More Encouraging Signs that Severely Brain-Injured Patients Can Improve.

"The findings follow recent studies by [Dr. Nicholas] Schiff and others that suggest some brain injury patients may be more responsive than anyone realized. And scientists have long known that patients in a vegetative state sometimes regain at least some awareness." -- Washington Post, September 8

"At a minimum, the report demonstrates that clinical exams may not be sufficient to establish that all elements of consciousness have been extinguished in someone who gives no outward appearance of responsiveness." -- Chicago Tribune, September 8

"But the vegetative state isn't what it used to be. A new study promises, or threatens, to overturn medical dogma about what is happening in the minds and brains of at least some patients in such a state. It also raises new questions about the meaning of consciousness, one of the deepest mysteries in all of science." -- Wall Street Journal, September 8

A report in the September 8 issue of Science has given additional impetus to mounting evidence that we know far less about patients with severe brain damage, whether the label be "minimally conscious" or "persistent vegetative state" (PVS).

What researchers found was that the brain activity of a 23-year-old British woman, said to be in a PVS, almost exactly paralleled the responses researchers found in the brains of 12 volunteers. As the Washington Post's Rob Stein put it, she "showed clear signs of conscious awareness on brain imaging tests."

The story begins in July 2005 when the woman suffered a head trauma which left her in a coma. About two weeks later, she opened her eyes and started experiencing sleep-wake cycles.

However (as is so often the case), after only five weeks of testing suggested "no signs of awareness or consciousness," the PVS label was affixed to her.