Coma !

A medical report out of Europe must send a chill down the spine of all thinking people.

A man involved in a road accident spent twenty-three years in a supposedly vegetative state - in a coma - but able to hear every word his doctors spoke, but unable to achieve any form of communication.

Written off by the medical community he was only saved when another doctor detected evidence of brain activity - and now this false diagnosis has been set aside, remedial work has enabled him to communicate via a specially designed computer keyboard.

That so easily could have been one of us, caused by anything from a car accident to a stroke. We wonder how many people here have suffered such a state and may be lying in a bed in a nursing home - or who have had their life support turned off because that has seemed the most merciful option.

What happens when a person is in a coma is one of the great unknowns. The fact that a false diagnosis is possible in a busy hospital makes it imperative that this must not become the final medical declaration - without every possible test having been undertaken.

It also a very good reason for a further medical appraisal by a doctor skilled in detecting brain activity be required before any decision on turning off life support is taken.

This report from Europe must now create indescribable anguish for those family members who have had to make that decision !