A coma rarely lasts more than 2 to 4 weeks. Some patients may regain a degree of awareness after persistent vegetative stateA persistent vegetative state (PVS) or post-coma unresponsiveness (PCU) is a disorder of consciousness in which patients with severe brain damage are in a state of partial arousal rather than true awareness.https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Persistent_vegetative_state
Comas may last from a few hours to years. Comas outwardly resemble a state of deep sleep, but are actually quite more complex. A good working definition is that a coma is a state of unresponsiveness from which an individual has not yet been aroused.
A coma can last for a few days or weeks. If a person enters a coma, this is usually a medical emergency. Doctors may need to take rapid action to preserve their life and brain function.
Can Your Loved One Hear You? During a coma, the individual is unconscious, meaning they are unable to respond to any sounds. However, the brain may still be able to pick up on sounds from loved ones. In fact, some studies suggest talking and touching a loved one while they are in a coma may help them recover.
Some comas are caused by metabolic issues like diabetes. If doctors are able to administer medication to treat these problems, the coma can be broken. Comas created by brain tumors and severe brain injuries, however, may last longer since the underlying causes are usually harder to treat.
Usually, coma patients have their eyes closed and cannot see what happens around them. But their ears keep receiving sounds from the environment. In some cases, the brains of coma patients can process sounds, for example the voice of someone speaking to them [2].
Yet many people who have recovered from comas report dreams into which something of the outside world penetrated. Others recall nightmares that seemed to go on and on. Whether they dream or not probably depends on the cause of the coma.
Coma is a state of prolonged loss of consciousness. It can have a variety of causes, including traumatic head injury, stroke, brain tumor, or drug or alcohol intoxication. A coma may even be caused by an underlying illness, such as diabetes or an infection. Coma is a medical emergency.
Severe brain injury is usually defined as being a condition where the patient has been in an unconscious state for 6 hours or more, or a post-traumatic amnesia of 24 hours or more.
Annie Shapiro (1913–2003) was a Canadian apron shop owner who was in a coma for 29 years because of a massive stroke and suddenly awakened in 1992. Apart from the patients in the true story Awakenings, Shapiro was the longest a person has been in a coma like state and woken up.
Even though those in a persistent vegetative state lose their higher brain functions, other key functions such as breathing and circulation remain relatively intact. Spontaneous movements may occur, and the eyes may open in response to external stimuli. Individuals may even occasionally grimace, cry, or laugh.
They may be able to breathe on their own, although some people require a machine to help them breathe. Over time, the person may start to gradually regain consciousness and become more aware. Some people will wake up after a few weeks, while others may go into a vegetative state or minimally conscious state.
The person's recovery depends on the cause and severity of the coma, but anyone who falls into a comatose state is at risk of dying. In some cases, there may be a complete recovery with no loss of brain functioning, while in other cases, lifelong brain damage is the result.
Clinically, a coma can be defined as the inability consistently to follow a one-step command. It can also be defined as a score of ≤ 8 on the Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) lasting ≥ 6 hours.
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.
The chances of someone recovering from a coma largely depend on the severity and cause of their brain injury, their age and how long they've been in a coma. But it's impossible to accurately predict whether the person will eventually recover, how long the coma will last and whether they'll have any long-term problems.
Such a person exhibits a complete absence of wakefulness and is unable to consciously feel, speak, hear or move. Such a person is called brain dead but as the body system is functioning, the person is considered as living.
Because patients who are in a coma can't urinate on their own, they will have a rubber tube called a catheter inserted directly into their bladder to remove the urine.
When Edwarda O'Bara died on 21 November 2012, she had survived 15,663 days (about 42 years) in a coma. Born in 1953, in Miami, Florida, O'Bara suffered a childhood history of diabetes, which she successfully managed with insulin.
Depth of coma
Those who show no motor response have a 3% chance of making a good recovery whereas those who show flexion have a better than 15% chance.
When someone is in a coma, they cannot interact with their environment. The brain is still working, however, and the degree of brain activity varies from patient to patient. New tools for mapping brain activity have helped doctors illuminate what is happening inside the brain, which informs their treatment and care.
“ Just several weeks before her death, Jim Scantlin had a good visit with his sister. “We hung out a lot and had a nice weekend,” he said. Sarah died of respiration issues and failing blood pressure.
Puddle of Mudd frontman Wes Scantlin may be well-known for his on-stage outbursts, but this one must be the strangest yet. A video has surfaced showing the lead singer walking off stage midway through a set after accusing an audience member of stealing his house.
In an era when what passes for rock musicians in the mainstream play neutered music and have movie-star haircuts, Scantlin is the last of the dangerous longhairs. Arrests, supermodel dating, drugs, car chases, onstage meltdowns, lip synching accusations, Graceland bans.