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Vegetative patients may be more conscious of the world than we think
Cambridge study shows brain-damaged patients responding to simple new test
Severely brain-damaged patients in a persistent vegetative state may be capable of being consciously aware of the outside world, scientists said.
A relatively simple test based on measuring patterns of brainwaves has revealed that some unconscious patients in a vegetative state have a “robust” network of brain activity that allows conscious thoughts, they said.
The test could be developed into a diagnostic tool for doctors so that they can assess whether brain-damaged patients in a vegetative state might be able to understand what is going on around them, said Srivas Chennu, a clinical neuroscientist at Cambridge University.
“Understanding how consciousness arises from the interactions between networks of brain regions is an elusive but fascinating scientific question,” Dr Chennu said.
Source: http://philosophers-stone.co.uk/wordpress/2014/10/vegetative-patients-may-be-more-conscious-of-the-world-than-we-think/
