Please understand, I appear to be the only freeper that hasn't been following this cases in detail. Thus, I am not sure as to who is right in this situation.
However, there is one thing that disturbs me greatly. I don't understand, from what I've read and seen, why Terri is considered to be in a vegetative state if she can respond to stimuli. From what I've read, she appears to respond to those around her. She appears to be able to eat, to some degree, if fed by hand. Although she is obviously severely brained damaged, she appears to be acting in a concise manner at times.
If this is true, how can the courts dismiss this behavior if there is any question in regard to it representing a feeling cognitive person? How can any physician, dismiss these actions as non-voluntary?
As for my brother, before he passed, he did open his eyes and make noises. However, he never focused on those around him, never responded to verbal requests, and never showed any response indicating he was conscious.
The doctors described his behaviors as actions directed from the brain stem; they stated the cognitive part of his brain was showing no signs of life.
Given this, shouldn't''t it be easy for Terri's physicians to measure the brain pattern reactions to external stimuli. I may be trivializing this matter greatly, but it sounds fairly easy to prove if she is showing any signs of conscious behavior.
I don't understand, from what I've read and seen, why Terri is considered to be in a vegetative state if she can respond to stimuli. From what I've read, she appears to respond to those around her. She appears to be able to eat, to some degree, if fed by hand. Although she is obviously severely brained damaged, she appears to be acting in a concise manner at times.
If this is true, how can the courts dismiss this behavior if there is any question in regard to it representing a feeling cognitive person? How can any physician, dismiss these actions as non-voluntary?
She can't eat and doesn't respond to others around her. She does respond to stimuli, like loud noises, but that's an involuntary action. Here's what one of the doctors said who testified at the trial:
After Judge Greer made this ruling stating unequivocally that Terri was in a persistent vegetative state and found clear and convincing evidence of Terri’s wishes in this situation, the Schindlers appealed to the Florida court of appeals. As part of their appeal, the Schindler family submitted a 113-second videotape, accompanied by multiple affidavits from various health care professionals saying patient was not in a vegetative state. Because of these videotapes, and notwithstanding the previous definitive ruling by the trial court judge on Terri’s neurological condition and chances for recovery, the court of appeals ordered the trial court to conduct an extremely thorough evidentiary hearing, the most complex evidentiary process in over three decades of landmark right to die court cases. Many of these affidavits contain the completely erroneous assertion that Terri’s ability to handle her own secretions was incompatible with the vegetative state. None of these medical professionals (including internists, rehabilitationists, speech pathologists, and others) who submitted these multiple sets of affidavits over the years at the behest of the Schindlers, had ever personally examined the patient, reviewed the medical records in any detail, considered the medical opinions of the consulting neurologists, nor looked at the CT scans or EEG’s. They instead relied on the brief videotapes showing Terri apparently interacting with her parents and noting that Terri could handle her own secretions. A few of these medical professionals did go to the bedside with the Schindler family to make observations about Terri’s apparent interactions with her family but none performed a complete neurological examination. All the videotapes released by the Schindlers to the media that I have seen are not only entirely consistent with the vegetative state but also, to the trained eye of any doctor experienced in the diagnosis of the vegetative state and related conditions, are completely compatible with the fact that Terri is in a vegetative state. For example, if one looks at Terri’s eyes closely during these videotapes, it is reasonably evident that she does not sustained visual pursuit, nor visual fixation, even when the mother is directly in front of the patient and Terri apparently “smiling” at her mother. Sustained visual pursuit (visual tracking) is almost always the cardinal feature distinguishing patients in a vegetative state from those with any degree of cognitive functioning. And the first sign of evolving from the vegetative state to a higher level of cognitive functioning, e.g. the minimally conscious state, is almost invariably the presence of sustained visual pursuit on a consistent, sustained, and reproducible basis, a physical finding that Terri Schiavo has never demonstrated.
Also...
These presumed neurological facts and assertions by the Schindler family, their lawyer, Pat Anderson, and others about Terri’s neurological condition are all completely and categorically false, with one exception. Patients in a vegetative state usually retain an intact swallowing reflex and thus can swallow to some degree in an involuntary, reflex fashion. Swallowing tests performed on Terri Schiavo in 1990, 1991, and 1992 all showed severe oropharyngeal dysphagia, compatible with the vegetative state. No further swallowing tests were ever performed again in her subsequent clinical course, since Terri Schiavo never improved, and there was no valid reason for believing these swallowing tests would be any different today than they were over 10 years ago. Thus, Terri Schiavo does have the ability to swallow, like most other patients in a vegetative state, but only in a reflex fashion. The majority of adult patients in a permanent vegetative state, like Terri Schiavo, are given nutrition and hydration by a PEG tube placed in the stomach through the abdominal wall. This form of medical treatment is the safest and most effective way of supplying long term nutrition and hydration to an unconscious patient. (29)
It is possible (but highly unlikely) that, with a great deal of attention and care, and an understanding of how to optimize swallowing by using the involuntary swallowing reflex, Terri’s nutritional and hydration needs could be maintained by the oral route (as is the case in many children in a permanent vegetative state, where parents and health care professionals spend many hours at the bedside feeding these children by mouth by utilizing the involuntary swallowing reflex). But such an undertaking is medically inadvisable, as it would greatly increase the risk of aspiration pneumonia and death.
The overwhelming fact is that, whether Terri is fed via a PEG tube or fed orally, she is still in a permanent vegetative state, and the manner of feeding her will not result in any change in her clinical condition, except she would probably die much sooner were attempts made to feed her orally. So further swallowing tests would be totally meaningless in terms of the ultimate outcome of Terri’s neurological condition and state of consciousness.
Reference