Actually, this may not be true.
Please the study that I posted several weeks ago regarding recent research into the brain activity of those in a PVS.
I did notice that in the portion you posted that it was said that the patient involved could respond to commands at some times. Based on that I would be very surprised if the patient was diagnosed as in a persistent vegetative state. Virtually all of the articles that have been posted to these threads that claim that patients have "returned" after a number of years have shown that they were not diagnosed as being in a PVS, but in a quasi vegetative state, or partial vegetative state, or in coma or deep coma. Usually this discrepancy is attributible to the lay-author or sometime to a family member or friend. Othertimes it has been a deliberate mistatement by someone out to try to prove a point.
I noticed the reference to "four years" in the first paragraph. If this is the period of first injury until some sort of recovery on the part of this patient, I would point out that four years duration is far short of the more than thirteen years that Terri has been in PVS.
"Actually, this may not be true".
Are you intimating that I made up this statement? It is taken directly from the Second DCA's published opinion.
Further, there was another hearing held in the circuit court where this very fact was re-visited. New scans were obtained which again revealed this condition. All of the experts agreed that Terri had suffered extensive and irreparible damage to her cerebral cortex. The only debate between the expert's, including those brought forward by the Schindlers', was whether she has a small amount of isolated living tissue in her cerebral cortex or whether she has no living tissue in her cerebral cortex. This was again affirmed by the appellate court.
Additionally, in what I would agree was bad taste, one of the frames of Terri's brain scan that was presented in court, was exhibited on the Larry King show. This clearly showed a void in Terri's skull where her cerebral cortex should have been.
I don't think there is any medical doctor anywhere that would say that one can recover from a loss of the cerebral cortex.