Death and its determination - SRS Flashcards
(13 cards)
In the Karen Ann Quinlin case of 1976, what did the New Jersey supreme court rule?
That the right to privacy included declining medical intervention and surrogate decision making.
What is the importance of the Nancy Cruzan case?
Missouri Supreme Court ruled and US Supreme Court upheld that states may establish guidelines to protect human life of incompetent patients
What does the Patient Self Determination Act of 1991 require of health organizations?
Must give patients written instructions about advance directives.
What did Terri’s law allow for?
Intervention of authorities
What did the 1968 Report of the Ad Hoc Committee of the Harvad Med school state with regard to determination of death?
(1) unresponsiveness to external stimuli;
(2) no spontaneous movements or breathing;
(3) no reflexes to light et al.;
(4) documentation of no cortical activity: EEGs 24 hours apart;
(5) exclusion of mimics such as hypothermia or drug intoxication.
What did the 1971 uniform determination of death act (UDDA) establish?
Alternative formulations - cardiopulmonary or whole brain
The 1981 Presidents Commision for the study of ethical problems in medicine et al stated what about death?
Fundamentally philosophical but based on physiological: permanent cessation of all brain function.
What impact did the 2008 presidents council on bioethics report on controversies in the determination of death have?
Refined implications of brain failure for organ transplant.
What is the definition of a coma?
“pathologic state of eyes-closed unresponsiveness in which the patient has neither awareness nor wakefulness and from which the patient cannot be aroused to awareness or wakefulness by vigorous stimuli.”
What is the definition of a vegetative state?
“disorder of consciousness in which wakefulness is retained but awareness of self and environment is entirely absent . . . may be a transient stage during spontaneous recovery from coma to awareness, or it may be a chronic, unchanging state.”
Define “medically conscious state”.
“disorder of altered consciousness characterized by a profound lack of responsiveness but partial or intermittent evidence of awareness of self and environment.
What is the definition of “Locked-In syndrome”?
“a state of profound paralysis, is not a disorder of consciousness but may be mistaken for one.”
What is the definition of brain death?
“irreversible cessation of all clinical brain functions.”
