Posted on 06/15/2005 12:27:19 PM PDT by veronica
(1st Add: Includes comments from George Felos, Michael Schiavo's attorney.)
(CNSNews.com) - Terri Schiavo's body did not show any signs of trauma or other criminal activity that would explain her brain injury, nor was there evidence to support previous diagnoses of a heart attack or an eating disorder, the Florida medical examiner who conducted her autopsy said Wednesday. A representative of Terri's family complimented the report, but said it still leaves many questions unanswered.
"She died of dehydration," Dr. Jon Thogmartin, the Florida medical examiner for Pinellas and Pasco counties said, noting that the official cause of death would be listed as "complications of anoxic encephalopathy."
"That's the only diagnosis that I know for sure, is that her brain went without oxygen," he added. "Why? That is undetermined."
George Felos - attorney for Terri's husband, Michael Schiavo - said the report confirms what he has argued all along.
"The courts have found that there was no abuse of Terri, no evidence of abuse, and that's what the medical examiner found," Felos said.
Terri Schiavo collapsed under unknown circumstances in 1990. Michael Schiavo was awarded nearly $2 million in judgments and settlements in a medical malpractice lawsuit claiming that the collapse was caused by a heart attack triggered by a potassium imbalance, caused by an undiagnosed eating disorder, bulimia nervosa. Thogmartin challenged that determination.
"No one observed Mrs. Schiavo taking diet pills, binging and purging or consuming laxatives and she apparently never confessed to her family or friends about having an eating disorder," Thogmartin found. "Furthermore, many other signs of bulimia nervosa were not reported to be present."
Terri was "heavy" as a teenager, according to Thogmartin, and had lost more than 100 pounds after graduation. The eating disorder diagnosis was based on that fact and a low potassium level measured during a blood test about an hour after Terri was first hospitalized.
"Her low potassium level appears to be the main piece of evidence purporting to show that she had an eating disorder," Thogmartin said. But he noted that she received numerous medical treatments when she arrived at the hospital that would have lowered that measurement.
"Thus the main piece of evidence supporting the diagnosis of bulimia nervosa is suspect," he concluded.
"Once you eliminate the potassium problem, which is known in bulimics, you end up with a 26-year-old who used to be healthy, who now lost the weight, is reveling in her thinness now, enjoying her life and doesn't want to gain the weight back," Thogmartin said. "If that's a bulimic, there's a lot of bulimics out there. It's just not enough."
Thogmartin said that because he cannot, "with reasonable medical certainty," ascertain why or how the blood and oxygen to Terri's brain were interrupted, he cannot rule on what started the chain of events that led to her death.
"The manner of death is different from the cause of death. Manner of death is the circumstances of death or how the death came about," Thogmartin said. "Since I don't know the circumstances or can't tell, actually, what the underlying cause is, the manner of death has to be 'undetermined.'"
Other allegations and theories addressed
Thogmartin dismissed the theory that the oxygen depravation to Terri's brain might have been the result of a myocardial infarction, the medical term for a "heart attack," or death of heart muscle from coronary artery disease.
"Mrs. Schiavo's heart was anatomically normal without any areas of recent or remote infarction," he explained.
In response to the allegations that Terri's collapse was the result of a physical assault, Thogmartin noted that she received nearly 30 X-rays, CAT scans and ultrasound examinations during the medical examination that followed her collapse.
"Any fractures - including rib fractures, leg fractures, ankle fractures, skull fractures, spine fractures - that occurred concurrent with her initial collapse would almost certainly have been diagnosed in 1990, especially with the number of physical exams, radiographs and other evaluations she received during her initial hospitalization," Thogmartin said. "No fractures or trauma were reported or recorded."
There was also, Thogmartin said, "no evidence to support or the evidence did not support," various allegations that Terri was abused or neglected after her initial brain injury.
Was Terri in a Persistent Vegetative State?
Thogmartin brought in Dr. Stephen Nelson, an expert in pathology of the brain and central nervous system, as a consultant during the autopsy. Nelson stressed numerous times that the diagnosis of a "Persistent Vegetative State," which was used to justify the removal of the feeding tube that kept Terri alive, "is a clinical diagnosis, it's not a pathologic diagnosis that has precision associated with it." But he did not dispute the finding.
"There is nothing in her autopsy report, in her autopsy that is inconsistent with Persistent Vegetative State," Nelson said, adding that there was evidence to support the finding.
"A normal brain weight for somebody who is approximately 41 years of age ought to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,200 to 1,300 grams," Nelson explained. "Her brain is 615 grams and is largely reduced to what is termed granular atrophy ... associated with the loss of blood flow that happened many years prior.
"Those all are consistent with what is reported in the literature for Persistent Vegetative State," Nelson added. "We found nothing that is contrary to what has previously been reported for Persistent Vegetative State."
Nelson compared the physical condition of Terri's brain to that of Karen Ann Quinlan, the New Jersey woman who died in 1985 -- nine years after her parents won a court battle to remove her from a respirator.
"Her brain, Karen Ann Quinlan's, weighed more than Terri Schiavo's brain weighed," Nelson said. "The findings here are, perhaps, worse, even, than Karen Ann Quinlan."
Thogmartin also concluded that Terri's brain injury was irreversible.
"Her brain was profoundly atrophied," the medical examiner concluded. "This damage was irreversible and no amount of therapy or treatment would have regenerated the massive loss of neurons."
Michael Schiavo relied on the diagnosis of a Persistent Vegetative State when he sought permission from the Florida courts to remove Terri's feeding tube. He and two of his relatives testified that Terri had said she would not want to be kept alive in such a condition. Thogmartin discussed the contention by many right-to-life advocates that Terri's family should have been allowed to offer her food and water by mouth after that feeding tube was removed.
"She would not have been able to consume sustenance safely or in sufficient quantity by mouth," Thogmartin said. "Mrs. Schiavo was dependent, therefore, on nutrition and hydration by her feeding tube and removal of her feeding tube would have resulted in her death whether she was fed by mouth or not."
In layman's terms
After a technical explanation of his findings, laden with medical language, Thogmartin was asked to summarize his findings in an exchange with one unidentified reporter:
REPORTER: "In layman's terms, did Terri Schiavo starve to death?"
THOGMARTIN: "No."
REPORTER: "Did she suffer any neglect or abuse?"
THOGMARTIN: "No."
REPORTER: "Will we ever know what caused her death?"
THOGMARTIN: "I don't know."
Pamela Hennessy, spokeswoman for the Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation and Terri's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, complimented Thogmartin on his report.
"However, it does seem that the conclusions of his report leave as many unanswered questions as there were previously," Hennessy said. "For instance, if Terri did not suffer bulimia and she had as healthy a heart as Dr. Thogmartin proclaimed, what caused her collapse?
"It doesn't really bring much in the way of closure to [the Schindlers] as far as what happened to their daughter, why this happened in the first place and what could have been done for her," Hennessy concluded.
Thogmartin said he is open to answering those questions.
"It is the policy of this office that no case is ever closed, and that all determinations are to be reconsidered upon receipt of credible new information," he explained.
"In addition to fading memories, the 15-year survival of Mrs. Schiavo after her collapse resulted in the creation of a voluminous number of documents, many of which were lost or discarded over those years," he continued. "Receipt of additional credible information that clarifies any outstanding issues may, or shall cause an amendment to her cause and manner of death."
That was "80% of her upper brain," but the mass listed is for her whole brain.
She wasn't brain dead. She was in a Persistent Vegetative State. Her lower brain functions were partially intact, allowing her body to continue operating without a ventilator, etc., but her cognition was gone.
Marvin, I will go back through these:
-Useless Eaters vs The Death Cult--
...and cull what I find- may be later in the day; got to shoo Miss Emily out the door & run errands- but I'll get to it directly.
Questions for you, and for others to ponder...
Do you think a person's right to refuse hydration/nutrition should be denied?
Do you think a less barbaric means of deliverance should be available for those who don't wish to remain in a PVS?
Do you think parents should have precedence over their adult children's spouses?
Do you think the armed forces of the State should be called in to overturn, by force, our court system decisions?
Do you believe individuals have no right to decide whether or not to continue their lives, for whatever condition they are in?
Do you value life over rights? "People" over individuals?
Do you realize that while you call others coldblooded, there are some who look at you that way...feeling that you have no compassion for those who would not want their body to be kept going?
And this diagnosis was made based on what evidence? Was it all based on what she could or could not do with her eyes? Hmmm. Wasn't she blind? I wonder how these doctors could mange to diagnose her brain potential without even factoring in the fact that she was blind. You have to wonder about their abilities to diagnose PVS if they did not diagnose such a basic thing as blindness, and did not even take it into consideration when looking at her.
Were not all the indications of he PVS diagnosis based on her ability to react visually? You have to wonder how these Dr.s could make such claims when they did not even know she was blind.
The word is trust. If you trust that everyone involved in this case had all honorable intentions then I could see your points. I on the other hand did not trust Michael Schiavo from the very beginning. I thing Judge Greer made some very huge mistakes in the beginning and had too much of an ego to retract his original findings - and so did all that he could from that point on to cover his ass. Not much of a stretch in the realm of possibilities and certainly not a vast conspiracy. All the other characters acted as their agendas dictated.
"Were not all the indications of he PVS diagnosis based on her ability to react visually?"
No.
"I thing Judge Greer made some very huge mistakes in the beginning and had too much of an ego to retract his original findings"
... and then the appeals courts and other judges including the Fed. Appeals Court and the US Supreme Court worked further to cover Greer's butt/mistakes. Roflmao
Who was it who criticized me for asking if he was a 'retread'?
Might have something to do with the fact that it was the middle of the night, huh?
Of course, you have no evidence for this whatsoever.
Do something constructive and bake some cookiers.
It isn't? Feeding tubes don't just naturally appear, you know.
feel that the death sentence
Hyperbolic rhetoric.
comletely based on nothing more than hearsay
That's pretty funny, coming from your side.
without the ORDERED (and nose-thumbed,) de novo hearing
Did you read the court rulings pertaining to this? In the Terri Law, congress did NOT change the existing rules regarding temporary injunctive relief. They had the opportunity to do so, and they chose not to. Consequently, the court ruled based upon existing statute and precedent. And this ruling was upheld by the full 11th Circuit and the Supreme Court.
There was NOTHING in writing stating her "wishes."
Like it or not, that isn't required in Florida.
At one point, they had her home for three weeks. They sent her back to the care facility because they couldn't take care of her.
unless you're going to say that the priests and others who visited her all the way to the end were lying about what they saw.
Perhaps "extreme wishful thinking" is kinder than "lying". The 'testimony' of Fr. Pavone, in particular, is absurd.
The tests were not allowed
Untrue. She had intense therapy, and repeated testing. Her condition was determined to be unrecoverable.
Dr. Thugmartin
A pathetic attempt to demonize yet another person who disagreed with your alternate reality version of events.
I don't buy it.
Of course you don't. You have bought every bit of rumor and speculation hook, line and sinker. All contradictory data, therefore, must be due to human evil and a vast conspiracy.
Is your forehead bleeding yet?
Great post...
"Culture of DisrespectTM "
Couldn't have said that better myself.
Bones
Unlike Michael, the Schindlers needed that trust fund money. They had filed for bankruptcy a year before Terri's collapse, following a bad investment in a Florida business venture.
Initially, everything was fine between the Schindlers and Michael:
"They moved in together after Terri's collapse in February 1990, and Michael called the Schindlers ''Mom and Dad.'' A year later, the Schindlers encouraged their son-in-law to get on with his life and date. They even met some of the women he saw."
"I looked at that as maybe he was starting to take a step in the right direction and get his life back together,'' Bob Schindler said in a 1993 deposition. ``He's still a young man. He still has a life ahead of him.''
Then in 1993 when Michael refused to give the Schindlers half of his $300,000 loss of consotium award that they demanded, they had a "falling out".
No, the cause of death was dehydration.
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.