Oh now Betsy..don't be so hard on those legal intellectual giants that ruled to end Terri's life. After all, they loved her to death.
"Careful there now honey"
Posted on 06/19/2005 6:04:50 PM PDT by wagglebee
Dr. William Hammesfahr, nominated for a Nobel Prize for his work in Medicine, has been recognized by agents for Medicare, the federal government, and others for new approaches to helping the brain injured.
Dr. Hammesfahr has been identified in helping patients with chronic brain injuries from many causes actually leave long term disability, and return to work.
Dr. Hammesfahr was identified the first physician to restore deficits caused by stroke.
Dr. Hammesfahr has released the following statement in response to the autopsy report on Terri Schindler Schiavo:
We have seen a lot on the autopsy of Terri Schindler Schiavo in recent days, that I feel needs to be addressed. To ignore these comments will allow future 'Terri Schiavo's' to die needlessly after the wishes of clinicians and family are ignored.
Considering that there were so many physicians and therapists who were willing to step forward to treat Terri Schiavo, from university based practitioners to those in private practice, it clearly shows that the mainstream medical community across the board, those involved in treating patients, knew that they could help Terri.
The record must be set straight. As we noted in the press, there was no heart attack, or evident reason for this to have happened (and certainly not of Terri's making).
Unlike the constant drumbeat from the husband, his attorneys, and his doctors, the brain tissue was not dissolved, with a head of just spinal fluid. In fact, large areas were "relatively preserved."
The purpose of the therapies offered by so many, from major universities, brain injury centers, and from private practice physicians, is to improve and restore quality of life, and function, which the mainstream medical community clearly tried to get to her.
I have had a chance to look at Dr. Nelson's analysis of the brain tissue, and essentially, as a clinician, these are my thoughts.
The autopsy results confirmed my opinion and Dr. Maxfield's opinions, that the frontal areas of the brains, the areas that deal with awareness and cognition were relatively intact. To use Dr. Nelson's words, "relatively preserved." In fact, the relay areas from the frontal and front temporal regions of the brain, to the spinal cord and the brain stem, by way of the basal ganglia, were preserved, thus the evident responses which she was able to express to her family and to the clinicians seeing her or viewing her videotape. The Spect scan confirmed these areas were functional and not scar tissue, and that was apparently also confirmed on Dr. Nelson's review of the slides. Dr. Maxfield's estimates of retained brain weight were apparently accurate, although there may have been some loss of brain weight due to the last two weeks of dehydration.
Dr. Maxfield and myself both emphasized that she was a woman trapped in her body, similar to a child with cerebral palsy, and that was born out by the autopsy, showing greater injury in the motor and visual centers of the brain. Obviously, the pathologists comments that she could not see were not borne out by reality, and thus his assessment must represent sampling error. The videotapes clearly showed her seeing, and even Dr. Cranfoed, for the husband, commented to her that, when she could see the balloon, she could follow it with her eyes as per his request.
That she could not swallow was obviously not borne out by the reality that she was swallowing her saliva, about 1.5 liters per day of liquid, and the clinical swallowing tests done by Dr. Young and Dr. Carpenter. Thus, there appears to be some limitations to the clinical accuracy of an autopsy in evaluating function.
With respect to the issue of trauma, that certainly does not appear to be answered adequately. Some of the types of trauma that are suspected were not adequately evaluated in this assessment. Interestingly, both myself and at least one neurologist for the husband testified to the presence of neck injuries. The issue of a forensic evaluation for trauma, is highly specialized. Hence the wish of the family to have observers which was refused by the examiner.
Ultimately, based on the clinical evidence and the autopsy results, an aware woman was killed.
s/Dr. W. Hammesfahr
[Dr. Hammesfahr was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology in 1999. The Nomination was for work started in 1994. In 2000, this work resulted in approval for the first patent in history granted for the treatment of neurological diseases including coma, stroke, brain injury, cerebral palsy, hypoxic injuries and other neurovascular disorders with medications that restore blood flow to the brain. It was extended to treat successfully disabilities including ADD, ADHD, Dyslexia, Tourette's and Autism as well as behaviorally and emotionally disturbed children, seizures and severe migraines.]
"I believe that Judge Greer should be held in contempt of Congress."
You're presuming that the "Congress" (actually the committee) acted according to protocol and their own rules. The rules were put into place to prevent Congress from abusing people they disagree with and minimize the politics.
It doesn't appear that the pertinent documents were properly executed. The people who did the documents know it and aren't going to proceed.
"yet she had been swallowing her own saliva. What a goofy world in which we live."
You did read the part in the autopsy where she was aspirating her mouth fluids right?
"After over 10 years in the medical field,
...
If she were swallowing saliva - then clearly her swallowing was not impaired."
I have a problem with Judge Greer being the only one who got to make that decision. Our elected Representatives felt otherwise about the papers and protocol.
Who gets to decide if it was right or wrong? Who has the power? Is it The people of the United States,who elect the Politicians and wanted them to act before a person was killed, or a County judge who wanted someone killed before they could testify before those elected reps?
Yup. She had numerous bouts of pneumonia over the years because of it.
But hey... Hammesfahr also said he would be able to get her well enough to go out to eat and to the movies! And that she was doing the parallel bars! And he's a Nobel Prize nominee, who's never even been peer-reviewed or published in a real journal!!!
Amazing. All the borderline/minimally conscious/PVS patients out there, and he has yet to actually perform any of these miracles he claims he could. lol
Nor would he or the Schindlers' atty submit his ever-so popular report to the court, it was so full of BS - the BS that gets repeated here as though it were worth more than ...BS. lol
What a quack.
National Enquirer, World Nut Daily, and Newsmax... FR's new media source, huh? ; )
Actually, Frist and Delay, et al, started off this whole mess after consulting with Hammesfahr himself, quoting him in their speeches and referring to the info he was pushing. They were outraged based mostly on what he was telling them, and believing he was credible.
But, it wasn't long before they found out he was a fraud and started backpedaling on the medical aspects in a big way.
Off to the pool. : )
Bump these real facts. Ignore the "facts" are all that matter ghouls. Most FReepers can tell the difference.
So according to you Terri was not swallowing her own saliva. What an odd thing to believe. Doesn't make any sense at all.
Funny. He's probably more deserving of a nomination than the quack.
You were right the other day, I didn't know what I was talking about. I don't spend very much time on the Terri threads and had you wrongly identified as one of the over-zealous save-Terri types. I do hope she's at rest now.
I apologize.
Oh now Betsy..don't be so hard on those legal intellectual giants that ruled to end Terri's life. After all, they loved her to death.
BUT... When I spoke with the people at Frist and Delay's office they were talking about Constitutional rights to representation, not on anything Hammesfahr. Further I find it hard to believe that Frist and Delay based their outrage all on one source and never looked at any of the other evidence.
That's just a buncha new-fangled doctorin' talk. If'n he was a real doctor, he'd have plenty a bat wings on hand. Ain't Doctor Granny good 'nuff fer ya? /sarcasm
(2) And how is it not an exact analogue of the situation in the Third Reich when they commenced their involuntary euthanasia program?
So would you want to make decisions about your husband? Or do you think his family should be the ones to decide?
BUT_ just because someone agrees with Greer- that does NOT make them a murder or a Nazi.
Secondly I am all for rights for the disabled- because I have worked with numerous fine people with disabiliies- but what happened to Terri is not the same thing as what Hitler did.
We could debate whether or not, in theory, Terri's case is a minute example of what motivated the Nazis. But I don't think it was.
I do think we need to have a discussion on disabled people have equal rights in this country- but I do not see that as the same thing as mass ethnic cleansing.
BUT I still say that supporting Greer does not a nazi make. (Althou I am not so sure about Felos... I do think he is a liar, a moonbat, a nut, a kook, a jerk and anything else I can think of.)
All things being equal to Terri's case-If there is no living will, and I have no idea what he would want, and I have exhausted all resources to find out what he would want, and he is still alive and breathing and NOT dying, then we need to come to a consensus as a family- and if that can not happen and I have a new lover and a family to raise ,and his parents want to care for him....I hand him over.
Pathology can only show so much, as the ME cautioned. He could not even ascertain the cause of the imjury.
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