NEW Neurosurgeon WAS at Terri's bedside Today--says Terri is misdiagnosed

CNN 5:PM PT Anderson Cooper on | 3/23/05 | gentlestrength

[gentlestrength]

The spiritual advisor of the Schindlers, Bro. O'Donnell, said the Dept. of Children and Families has had a new physician examine Terri and that "he DID go into her room and WAS at her side and DID observe her."

Department of Children and Families, are the department if someone is being physically abused, or the elderly, and "they have the authority" to take her into protective custody.

He continued, "what is being done to her now constitutes" that, and that DCF should "be taking her into protective custody."

Cooper: "Aren't people being taken off feeding tubes all the time?" Brother O'Donnell: "When they're DYING. But she was not dying. She could live another 20, 40 years."

"She's the only person who has been COURT ORDERED to have her tubes removed. Not 'The guardian MAY" but the guardian 'shall' remove her tubes."

CNN checked on the facticity of this last claim, and found that "There is ONLY ONE other case, Nancy Beth Cuzan in which the court ordered the tube MUST be removed."

Dr.Sanjay Gupta says if Terri is in the minimally conscious state, her eyes open spontaneously. She must do one of the following: --follow simple commands (to show she can hear and understand) --give yes or no responses

[samantha]

I hope you do not take this personally,but you are starting to sound like TLBSHOW. Just my observation.

[Axenolith]

If one granted that this was right and true (from a devils advocate standpoint), why starve her? You'd have people up in arms over it if you were starving an amoeba. This is crap. If her cognitive state is no better than a crab, sea cucumber etc... If the word is to put her to death, then someone on the death side should get some balls and start advocating squirting her full of Potassium Chloride or putting a bullet in her head. But Nooooo... even the pro-death side is a little leary of helping this "vegetable" along in to the dark night.

And you know why? It's because most on the death side have this little nagging doubt in the backs of their mind and fear that step up to the judgement podium and the Lord asking you what the heck you thought you were doing. So you scurry over to the tube removal side and the relative mental comfort of having had "nature" take its course. I got news for you, God will see through that obfuscation like wet onion paper.

Come on and step up to the plate, argue she should be put to sleep, it's the "humane" thing to do...

[absalom01]

First, thanks for posting all of these links in one place. It helps a great deal in terms of understanding where folks are coming from.

And let's stipulate that the diagnosis of PVS is correct, just to avoid that argument, and further stipulate that Michael Shiavo is acting in what he believes is his wife's interest. And let's even stipulate that her cognitive function will never improve. Granting all that, does it logically follow that it is ethical to kill such a person?

It seems that the argument that demands Terri's death by starvation hinges on a "quality of life" assessment. IE, somehow, while we weren't looking, the law has come to say that it's OK to kill someone if their quality of life falls below some standard -- in this case, a diagnosis of PVS. That seems to strike some thoughtful people as more than a little bit troublesome. In the real world, the "slippery slope" is not always a fallacy.

The undisputed facts are that Terri has no terminal illness, is not in pain, and did not leave a written living will. The remaining layers of conspiracy theory, speculation, and legal wrangling really aren't essential to the core assessment of whether she should be allowed to live, or be killed.

I don't gather from the uproar that FReepers are seriously alleging that the order to kill her is unlawful, but that it is evidence that the law has become seriously unmoored from morality.

[AaronInCarolina]

Yes, and the affidavit by Dr. Cheshire does a pretty complete if brief review of the literature on fMRI/PET findings that distinguish PVS from Minimal Consciousness. CAT, purely a structural view, shows the presence of cerebral cortex. At issue is functionality, and CAT tells you nothing about that.

fMRI is apparently a fairly recent technology. I know it goes back as far as 2003 (one of the papers I read was dated 2003) but much more recent publications have surface including the one by Dr. Joy Hirsch and Dr. Giacina published in Neurology. Their findings were stunning call into question a great deal of conventional thinking about severely brain damaged patients and what their remaining function is. If nothing else, it points out the arrogance of doctors who think that they are infallible and know all there is to know about severe brain damage capabilities. Why should not Terri Schiavo have this modern examination?

[workerbee]

No, I think for Michael Schiavo this long ago became just a matter of ego and pure winning. How else can you explain his refusal to allow Terri the comfort of her parents' presence, her religious beliefs, even the very sunlight in her room? For him I think all this is as much about torturing her parents as it is about torturing her.

[Paul C. Jesup]

POST 151 LISTING JUDGE Greer's money ties NEEDS IT'S OWN THREAD ASAP!!

[green pastures]

I had posted this on another thread... Non-ferrous metal is not a problem in an MRI, from the standpoint of patient injury (i.e., the magnets pulling the metal right out of the patient). Non-ferrous metal can, however, cause some interference to the resulting images.

I have a titanium plate in my neck. I did have an MRI following the surgery, but I ended up having to have a different radiographic procedure done because the titanium did interfere with the quality of the images.

An aside to Osage Orange-- you wrote "Most orthopedic implants, even though they may be ferromagnetic, are fine because they are firmly embedded in bone. "

My sister and I just had a conversation about this the other night. Most orthopedic implants are non-ferrous. The impression I got from my sister (works in medical imaging) is that while ferrous metals attached to bone wouldn't get pulled out of the body, it might pull the part of the body that's attached to the metal to the MRI magnet-- at a rather high rate of speed.

But, it was rather late when we had that conversation, so maybe I am not re-calling it correctly...

[Petronski]

Not what I said at all.

Report and/or believe whatever you want. But understand, those things you report and/or believe indicate a lot about YOU and YOUR VALUES.

[GopherIt]

>If she has any cognitive thoughts, I would actually feel worse if it were my wife in that situation.

Well said. A caller today (I think to Rush) expressed sentiments very similar to yours. Then he added, (paraphrase) "but she was, is, and always will be the child of her parents. We are a family and I love them. So if they came to me and said 'Don't do it, let her live and we'll take care of her' I know I would defer to them."

My wife and I discussed this at some length, because I told her I agree with that. Unfortunately, that option is moot, since they have passed away already.

Unfortunately too, that family has been destroyed; that we do know.

[Gosh I love this neighborhood]

Thanks for telling me this. I feel so stupid. I've been reading about Terri for a couple years and did not know that Florida has a law permitting euthanasia. That sure is a good reason not to live there.

[varon]

What does Judge Greer personally gain by Terri being murdered?

He proves that no one pisses in his punch.

[Cboldt]

I don't find the physician's statement surprising at all.

http://www.nationalreview.com/pdf/Affidavit.pdf <-- March 23, 2005 Neurologist

Read it for yourself instead of taking ABC's word for it.

[PhilDragoo]

[gentlestrength]

Prince Ranier of Morocco has been put on a ventilator today.

Terri is not on a ventilator, yet they want to murder her.

Will they murder the Prince, too?

[workerbee]

If the word is to put her to death, then someone on the death side should get some balls and start advocating squirting her full of Potassium Chloride or putting a bullet in her head. But Nooooo... even the pro-death side is a little leary of helping this "vegetable" along in to the dark night.

Oh, but they will, Axenolith. This is just their big test case. Very, very soon we are going to witness a case in which Terri's death is cited as how we should not kill people -- oh, how much better it is, they will opine, to simply put them to sleep. I have already seen statements on this very board saying just that. For the Death Cult this is merely the stepping stone to wholesale marketing of "peaceful and responsible" death.

[Petronski]

Even if a ferrous-metal object is not pulled from the body at a high rate of speed, I imagine it might be given to high-speed oscillations/vibrations and/or some type of heating; either of which would play hell with the surrounding tissue.

I invite correction, but it is my belief that any implant of ferrous metal must be removed prior to an MRI.

[ptrey]

If Greer held DCF in conyempt couldn't Jeb at least counteract with a pardon for them????

[Miss Marple]

I am beginning to think that your photo montage is pretty close to the truth.

[Cboldt]

You should read the affidavit for yourself. The ABC characterization is really misleading, I'm surprised it is pedaled as honestly representative.

http://www.nationalreview.com/pdf/Affidavit.pdf <-- March 23, 2005 Neurologist

[Miss Behave]

Trust but verify wrote:

"Well, what kind of doctor makes a diagnosis after spending 90 minutes with a patient?"

And kcvl wrote:

"That's 45 minutes more than the doctor who Greer used to say that Terri was pvs, who I might add is also in the death movement with Felos. He even claimed that people who were pvs didn't have any constitutional rights last night on Hannity & Colmes."

Yes, kcvl. This Mayo Neurologist spent at least 30 minutes more than the doctor whose word of PVS, PVS, PVS, bla, bla, bla, is taken as GOSPEL by those condoning Terri's starvation and Terri's "husband" who can't [wait for "the b*tch" to die.]