed all four hours of tapes, which now are public record in the Pinellas County Courthouse. Over and over, Robert and Mary Schindler beg their daughter to demonstrate any sign of consciousness. They have contended for more than a decade that she smiles and laughs in direct response to their conversation. They have told the court that her eyes follow them around the room.

These tests, these videos, offered a chance to show the judge firsthand.

"It's Mommy. Look this way," Mrs. Schindler urges at one point. "Can you say, "No, no, no' like you did before? No, no, no?"

"Terri, Terri, Terri. Can you look over here, sweetheart?"

Here and there, their daughter's glances and moans seem to coincide with what's being asked of her and might lead one to conclude that she responds. But more often than not, the parents' entreaties fall flat.

A judge who viewed all four hours concluded that Terri Schiavo exists in a hopeless vegetative state and ordered that her feeding tube be removed, as her husband requested. Appellate judges, who also saw all four hours, agreed.

Still, there's no denying the haunting power of a few, select moments. They seem to suggest that Schiavo - brain-damaged as she is - retains some shred of awareness and will. They are so disconcerting the Florida Legislature took one look at the snippets, overturned those judicial rulings and empowered the governor to put Schiavo back on the feeding tube.

Yes, the mother's words do seem to prompt what seems like a smile from Terri. Not just once, but twice. Her eyes do follow a balloon on three separate occasions, surprising even a doctor selected by her husband, Michael Schiavo.

But mostly, the Schindlers conduct one-sided conversations with Terri. They speak of family vacations, barbecues and newborn relatives. They profess to spot nuances in their daughter's face that aren't readily apparent to an outsider's eye.

At one point her father gets gruff while trying unsuccessfully to get her to follow a Disney-character balloon. "Come here, Terri, no more fooling around. No more fooling around with your Dad."

He pokes her in the forehead to make sure she's awake. "No more fooling around with your Dad. Listen to me. You see the balloon? You see Mickey?"

Later, he apologizes, telling her others have admonished him for his tone. "I'm not going to lecture you anymore. I was scolded. No more lectures. You do as you please."

Neither the father's gruff admonition nor his soothing apology seem to elicit any reaction from his daughter.

These ministrations are painfully poignant, right down to the music from a portable radio/cassette player.

From the movie Titanic: "Near, far, wherever you are. ... my heart will go on and on."

From James Bond: "Live and let die. Live and let die."Medical uncertainties

Theresa Maria Schiavo's brain suffered terrible trauma 13 years ago, when her potassium levels dropped so low her heart stopped beating.

For a few years, her family and husband, Michael, worked toward recovery. Then, he changed his mind. It was hopeless, he contended. She would not have wanted to live like this.

Years of litigation culminated with testimony last November by the five doctors who did the videotaped exams - two picked by the Schindlers, two by Michael Schiavo and one by Circuit Judge George Greer, who oversees the case.

The two Schindler doctors said Terri Schiavo, now 39, shows awareness and might be helped by treatment. The other three doctors said she lives in a persistent vegetative state, with no hope of recovery. Greer and an appellate court agreed that her feeding tube should be removed. In October, the tube came out; Terri was expected to die within a few weeks.

Then, the Schindlers posted six segments of the videotaped exams, totaling 4 minutes and 20 seconds, at www.terrisfight.org The clips were seen by thousands of people, including members of Florida's Legislature. With two days of debate, the Legislature passed "Terri's Law" and Gov. Jeb Bush ordered her feeding tube reinserted. She had lived six days without nourishment.

"I said, wait a minute, that's not my definition of somebody in a comatose situation," said Rep. Frank Attkisson, R-Kissimmee, after viewing the Web clips.

Such lay references to "comas" demonstrate the vexing nature of determining vegetative states. Comatose people's eyes are closed, but if their thinking functions remain, those people can be better off than people in true vegetative states.

Vegetative people may seem alert if their involuntary functions remain intact. They may blink, sleep, wake up, make sounds and flinch. They even may laugh, shed tears and utter random words. But the brain sections that control thought are gone. Most doctors agree that such patients have little or no awareness of self and surroundings, and will never improve.

Patricia Anderson, lawyer for the Schindlers, noted in court that doctors sometimes err. Some people tagged with the vegetative label later come out of it, including one patient who emerged after 22 months. His doctor? Minnesota neurologist Ronald Cranford, who testified that Terri Schiavo is a hopeless case.

Cranford acknowledged that misdiagnosis, saying he lacked the benefit of a brain CAT scan. Schiavo has undergone multiple scans, he said, and they show a decimated cerebral cortex, the thin brain coating that controls higher functions.

Radiologist William Maxfield, chosen by the Schindlers, testified that Schiavo's cerebral scans show improvement, but none of the other doctors supported him.

The Schindlers couldn't make their case with scans, or blood tests, or X-rays. They needed their daughter to perform. Her life depended on the doctors' exams and what four hours of video - taken as a whole - really show.What about that balloon?

"Hi. It's Mommy. Hi baby, how are you?"

Mary Schindler enters the hospice room and breaks the silence that surrounds her daughter. She kisses Terri, strokes her face and fluffs her pillow. Terri's face seems to brighten. Her blinking slows. She seems to stare at her mother. Her mouth opens, as if smiling.

Is this the "pure love" of a disabled soul, as Anderson contends? Has that familiar voice and tender breath on cheek pierced through Schiavo's shroud?

Probably so, the two Schindler doctors testified.

No way, said the two doctors picked by Michael Schiavo and the doctor picked by the judge.

"This is a reflex response," testified University of Florida neurologist Melvin Greer, not related to the judge. "The muscles of the facial area will react to sensory and auditory stimulation."

In court, the doubters contended that Dr. Cranford elicited a similar reaction when he touched and talked to Schiavo much like her mother had.

The videotape seems less conclusive. Schiavo makes a smile-like expression with Cranford, but it is less pronounced than the two incidents with her mother.

In another scene, not posted on the Web, Robert Schindler reminds his daughter of her "lazy eye" syndrome and how, when she was a girl, she would annoy her mother by purposely lolling her eye around.

Schiavo makes a sound a lay person might interpret as a laugh. Her noises get louder and louder until they exceed any other sound she makes during all four hours.

"You sound like an air raid siren," her father says. "Are you trying to tell me something?"

She also seems to laugh, after a 45-second delay, when her mother plays loud piano music next to her ear. On another occasion, she seems to laugh at no apparent stimulus.

"What you see," said lawyer Anderson, "is a human spirit very nearly crushed by the most unimaginable circumstances saying, "Here I am. Here I am. I like that balloon. I love my mother. I like piano music.' "

George Felos, Michael Schiavo's attorney, scoffed at the notion that a father's reminiscing prompted conscious laughter.

"If Terri has the ability to comprehend language and supposedly laugh and respond to the context of what she heard, then why doesn't Terri laugh when you say, "Terri, please laugh.' If she has the ability to comprehend language, why can't she follow a simple command" like blinking her eyes.

What about that balloon? The tapes indicate that her eyes followed it three times and failed to follow it twice. Cleveland neurologist Peter Bambakidis, appointed by the court to examine Terri, said the retina connects with regions of the brain that control involuntary reflexes. Her eyes follow things, he said, but she has no awareness of what she is seeing.

The single most dramatic moment occurred when William Hammesfahr, a Clearwater neurologist picked by the Schindlers, asked Schiavo to open her eyes.

At first, her eyelids barely flutter. She slowly turns her head toward Hammesfahr, gradually opening her eyes. Then her eyebrows lift into an exaggerated arch - the kind of face a cartoonist might draw to show astonishment.

A lay person could easily conclude that she somehow tapped into a latent reservoir of cognition, even if just for a second. Hammesfahr and her parents bubble with excitement.

"Good job!" the doctor exults. "Good job, young lady!"

But she never pulls it off again, or anything remotely like it. For nearly an hour, her parents and the doctor tell her to open her eyes, close her eyes, look this way, look that way - with little apparent response.

Judge Greer counted.

"By the court's count, (Hammesfahr) gave 105 commands to Terri Schiavo and, at his direction, Mrs. Schindler gave an additional six commands," Greer wrote. "He asked her 61 questions and Mrs. Schindler ... asked her an additional 11 questions. The court saw few actions that could be considered responsive to either those commands or those questions."

[linear]

For whatever reason, liberals want this woman to die.

[GovernmentShrinker]

If the clips are indeed misleading, Michael Schiavo has no one to blame but himself for the public's impressions. Nothing was stopping him from letting an independent party tape and publicize a long uninterrupted attempt by Terri's parents to spark responses from her. And if her parents truly believe she shows signs of response when stimulated like this, theu they'd have been happy to cooperate, so the whole world would know.

[pickyourpoison]

It seems the husband wants it. He got around a million dollars for her rehab, then remembered she didn't want to live. Nothin has been spent on rehab.

[Sloth]

Irrelevant. If she were lying there completely oblivious to any stimuli, it'd still be wrong to starve her to death.

[lilypad]

I sat in the court room while they were playing some of the tapes for Greer. At the time I thought he was just just uninterested because he was looking away. Then I heard later on the is legally blind!

[trussell]

"If Terri has the ability to comprehend language and supposedly laugh and respond to the context of what she heard, then why doesn't Terri laugh when you say, "Terri, please laugh.'

It is easier for me to laugh if I have found something to be funny. For someone to tell me to laugh, most often, I cannot force a convincing sounding laugh.

[trussell]

Ping

[jwalsh07]

It doesn't matter. I wacthed a woman on O'Reilly last week. She responded intermittently to her husband by blinking when she was diagnosed as PVS.

The Dr's did not believe her husband and ordered her feeding tube removed. The woman knew what they were talking about, knew what they were going to do and according to her the pain from the removal of food and water was excruciating. Torture was her exact word.

Her husband threatened everybody he could find with law suits and he eventually got the g-tube reinserted.

Last week on O'Reilly the woman told her own story. Think about it.

[skr]

"This is a reflex response," testified University of Florida neurologist Melvin Greer, not related to the judge. "The muscles of the facial area will react to sensory and auditory stimulation."

A brain will also respond to stimuli, unless it's dead. Mr. Schiavo has deliberately kept therapeutic stimulation, even on the most basic level, from Terri for over a decade.

[pc93]

Judge Greer counted.

"By the court's count, (Hammesfahr) gave 105 commands to Terri Schiavo and, at his direction, Mrs. Schindler gave an additional six commands," Greer wrote. "He asked her 61 questions and Mrs. Schindler ... asked her an additional 11 questions. The court saw few actions that could be considered responsive to either those commands or those questions."

Comments:

Florida Law says PVS is NO cognitve behaviour of ANY kind. Even the Judge acknowledges that she had a few actions that were!

FS765.101 Definitions; (11) "Living will" or "declaration" means: (a) A witnessed document in writing, voluntarily executed by the principal in accordance with s. 765.302; or (b) A witnessed oral statement made by the principal expressing the principal's instructions concerning life-prolonging procedures.

(12) "Persistent vegetative state" means a permanent and irreversible condition of unconsciousness in which there is: (a) The absence of voluntary action or cognitive behavior of any kind. (b) An inability to communicate or interact purposefully with the environment.

That's a) and b). Not or. She is not unconscious and showed a few voluntary or cognitive behaviours according to Judge Greer. That's not the same as NONE of ANY KIND>per the statute. In order to KILL her. Oh yeah, to *allow* her to die.

---

Key: ,. = etc.

The Terri Schindler Life Ribbon Campaign acts as a beacon pointing to Terri's plight. It also acts as lighthouse and gateway to others who already Realize and stand as Witness to Terri's inherent right to life and rehabilitation,. It is apparent that Michael Schiavo, George Felos, Deborah Bushnell and Co. must be bound by laws in order to be forced out of Terri's life. Let us continue to spread the word and take actions,. for Terri.

Juan Schoch
e-mail: pc93@bellsouth.net

Join the Terri Schindler Life Ribbon Campaign!

[windchime]

"Irrelevant. If she were lying there completely oblivious to any stimuli, it'd still be wrong to starve her to death."

Exactly!!

[cyn]

Hi, that's right. Her brother says he elicits a response from her -- lol, knowing brothers, he sure can.

Another factor -- Kate Adamson (the woman mentioned in post #9) said she was exhausted after blinking just a time or two in attempt to communicate her awareness. It's not as if it can be done totally "on command".

[cyn]

THANK YOU for being there, and for being here.

[Poohbah]

If the clips are indeed misleading, Michael Schiavo has no one to blame but himself for the public's impressions.

You mind telling me who's going to sit around while a four-hour-long video streams across the World Wide Wait?

[cyn]

YIKES -- just caught the very end of the MSNBC Abrams report about Terri. Caught last comments by Janie Weintraub. She's pro-death ['the courts have ruled, that's it, Terri should be allowed to die with dignity'] and firmly (somewhat angrily) stated that "we can't change the rules of the game" . We'll try to tape it when repeats at 2.

We know that is what Terri is in the "right to die" movement, just a pawn in their game.

[cyn]

That would be this woman:

Terri is capable of the same things she was capable of in the early 90's.
She was in a wheelchair then (upper photo, trip to mall salon) -- she should be in a wheelchair NOW.

For Terri . . .may angels seen and unseen continue to guard, protect, and strengthen you.

[lakey]

Thanks for the ping.

[cyn]

Terri should be no worse today, at least, than she was in 6/90 to 3/91, when these reports were made:

These are EXCERPTS -- please see PDF for original from friends of Terri website. Thanks to FL engineer, who found this!

Reports ‘transcribed’ to FreeRepublic

Physical Examination -- 6 - 27 - 90

*patient is awake, eyes are open
*easily startled to her name or when bedrail fell down
*significant amount of tone in the head and neck.
*severe hypertonicity of all four extremities; plantar flexor contractures, some shoulder limitation
*"again, tone is quite significant in all four extremities and difficult to achieve range of motion of the left hip and knee while she is in a supine position."
*she does give eye contact to family members
*she will close her eyes to any threatening response around her face and blink appropriately
*no verbal output during this exam but it has been reported by husband and other family members and therapists over at College Harbor.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Treatment Plan Review from Mediplex rehab, Bradenton, 1/29/91

*Vocalizing when prone in P.T. [physical therapy]
*Occasionally will say "STOP" to nursing during procedures.
*to TR [recreation?] groups. More relaxed to therapists voice, touch (habituation)

Thanks again to FL engineer, who found the PDF & posted it to FR. There's a lot of info posted here; may it be used to return Terri to her family.

[cyn]

http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/1018981/posts?page=14 (which also has link to original sound file)

This is an interesting interview -- I do not believe this former girlfriend from '93 or so could be making this part up about Michael's reports of his visits to Terri: "as soon as he got near the door, her head was already looking at the door, but that she would recognize his voice......and she would start crying when he got ready to leave."

Michael knows he has to hide the truth about Terri, which means he has to hide TERRI. She should be out in a wheelchair like she was in the picture above. That's just normal treatment for someone in her condition -- get her up in a chair! get her out! SHEESH!