Posted on 09/11/2006 8:17:41 PM PDT by aculeus
We have always been told there is no recovery from persistent vegetative state - doctors can only make a sufferer's last days as painless as possible. But is that really the truth? Across three continents, severely brain-damaged patients are awake and talking after taking ... a sleeping pill. And no one is more baffled than the GP who made the breakthrough. Steve Boggan witnesses these 'strange and wonderful' rebirths
For three years, Riaan Bolton has lain motionless, his eyes open but unseeing. After a devastating car crash doctors said he would never again see or speak or hear. Now his mother, Johanna, dissolves a pill in a little water on a teaspoon and forces it gently into his mouth. Within half an hour, as if a switch has been flicked in his brain, Riaan looks around his home in the South African town of Kimberley and says, "Hello." Shortly after his accident, Johanna had turned down the option of letting him die.
Three hundred miles away, Louis Viljoen, a young man who had once been cruelly described by a doctor as "a cabbage", greets me with a mischievous smile and a streetwise four-move handshake. Until he took the pill, he too was supposed to be in what doctors call a persistent vegetative state.
Across the Atlantic in the United States, George Melendez, who is also brain-damaged, has lain twitching and moaning as if in agony for years, causing his parents unbearable grief. He, too, is given this little tablet and again, it's as if a light comes on. His father asks him if he is, indeed, in pain. "No," George smiles, and his family burst into tears.
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
Having it written into the will makes it "written in stone" as it were.
I've been living here since the middle of 1991, and shortly after I moved in, she asked me whether I wanted to have her car or her pickup truck, and I said the car, and she said I will put that into my will and her exact words were "I want you to have the house and everything in it, and I will make sure that's written in there too.". So, as it is written, the car and house (everything in it) are to be in my name and her pickup truck will be dad's upon her passing. I have used her car every once in a while since that conversation. She had no problems with that, as I have paid for my own gas, washed it for her in the summer months, and I've changed her oil for her every spring.
Why does your aunt have a say so?
I dunno. My mom can't figure that out either. My aunt hasn't lived here for 40 years. She graduated high school, went off to college, got married, and hasn't been back here since.
This personal stuff is best left to FR mail.
this is incredible! Thanks for posting. sharing with MANY...
Agreed.
Yes, I read it and it's interesting to say the least. Makes sense at first glance anyway.
I'm still going to wait to see how this plays out before certain comments about what happened two years ago come out in full force from my direction. We'll see.
Oh, let it go already. The Guardian is the Nat'l Enquirer of the UK.
I was actually going to mention the "Ambien effect." It makes sense to me that it might kick-start the brain. A lot of people legitimately have some really insane/weird side efects when they take Ambien. I wonder exactly what it triggers in the brain chemistry...
Who used to pay for all the organ transplants from patients like these?
Off hand, it seems the organ transplant people might need to look to other sources
Anyway, there might actually be a reduction in overall costs, if a good number of the brain injured patients more quickly get to a state where they don't need as much care.
The people in the article have been cared for for years...If some of them had been given the sleeping pills sooner, the costs for their care might have gone down.
The families of the patients might gain some hope and happiness, in their lives, too.
How much is that worth?
Aren't they the biggest hypocrites on the forum? They are typically liars as well.
If you HADN'T had the financial resources to care for them -- if it had come down to medicare/medicaid, would you have been able to let them go?
I agree with the question of "who pays," but it's so complicated...if there is no one to pay, what do you do with those people? What responsibility do we have as a society?
I might argue that it's better to err on the side of Life.
Do we just let them die?
Doing great, hope you are as well. Will read later - off to work.
How about the elderly? My 90+ year old mother still has a sharp mind, but she sleeps quite a lot.
Do the elderly sleep so much because their sleep is "poorer quality" sleep?
Will research lead to a pill that allows her to be awake more hours, but still keep a sharp mind?
Is someone making a docu on this?
YOu figured that out: the drug is now available as a genetic.
So the pharma company is desperately working on a slight chemical variation for use in these patients that they can repatent and make gazillions on.
Now that there's anything wrong with that.
Isn't this just an off-label use of a drug that's already been approved?
All that happens is the word gets out that this works on some patients and doctors will start trying it.
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.