From your previous link about Chris Barnes, I found an encouraging entry. Chris eating and feeding. Patients are routinely made dependent on feeding tubes, only to have those feeding tubes suddenly removed, causing death. Chris' wife is doing what she can to break his dependence on the feeding tube.
I came across his case because the his wife, Koo Cho, had an interview with Mark Ragucci, the recovered "pvs" patient. That poor, dear woman, she has done so much; may God give her strength. And may her husband make some real medical progress. There are so many promising new research leads and therapies, I do hope something will make him better.
>>Doctors often make minimal efforts to save the lives of advanced stroke victims, especially those who are days or weeks into a coma. They often see the prospects of survival as low and question the value of saving a life that they expect, in the best case, to be severely constrained by mental and physical damage.
>>Now proponents of neurointensive care are challenging these assumptions. They say many of the studies underlying the earlier consensus are out of date, and they believe newer treatments such as one designed to cool the brain may help stroke patients in comas. "Doctors are telling people there's no hope when, in fact, there is," says Dr. Mayer.
>>Dr. Ragucci, who is now at 35 back to practicing rehabilitation medicine, says he was somewhat conscious even when his doctors perceived no brain activity, and it bothered him to hear nurses and doctors referring to him in the past tense. "Somebody has to realize that you're in there," he says. "Just because you can't move doesn't mean there's not somebody in there."