Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Schiavo Videotape Misleading, Experts Say
Reuters ^ | 3.23.05

Posted on 03/23/2005 2:19:08 PM PST by ambrose

Schiavo Videotape Misleading, Experts Say

Wed Mar 23, 2005 10:06 PM GMT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The videotape that runs endlessly on television stations around the world shows an apparently smiling Terri Schiavo being caressed by her mother's loving hand.

She seems to look deeply, even lovingly, into the off-camera eyes of her mother.

Schiavo's parents and their supporters, including doctors in Congress, have used the tape as evidence the 41-year-old brain-damaged woman is at least occasionally aware of her surroundings and might even be revived from her condition.

They are fighting to get her feeding tube reinserted against the wishes of her husband and legal guardian who says Schiavo would not want to be kept alive in that condition.

But many experts agree the tape is a cruelly misleading trick of biology.

"Pictures do lie," said Dr. Lawrence Schneiderman, a physician and bioethicist at the University of California, San Diego.

"Every time they have done a videotaped neurological examination, the courts have reviewed them and said, 'Yes this woman is unconscious.' Those movements of her eyeballs are reflexive and have nothing to do with recognition."

Studies of people whose cerebral cortices are damaged in the way Schiavo's is show that their eyes will respond to stimuli such as movement or a human face, but there is no way for them to be conscious of what they are seeing.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who has been part of the fight to prolong Schiavo's life, said on Wednesday a review of Schiavo's medical records by a neurologist for Florida's Adult Protective Services indicated she may have been misdiagnosed and was more likely in a state of minimal consciousness rather than in a persistent vegetative state.

Such a condition, in which a patient slips in and out of consciousness, was sometimes mistaken for a persistent vegetative state, said Dr. Joseph Fins of New York Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center. But Schiavo was not in that state, Fins said.

"I think now it can be argued that with the advent of minimally conscious state (as a diagnosis), that permanent vegetative state as a diagnosis becomes much more certain," Fins said in a telephone interview.

It is almost certain that when someone suffers brain damage from a lack of oxygen, they are permanently vegetative, Fins said. Schiavo's brain was starved of oxygen after her heart stopped 15 years ago and most doctors who have examined her say there is no chance of recovery.

'UNNERVING PHENOMENON'

Dr. Ronald Cranford, a neurologist and bioethicist at the University of Minnesota Medical School, said reflexes can fool nonspecialists.

"To the families and loved ones, and to inexperienced health care professionals, PVS (permanent vegetative state) patients often look fairly 'normal,"' Cranford said in a statement.

"Their eyes are open and moving about during the periods of wakefulness that alternate with periods of sleep; there may be spontaneous movements of the arms and legs, and at times these patients appear to smile, grimace, laugh, utter guttural sounds, groan and moan, and manifest other facial expressions and sounds that appear to reflect cognitive functions and emotions, especially in the eyes of the family."

Dr. Timothy Quill of the Center for Palliative Care and Clinical Ethics at the University of Rochester in New York, said reporting about the case had confused people.

"Distortion by interest groups, media hyperbole, and manipulative use of videotape have characterized this case and demonstrate what can happen when a patient becomes more a precedent-setting symbol than a unique human being," Quill wrote in a commentary published on Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.

"Anybody who been around patients in a persistent vegetative state knows that it is an unnerving phenomenon because they are alternate between sleep and wakefulness but that have no ability to interact," Quill said in a telephone interview.

"It is difficult for families because it is very difficult to discern that."


TOPICS: Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: cultureofdeath; expertssay; msp; reuters; schiavo; terri; terrischiavo; terrisfight; terrisfightorg
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 61-8081-100101-120 ... 141-150 next last
To: ambrose
If I show you a video of someone pointing his dog to a pile of shaggy grass on a golf course, asking "what's that?" - and the dog responds "ruff!"... What does that prove?

It proves that what is on the videotape is alive rather than a "vegetable". Like I said.

Are we going to go through every joke of this sort? ;-)

81 posted on 03/23/2005 2:53:37 PM PST by Dr. Frank fan
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 80 | View Replies]

To: ambrose
This from the same wing of the MSM that tried ( and failed ) to convince us a few months ago that the Howard Dean "scream" never happened. This story sounds just as lame.
82 posted on 03/23/2005 2:54:39 PM PST by Hillarys Gate Cult (Pray for Terri Schiavo)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: northernlightsII
Look at the statement by Cranford, look at all the behaviors he dismisses, opening closing eyes.turning head,smilimg laughing,moving parts of the body,making sounds even words sounding. But this is nothing,just confusion for the family. THat guy is dangerous. It has occurred to me what his agenda is.

This is Cranford's objective:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1368567/posts

Cranford is a member of the board of directors of the Choice in Dying Society, which promotes doctor-assisted suicide and euthanasia.

In 1997, Cranford wrote an opinion piece in the Minneapolis Star Tribune titled: "When a feeding tube borders on barbaric."

83 posted on 03/23/2005 2:55:54 PM PST by thecabal
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 63 | View Replies]

To: JFC

CAll ASAP! TIME IS AN ISSUE!!! THey are logging calls.

Contact info for DCF

Lucy D. Hadi, Secretary 1317 Winewood Blvd.
Building 1, Room 202
Tallahassee, Florida
32399-0700

Phone: (850) 487-1111

*****Thanks for posting this info and number...I just called...they were very friendly.*****


84 posted on 03/23/2005 2:56:17 PM PST by Lady Eileen (It's legal to murder innocent babies...now the disabled...who will be next. May God save TERRI.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 73 | View Replies]

To: madprof98

I think it's safe to say the conservatives on the side of allowing Terri food and water are social conservatives. On FR, they seem to be the majority. I honestly don't know how the final outcome of this case will affect how social conservatives will vote. Guess it'll depend on how they rate the sincerity of the Republicans' reactions.


85 posted on 03/23/2005 2:57:00 PM PST by k2blader (It is neither compassionate nor conservative to support the expansion of socialism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 75 | View Replies]

To: ambrose
Can anybody ever make the argument that starving Terri to death is a good and honorable thing?

Have the courts really followed the LAW? (BTW, NO ONE has yet to explain what LAW the courts are upholding!)

All you people that bitch, moan, and worry about your PRIVACY rights because of the PA pales in comparison to the friggin' courts ordering death by starvation of an innocent person just because of the HEARSAY testimony of a money grubbing PRICK...

The COD has truly arrived...

Hells Bells, there's been revolutions for things much more insignificant than this. We've gotten way to comfortable in our greed and selfishness, let's just continue to sit on our fat asses and do nothing!

Bye, Bye America!

86 posted on 03/23/2005 2:57:17 PM PST by sirchtruth (Words Mean Things...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: dfwgator

How do you know we DON'T know the truth? Are we going to know it when we hear it? Who gets to determine what the truth is? The judge thinks after presiding over this case and having all the evidence presented that he has the truth. Do you see where I'm going with this?


87 posted on 03/23/2005 2:57:21 PM PST by Trust but Verify (Pull up a chair and watch history being made.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 57 | View Replies]

To: deadhead

Thanks for posting that picture.


88 posted on 03/23/2005 2:57:54 PM PST by Lady Eileen (It's legal to murder innocent babies...now the disabled...who will be next. May God save TERRI.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 60 | View Replies]

To: sirchtruth

Are you prepared to tell thousands, probably tens of thousands of people who have made the decision to withdraw nourishment for themselves or relatives that their actions weren't good or honorable?


89 posted on 03/23/2005 2:59:22 PM PST by Trust but Verify (Pull up a chair and watch history being made.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 86 | View Replies]

To: Hillarys Gate Cult

"This from the same wing of the MSM that tried ( and failed ) to convince us a few months ago that the Howard Dean "scream" never happened"

Uh really!! I seem to remember ALL media outlets playing the scream over and over and over ad nauseum


90 posted on 03/23/2005 2:59:39 PM PST by Ignatius J Reilly
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 82 | View Replies]

To: Aussie Dasher
they can diagnose a patient without having ever actually met them!

Sounds like about a dozen people on this thread.
91 posted on 03/23/2005 3:00:27 PM PST by HostileTerritory
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 61 | View Replies]

To: northernlightsII
I wouldn't have believed it if I didn't hear those words from that doctor's own mouth because I didn't believe anyone could be so cruel. But yes, he said it.

Expect to hear that doctor "clarify" what he said on later talk show appearances ( if he's smart he will quit while he's behind ). He'll tell us just because he said it, it wasn't what he meant. Yea. Sure. Right.

If I was on the fence about who was right, this doctor would have knocked me over to Terri's side.

92 posted on 03/23/2005 3:02:48 PM PST by Hillarys Gate Cult (Pray for Terri Schiavo)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 78 | View Replies]

To: Trust but Verify
I did read the story, actually. Sorry for the slant of my comment. It’s all in the material one decides to select, isn't it? Here’s what bothers me:

All four of these physicians agree, yet other physicians and health care professionals have expressed less certainty - even contradicted the “experts”.

"Pictures do lie," said Dr. Lawrence Schneiderman, a physician and bioethicist at the University of California, San Diego

Michael Schiavo has allowed no pictures to be taken for 4 years. So which pictures are lying, and to whom? And how is it that all the information provided by the attending nurses has been left out of your post?

Dr. Timothy Quill of the Center for Palliative Care and Clinical Ethics at the University of Rochester in New York, said reporting about the case had confused people.

So what? The issue of her PVS is still very much up in the air.

Whether or not Terry Schiavo is actually in a persistent vegetative state has by no means been decided.

"Anybody who been around patients in a persistent vegetative state knows that it is an unnerving phenomenon because they are alternate between sleep and wakefulness but that have no ability to interact," Quill said in a telephone interview.

Oh, really? Anyone??? All the reports I’m reading indicate considerable responses.

"To the families and loved ones, and to inexperienced health care professionals, PVS (permanent vegetative state) patients often look fairly 'normal,"' Cranford said in a statement.

How utterly patronizing and patrician.

Long story short, here, a one-sided series of “expert” quotes does not do anything to enlighten the issue.

I can’t help but suspect that people who are so willing to ignore even the possibility that Terry’s parents see their daughter and not some vegetable indicates a sad lack of knowledge about UNCONDITIONAL LOVE - and God’s mercy and grace. May he have such on those of you so willing to deprive her of her life.

93 posted on 03/23/2005 3:02:51 PM PST by steenkeenbadges
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 29 | View Replies]

To: Trust but Verify

What's the harm in keeping her alive? If they say that she won't suffer during the starvation, then she isn't suffering with the feeding tube. Before they put criminals to death, first, they must be found guilty beyond reasonable doubt, then go through endless appeals. Why is that? Because there is the possibility that there was a mistake in the legal process. Now with Terri, it's double-edged. Not only is her life in the hands of medical "experts", but legal "experts" as well. That only compounds the possibility that somewhere, there was a mistake.


94 posted on 03/23/2005 3:03:23 PM PST by dfwgator (It's sad that the news media treats Michael Jackson better than our military.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 87 | View Replies]

To: HostileTerritory

"Sounds like about a dozen people on this thread."

Sounds like MOST people on all the Terri threads, on both sides of the issue. I for one would like to see CAT/MRI scan to see if there really is any brain function.


95 posted on 03/23/2005 3:03:27 PM PST by Ignatius J Reilly
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 91 | View Replies]

To: Trust but Verify

There's no proof that Terri did that. Only the word of a philanderer who stands to gain from her death and his brother. Will those thousands of people write their wishes down?


96 posted on 03/23/2005 3:04:02 PM PST by monkeywrench
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 89 | View Replies]

To: HostileTerritory
Just announced on Radio: A Judge (unamed) in Florida just ruled that the Department of Child and Family Services is not allowed to intervene in this Schiavo case.
97 posted on 03/23/2005 3:04:49 PM PST by Rudder
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 91 | View Replies]

To: Trust but Verify
Are you prepared to tell thousands, probably tens of thousands of people who have made the decision to withdraw nourishment for themselves or relatives that their actions weren't good or honorable?

If they act like Michael Schiavo, unquestionably.

98 posted on 03/23/2005 3:04:52 PM PST by Sloth (I don't post a lot of the threads you read; I make a lot of the threads you read better.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 89 | View Replies]

To: Ignatius J Reilly
Have you seen that particular video? It's extremely compelling. Take a look. The doctor (one of Michael's by the way) making the request is quite tickled by her response.
99 posted on 03/23/2005 3:04:56 PM PST by agrace
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 50 | View Replies]

To: isthisnickcool
Someone that has PVS. [Gore]

No, he's got Dutch Elm disease.

100 posted on 03/23/2005 3:05:22 PM PST by rustbucket
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 61-8081-100101-120 ... 141-150 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson