Brain Scan May Foster Communication with Brain Injured Patients
February 4, 2010 (ABC News Medical Unit)
For the brother of Terri Schiavo, Wednesday's news that a team of researchers in England were able to use a novel scanning technology to establish limited communication with a man in a persistent vegetative state was bittersweet.
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Bobby Schindler said that while the test using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) likely holds promise for the families of minimally conscious and persistently vegetative patients, he wishes his sister had been afforded this technology before a court ruling allowed her husband Michael Schiavo to remove her feeding tube in 2005 leading to her death.
"It's upsetting to me when I see this type of research," Schindler said. "We were looking to afford these kinds of tests for Terri, but the court did not allow us to perform these kinds of tests."
Schiavo's case ignited a firestorm of publicity in between 1998 and 2005. Ultimately, the courts sided with doctors who testified that Schiavo was in a persistent, vegetative state with no hope of recovery—though doctors that the Schindlers brought to court said there was a chance of recovery.
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(click here to read, The Schindlers Were Right to Insist on Tests for Terri . . .)
