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.
Most comas do not last for more than two to four weeks, but there are patients who have woken after decades. The story of how Munira Abdulla spontaneously woke from a coma after 27 years has shed light on how someone could come back to life after decades of unconsciousness.
On Aug. 6, 1941, 6-year-old Elaine Esposito went to the hospital for a routine appendectomy. She went under general anesthetic and never came out. Dubbed the "sleeping beauty," Esposito stayed in a coma for 37 years and 111 days before succumbing in 1978 — the longest-ever coma, according to Guinness World Records.
A: Many people who have woken up from comas have reported having dreams in which they saw something from the outer world. Others have had dreams that seemed to stretch on and on. A person's ability to dream is most likely determined by the underlying medical condition that put them in a coma.
A coma usually only lasts a few weeks, during which time the person may start to gradually wake up and gain consciousness, or progress into a different state of unconsciousness called a vegetative state or minimally conscious state.
Someone in a coma needs intensive care in hospital. They may need help with breathing, they will be fed through a tube and they will receive blood and fluids through a drip inserted into the vein. The cause of their coma will also need to be treated to prevent further brain damage.
Coma is a state of consciousness that is similar to deep sleep, except no amount of external stimuli (such as sounds or sensations) can prompt the brain to become awake and alert. A person in a coma can't even respond to pain. A wide range of illnesses, conditions and events can cause coma.
A case of pituitary coma with continuing menstruation is presented. This association is extremely rare, but a history of recent menstrual periods does not exclude advanced hypopituitarism from the differential diagnosis of severe hyponatraemia.
Comatose patients do not seem to hear or respond. Speaking may not affect their clinical outcome; time spent with them takes time away from other, more "viable" patients. Comatose patients may, however, hear; many have normal brain-stem auditory evoked responses and normal physiologic responses to auditory stimuli.
How long does a coma last? A coma can be very brief and last only a few minutes, or it can last as long as one to two weeks.
A coma is similar to a dream-like state because the individual is alive but not conscious. A coma occurs when there is little-to-no brain activity. The patient is unable to respond to touch, sound, and other stimuli. It is also rare for someone in a coma to cough, sneeze, or communicate in any way.
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].
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.
Usually, a coma does not last more than a few weeks. Sometimes, however, a person stays in a coma for a long time — even years — and will be able to do very little except breathe on his or her own. Most people do come out of comas.
Background: Coma is defined as a state of deep unresponsiveness with eyes closed from which the patient cannot be aroused to respond appropriately to any kind of vigorous stimulation. However, rare cases of coma patients with either blinking or eye opening have been reported in literature.
If your family member is comatose, a mouth sponge, kind of like a little chunk of sponge on a stick, can be used to swab a bacteria killing solution called Peridex on the teeth a couple of times a day. Even a very small amount of this product will do quite a bit to reduce the effect of the comatose period on the teeth.
coma patients that are most aware of their environment react to pain as much as healthy people. Researchers who did the scans in Belgium say it justifies giving pain relief to all patients in this “minimally conscious state” (MCS).
Brain death is not the same as coma, because someone in a coma is unconscious but still alive. Brain death occurs when a critically ill patient dies sometime after being placed on life support. This situation can occur after, for example, a heart attack or stroke.
Generally, most patients at a hospital do come out of a coma. Typically, a coma does not last more than a few days or couple of weeks.
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.
People who do wake up from a coma usually come round gradually. They may be very agitated and confused to begin with. Some people will make a full recovery and be completely unaffected by the coma. Others will have disabilities caused by the damage to their brain.
The vast majority continue to be kept alive via hydration and nutrition delivered through a feeding tube.
Meals that are rich in carbohydrates can help the body absorb tryptophan, which is an amino acid that the body uses to create serotonin. Serotonin is a hormone that helps regulate sleep, digestion, and mood, which may account for that common post-meal feeling of happiness, sleepiness, and satiety.