The concious Coma

[Mr2Spyder2828]

HI I want to hear what you guys think of this.
My dad is a Neurologist and he deals with brain dead people alot. I was wondering if you think that if someone is considered brain dead that they should be put to death or alowed to die. see when someone is brain dead only their primortal brain lives(or functions with electrical signals determined by EKG's) alowing the patien to breath and live in a coma. How can we know that the person laying there cant hear everyword around them, and knows that the Doctors are considering to pull the feeding tube, allowing you to die of starvation and dehidration.
I have heard of doctors deciding that the person was brain dead and should have the plug pulled when one doctor found that the person was concious, able to comunicate thru blinking. they could hear every word, he could only respond by blinking. That would be hell.
Thanx
B.

[YogsVR4]

I think that there should be multiple tests done by different doctors to determine that the patient is really brain dead. After that, the wishes of the patient should be adhered to in all cases. If the patient has not made their wishes clear the decision should go to the spouse, then to the kids, followed by their parents. The state should be the last area involved and they should never pull the plug. The state should not get into the business of determining the best wishes of a terminal patient.

[Mr2Spyder2828]

Originally Posted by YogsVR4

I think that there should be multiple tests done by different doctors to determine that the patient is really brain dead. After that, the wishes of the patient should be adhered to in all cases. If the patient has not made their wishes clear the decision should go to the spouse, then to the kids, followed by their parents. The state should be the last area involved and they should never pull the plug. The state should not get into the business of determining the best wishes of a terminal patient.

They do do several tests but all they look for is if the brain is having electrical signals, if there is none or if they are minimal they are concidered brain dead. Does this mean that your soul has already left. Does this mean that your body can still function but you are in heaven or hell if there is such a place.

I think that we are like every other creature. We live, we react, then we die. Once dead we cease to exist. What you think?

Thanks
B.

[TexasF355F1]

It depends. If the person has to be hooked up by 100 different devices to stay alive then I think that's cruelty and it should be up to the family. My grandma had a massive stroke going on 10 years ago. She is completely paralysed on her entire left side and she can't speak a word. She is not hooked up to anything though. And we know she can understand most of what we are saying. She just sometimes refuses to eat. Now if she were to get so sick as to she had to connected to all the machines to stay alive; our family has already discussed that we would probably take her off the machines after a certain amount of time had passed. So basically if there were no signs of improvement and she seemed to get worse over time, probably a year or more then we would proceed to let her in the hands of God.

[Mr2Spyder2828]

Its wierd but I think that the way in which they let people die when they are concidered brain dead is wrong. They let them starve and dehydrate to death. That seems to be a painfull death if they were able to feel the side affects of that. Once the "plug" is pulled it usually takes a week or more to die of starvation. Which seems more inhumane than injecting them with a leathal dose of morphine or similar painless drug.
Thanks
B.

[jon@af]

The person is brain dead correct? So, that said, it would imply that his afferent(sensory) neurons and efferent (motor) neurons would not be recieved by the dendrites in his brain thus he would not feel himself dying or even have a coherent sense of what was going on. I was always under the impression that when someone is brain dead, the only thing keeping him/her alive is a machine, in that the machine is pumping blood through the heart and keeping the other organs functioning. Most of the time they do that so should they need to, they can harvest the good organs, if any. When the plug is pulled, it is just to let the body stop working, the brain, as by definition is already dead, and is not leaving any feeling in the body or any subconscious awareness.