Can you be brain dead and in a coma at the same time?
Brain death is death. A patient who is in a coma or persistent vegetative state typically has some brain stem function (which controls breathing) and possibly other brain function.
What happens to the brain when comatose?
Someone who is in a coma is unconscious and will not respond to voices, other sounds, or any sort of activity going on nearby. The person is still alive, but the brain is functioning at its lowest stage of alertness. You can’t shake and wake up someone who is in a coma like you can someone who has just fallen asleep.
Can you come back from a brain dead state?
A person who’s brain dead is legally confirmed as dead. They have no chance of recovery because their body is unable to survive without artificial life support.
Can comatose lead to death?
Although many people gradually recover from a coma, others enter a vegetative state or die. Some people who recover from a coma end up with major or minor disabilities.
Can a brain dead person breathe on their own?
When someone is ‘brain dead’ they have no reflexes and cannot breathe on their own. They will never regain consciousness or the ability to breathe and are considered legally dead. Usually when someone loses brain stem function they stop breathing, their heart stops and they are clearly dead.
What determines brain death?
The three essential findings in brain death are coma, absence of brain stem reflexes, and apnea. An evaluation for brain death should be considered in patients who have suffered a massive, irreversible brain injury of identifiable cause. A patient properly determined to be brain dead is legally and clinically dead.
Why is it called a vegetative state?
The term “vegetative state” connotes that the human being lying in the bed before you is a vegetable, just a conglomeration of organs inside muscle and skin, no reason to believe those reflexes are anything more than nonsentient reactions to noxious stimuli.
Can you be brain dead and still breathe on your own?
What happens when there is no brain activity?
Brain Death is death. No brain function exists. Brain death results from swelling in the brain; blood flow in the brain ceases and without blood to oxygenate the cells, the tissue dies.