Posted on 03/29/2005 9:45:05 PM PST by flixxx
TRANSCRIPT Updated: 4:04 p.m. ET March 29, 2005 The overwhelming majority in the medical community say Terri Schiavo has close to no brain activity and has no chance of regaining awareness. Dr. Ronald Cranford, who actually examined Terri Schiavo in 2002 and testified to her condition, joined "The Abrams Report" on Monday. Cranford is the assistant chief of neurology at the Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis as well as a faculty member at the University of Minnesota's Center for Bioethics. Below is the transcript of their conversation.
DAN ABRAMS, HOST: You're one of the few people who has actually examined Terri Schiavo and you're hearing all of these people who are coming on from the sidelines saying, "She's has been misdiagnosed," et cetera. How confident are you in your diagnosis and why?
DR. RONALD CRANFORD, UNIV. OF MN NEUROLOGIST: I'm extremely confident. I think at the time of the trial in 2002 there had been eight neurologists who examined her. And of those eight neurologists total, seven of them said beyond any doubt whatsoever Terri is in a vegetative state. Her CT scan shows severe atrophy or shrinkage of the brain. Her EEG is flat and there's absolutely no doubt that she's been in a permanent vegetative state ever since 1990. There's no doubt whatsoever, Dan.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
Cute little game, but your questions do not pertain to me. I would not make any kind of determination based on this scan.
All I said was that the scan clearly shows significant brain injury.
Maybe it's not Terri's scan. Most likely it is though.
Read the links on Trinity_Tx's homepage and get back to me.
I don't think she was not fed or hydrated orally because MICHAEL didn't want her to. That would be a decision for a doctor to make.
If the above is true, then this is being missrepresented.
But Hannity reviewed it all also and said there seems to be lots of evidence the court is ignoring.
I thought everyone was saying the CT scans were not taken?
Terri's scan shows much more damage. Look outside of the dark areas.
Truly, I'm not trying to bait you.
And it was you, not me, that put the focus on the CAT scan. Maybe that wasn't the only evidence you relied on, but is sure was THE ONLY THING YOU BOTHERED TO MENTIONED.
And putting people down on the basis of such a scan is exactly what I characterized it as - an execution.
Sorry, but if the shoe fits, you must wear it.
"Did you look at the scan? Can't you see the atrophy?"
Please don't ever, ever look at my CT scan. You would surely call me PVS and try to starve me. I'd post it if I could and you'd see a huge area of my brain filled with spinal fluid where they removed my right temporal lobe and then some. You'd deny that I am fully functioning and suffer no deficite. You can't make a diagnosis of a patient based on one cat scan. Any doctor who did would be an idiot. So pointing to a cat scan and saying SEE is stupid. EEG's are also wrong or inconclusive 90% of the time. I had epilepsy for 17 years and they never once showed any abnormality. I guess I was fine hu? This doctor obviously cares more about his euthanasia politics than the value of a human life. There are doctors on both sides of this and you CHOOSE to believe the people that say kill her no matter what the chances are that they are wrong or politically motivated. If only people could sit by her bed and listen to her moan (nurses have reported she does this, hence the morphine), and see the sores open up on her body, smell the festering wounds, and watch it for WEEKS. I'm leaving the Republican party. They're just as robotlike as the DUmmies. No matter what, they sing the praises of their party and believe anything in order to defend them. States rights, they scream. Conveniently forgetting that slavery was also a states rights issue. A bunch of sheeple. Registering as an Independent and burning my CT scans lest some idiot post them on FR and clame I'm brain dead.
Uh, that's what I said. These decisions are legally Michael Schiavo's to make.
Oh certainly, I want my body to continue living on even though my cerebral cortex is now a combination of liquid and scar tissue. It would teach the world such a positive lesson
Obviously, it's lost on me because I find this matter ghoulish in the extreme.
All I said was that the scan showed significant atrophy.
You are mistaken and confused.
CT scans were done, as all admit. But they are not a reliable diagnostic tool, and need to be supplemented by an MRI scan or PET scan. There is a technical reason why an MRI couldn't be done on Terri, but that problem could have been overcome. A PET scan might involve travel, as it is doubtful that the equipment is avialable near her location.
Please don't mix up these different diagnostic tools.
You may respect him -I do not!
For a patient to "pass" a swallow test, doctors have to conclude that there is not any significant likelihood of aspiration. Failing a swallow test doesn't mean there's a zero percent chance oral feeding would be successful; it merely means that oral feeding wouln't be worth the risk given the availability of safer alternatives. Even a 10% risk would outweigh a 90% probability of success if safer alternatives were available. In the absense of such alternatives, though, even a 95% probability of aspiration and a 2% probability of success should not disqualify the attempt.
If I may use a crude analogy, would it make sense for a pilot to attempt to land a jetliner without using the rudder, elevators, or ailerons--relying entirely upon varying thrust to control the aircraft? A pilot who attempted such a thing in any normal circumstance would be soundly condemned, and rightly so. Under any normal circumstance, the risks involved with such a landing would be completely unjustifiable. But in a case where a plane (DC-10 I think) suffered critical failure on all three hydraulic systems, a test pilot who happened to be on board was able to control the plane by precisely that method, and was able to land well enough to save many of the passengers.
Would you suggest that the captain of the aircraft should have refused to let the test pilot attempt to fly it, on the basis that such a crazy method of controlling an aircraft was exceptionally dangerous?
Giving you the benefit of the doubt, I would have to suggest that you have some of your cerebral cortex remaining.
And I agreed.
Your point being that you really didn't mean anything by it? In the context of how the comment was made, I don't buy it.
You've got to be kidding me. After three failed attempts, had they forced another swallow test and her body aspirated the liquid, they'd face a possible malpractice suit.
What about straws and baby bottles? What about elderly who have to be spoonfed?
BTW, your opinion that feeding tubes are equivalent to ventilators is a feeble, fact-free opinion.
What you should be doing is questioning yourself as to why you are so anxious to allow disabled people to be starved/dehydrated to death.
No, you are wrong. I would know exactly what was going on if I saw your scan. I've seen that before.
I didn't diagnose Terri. All I said was that the scan shows significant atrophy.
That is as easy as looking at your scan and noticing that your right temporal lobe was gone.
I have also not made any judgment about the issue of whether she should be starved to death or not.
You will also not find any of my posts that are in defense of any political party. That crap is in your mind.
Why should I care if you leave the republican party? That is your decision.
Thanks, that explains the complaints then, thanks.
You make my point for me. She failed the tests not because there was zero probability of success, but because there was non-zero probability of harmful failure. That she failed the tests three times does not in any way imply that there would have been a zero percent chance of her taking food by mouth. Rather that, as long as safer methods of feeding were available, oral feeding wasn't worth the risk.
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