Jahi McMath is Taken off Life Support Discussion

[BetteDavisEyes]

...If I am in such a state, I wouldn't want to be made to go on.

<respectfully snipped>
I feel the same way, but Jahi was unable to make the decision by herself. Her parents made the choice to keep their daughter alive, and even though some might not agree with their choice, I credit them for doing what they believed to be in Jahi's best interest. If keeping Jahi alive with machines made them feel that she was still here with them, I hope they found peace in caring for her and loving her in a way that most parents will never experience.

Many years ago, when our daughter was in middle school (1987), an eighth grader at her school (someone whose family we knew from church) was involved in a bicycle accident that left him comatose and on life support. We had been up north for the Memorial Day weekend and learned about the accident when we returned. The following day, I learned from a neighbor that the young man had been removed from life support and died immediately in the presence of his parents, older sister (who babysat our daughter for a few years), and the pastor of our Catholic parish. It was likely the most difficult decision they ever had to make, but they did what they believed to be in the best interest of their brain-dead son.

 

[watcher9]

After watching and listening to the renown specialists in the Caylee Anthony murder trial, I couldn't get over the differences of opinion they had, depending upon which side they represented.

Anything the NJ specialists have said could be suspect unless they can provide proof of their findings. Her records including the new "surgery" need to be opened for a thorough review and there needs to be an independent study done of her brain if it is preserved.

There may have been a reason for not allowing examinations to be conducted over the years.

Her brain will be preserved in order for scientists to study it, the McMath family attorney Christopher Dolan told the publication.

Arthur Caplan, head of medical ethics at New York University’s Langone Medical Center, told the Associated Press in 2014 he knew of no cases of a brain-death determination being reversed. He cautioned that the data collected on Jahi had to be examined by other researchers and experts in the field before any conclusions can be made.

Jahi McMath, Girl at Center of Brain Death Debate, Dies After Surgery Complications

 

[MyBelle]

After watching and listening to the renown specialists in the Caylee Anthony murder trial, I couldn't get over the differences of opinion they had, depending upon which side they represented.

Anything the NJ specialists have said could be suspect unless they can provide proof of their findings. Her records including the new "surgery" need to be opened for a thorough review and there needs to be an independent study done of her brain if it is preserved.

There may have been a reason for not allowing examinations to be conducted over the years.

Her brain will be preserved in order for scientists to study it, the McMath family attorney Christopher Dolan told the publication.

Arthur Caplan, head of medical ethics at New York University’s Langone Medical Center, told the Associated Press in 2014 he knew of no cases of a brain-death determination being reversed. He cautioned that the data collected on Jahi had to be examined by other researchers and experts in the field before any conclusions can be made.

Jahi McMath, Girl at Center of Brain Death Debate, Dies After Surgery Complications

The debate lives on because traumatic brain injuries will still occur. What Jahi has proved is that her brain was not entirely as "dead" as the initial testing indicated it to be. There doesn't need to be any second-guessing of the medical treatment she received in New Jersey, imo.

Hopefully, scientists can study Jahi's brain in order to develop more specific testing and also treatments that can improve the quality of life for other brain-injured people.

 

[watcher9]

Dozens of family members, friends and other mourners have filed into a Northern California church for the funeral of a teenage girl at the center of a medical and religious debate over brain death.

Mother of girl declared dead twice slams doctors at funeral

 

[Wyle_E_Coyote]

Report: Jahi McMath’s Brain Showed Some Signs Of Improvement After Brain Death, Doctors Say (with clip)

July 3, 2018

"...Doctors say there were clinical signs she incrementally improved over the five-year span, crossing the line between brain dead and a “minimally conscious state.”...

Several specialists concurred after neurological tests, and a coroner signed a death certificate..."

Report: Jahi McMath's Brain Showed Some Signs Of Improvement After Brain Death, Doctors Say
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

IIRC, her family refused to allow anyone to do another brain death test. They even filed last year to prevent the hospital from doing another test during the lawsuit.

Any doctors opining are doing so with limited information.

 

[Wyle_E_Coyote]

Yes! Post mortem is the only way to know exactly what happened to Jahi. That said, Jahi had been "dead" for so long that her organs had probably deteriorated so much that it might be impossible to know for certain what went wrong during the tonsillectomy.

BBM. Or perhaps what went wrong in the recovery room. I was very much looking forward to hearing testimony from other families in the recovery room at that time.

 

[always reading]

Jahi's mother was most certainly NOT a nurse. Jahi's grandmother said on camera that she was an RN, but she lied. She was an LVN (some states call them LPNs), which requires less education, comes with a more limited scope than RNs or advanced practice nurses, and usually are limited with regard to which areas they work. In other words, Grandma knew very little about pediatric ICU care.

Since when are those not nurses? Did you mean to say she's not an RN instead?

 

[MyBelle]

IIRC, her family refused to allow anyone to do another brain death test. They even filed last year to prevent the hospital from doing another test during the lawsuit.

Any doctors opining are doing so with limited information.

I think Jahi's doctors have had plenty of information on which to form their conclusion that Jahi's brain wasn't quite as dead as the tests indicated and that's why they decided to perform the surgery.


Jahi McMath improved after she was declared brain-dead, doctors say
“Brain death” is an important legal term, but not a biological certainty

Jahi McMath improved after she was declared brain-dead, doctors say

 

[MyBelle]

IIRC, her family refused to allow anyone to do another brain death test. They even filed last year to prevent the hospital from doing another test during the lawsuit.

Any doctors opining are doing so with limited information.

 

[jjenny]

I think Jahi's doctors have had plenty of information on which to form their conclusion that Jahi's brain wasn't quite as dead as the tests indicated and that's why they decided to perform the surgery.


Jahi McMath improved after she was declared brain-dead, doctors say
“Brain death” is an important legal term, but not a biological certainty

Jahi McMath improved after she was declared brain-dead, doctors say

If you mean the surgery that was done just before she was finally taken on life support, I don't think it had anything to do with how dead or not dead her brain was.
The surgery was in New Jersey. New Jersey doesn't considering brain dead persons as legally dead.
Which is why medicaid was paying for at least some of Jahi's care. And if she isn't considered dead, and her family wants surgery, presumably the doctor had to do it.

 

[MyBelle]

New Jersey absolutely uses brain death as a legal criterion for declaration of death. According to the statute definition, Jahi did not meet it because she had some brain function remaining. afaik, no surgeon is required to perform surgery just because the family wants it.

Brain Death.org Legal Resources

26:6A-3. Declaration of death based on neurological criteria Subject to the standards and procedures established in accordance with this act, an individual whose circulatory and respiratory functions can be maintained solely by artificial means, and who has sustained irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain, including the brain stem, shall be declared dead. L.1991,c.90,s.3.

 

[jjenny]

No, it has nothing to do with brain function remaining or not. New Jersey allows a religious exemption. If relatives don't believe that a brain dead patient is dead based on religious grounds, then New Jersey allows that patient to be considered alive.
"Her family fought the declaration and moved Jahi to New Jersey to take advantage of a religious exemption. Under state law, if a patient’s faith dictates that life persists so long as the heart is beating, then brain death alone is not sufficient for a legal declaration of death."
Declared brain dead almost 5 years ago, Calif. teen dies in N.J.

 

[MyBelle]

New Jersey's religious exemption applies only to the continuation of life support such as ventilation and feeding. The exemption doesn't require any doctor or hospital to perform additional surgery just because the family wants it.

 

[Wyle_E_Coyote]

Report: Jahi McMath’s Brain Showed Some Signs Of Improvement After Brain Death, Doctors Say (with clip)

July 3, 2018

"...Doctors say there were clinical signs she incrementally improved over the five-year span, crossing the line between brain dead and a “minimally conscious state.”...

Several specialists concurred after neurological tests, and a coroner signed a death certificate..."

Report: Jahi McMath's Brain Showed Some Signs Of Improvement After Brain Death, Doctors Say
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The doctors cited here have long histories of opposing the definition of brain death. They have affiliations with the Shiavo organization and right to life groups. That doesn't necessarily mean they are wrong, but it does mean they are not objective (after all, if the concept of brain death is wrong, then by definition "brain dead" people are alive), and they are definitely outside of the medical mainstream. I think it is important to recognize the potential bias here.

 

[Jax49]

The doctors cited here have long histories of opposing the definition of brain death. They have affiliations with the Shiavo organization and right to life groups. That doesn't necessarily mean they are wrong, but it does mean they are not objective (after all, if the concept of brain death is wrong, then by definition "brain dead" people are alive), and they are definitely outside of the medical mainstream. I think it is important to recognize the potential bias here.

^^^^
This!

 

[Fairy1]

Mother of girl declared dead twice slams doctors at... | Daily Mail Online

The mother of Jahi McMath, the teenage girl who was declared brain dead twice after a routine tonsil surgery, has slammed doctors who tried to turn off her life support as she was finally laid to rest nearly five years on from her tragic diagnosis.

Nailah Winkfield was given a standing ovation on Friday by the packed congregation of a church in Oakland, California, for waging the long-running legal battle over her daughter's future.

 

[Harikari]

I'll admit I'm sensitive. My cousin drowned and was resuscitated. He has no measurable quality of life by most people's standards. He can laugh and cry and watch television. He IS like Terri Schiavo. He requires no machines to keep him alive. He does get a feeding tube. I know people who walk around who also require feeding tubes to survive for various reasons. In fact doctors threatened to report his father when he asked for him to be taken off life support. But he's lived over 20 years now. I think it would be a crime to deprive him of food and water and let him spend over a week slowly dehydrating to death.

I would never choose to keep any of my kids on life support immeasurably. BUT I don't believe someone is dead just because they are on life support. And I don't believe someone who is truly dead by any definition can be kept alive for years on life support. It just doesn't work that way. If it does work that way please feel free to pull out studies and case studies that show the dead can live indefinitely on life support and by what definition they are indeed medically dead. But I don't believe in the redefining of death as convenient. The dead rot.

The thing is you just can't keep changing the parameters of what defines death to suit you. I remember this case well and I further remember everyone insisting she was dead. And everyone insisting she was dead was expounding on just how quickly her body would rot and how her brain would leak our her nasal cavities etc if she was dead regardless of the equipment she was on. I remember thinking, "Well, I guess we'll see if they were right."

Well they were wrong. You can not keep a corpse going for years. If you want to rely on science then do. But you can't rely on baloney instead. Whether she was dead or not has absolutely no bearing on how her parents behaved and whether or not it was appropriate to keep her on machines for years etc. She was either dead or she wasn't. And medically the dead have never been kept alive for years on machines. It defies all medical description of dead. Her body did not do what the medical authorities said it would do if she was dead or brain dead. Period. So I wish people would just own up to that already. They said the machines absolutely could not keep her going for long at all. They were wrong. So maybe, just maybe the doctors were wrong in their diagnosis. I think the fact that it took a full four years to for this happen shows someone was wrong.

And again that has no bearing on whether or not something things how her parents handled things. She was either dead or not. She wasn't. A piece of paper doesn't define death literally. That's like saying someone isn't dead either till they get a death certificate.

The thing is you just can't keep changing the parameters of what defines death to suit you. I remember this case well and I further remember everyone insisting she was dead. And everyone insisting she was dead was expounding on just how quickly her body would rot and how her brain would leak our her nasal cavities etc if she was dead regardless of the equipment she was on. I remember thinking, "Well, I guess we'll see if they were right."

Well they were wrong. You can not keep a corpse going for years. If you want to rely on science then do. But you can't rely on baloney instead. Whether she was dead or not has absolutely no bearing on how her parents behaved and whether or not it was appropriate to keep her on machines for years etc. She was either dead or she wasn't. And medically the dead have never been kept alive for years on machines. It defies all medical description of dead. Her body did not do what the medical authorities said it would do if she was dead or brain dead. Period. So I wish people would just own up to that already. They said the machines absolutely could not keep her going for long at all. They were wrong. So maybe, just maybe the doctors were wrong in their diagnosis. I think the fact that it took a full four years to for this happen shows someone was wrong.

And again that has no bearing on whether or not something things how her parents handled things. She was either dead or not. She wasn't. A piece of paper doesn't define death literally. That's like saying someone isn't dead either till they get a death certificate.

No, the fact that her body didn't decay doesn't necessarily mean that medical professionals have to re-think whether she was dead or alive. Imo it means that they learned something they didn't know - which is that it is possible to someone to be dead, and having things done to their bodies by machines, and have them not decompose. And this is only one case. So they just learned something they didn't know before. That's science. Maybe they had never had someone dead on these machines for so long before; who knows? The only people Not calling her dead after the hospital are people who *wanted* her to be alive so badly that they basically cause massive hysteria. Please don't take that personally; I'm not saying you or anyone is really 'hysterical', that's just the outdated word for it in psychology. It's very common for people to see things that they want to see, and that is so, so, so important in this case. They can tell someone else there, "omg, she moved her finger, did you see that"? And the person will think they did. And pretty soon it becomes 'truth'.

Or maybe I misunderstood your comment when I read that maybe the doctors were wrong in her 'diagnosis' of alive or dead.

 

[Harikari]

Mother of girl declared dead twice slams doctors at... | Daily Mail Online

The mother of Jahi McMath, the teenage girl who was declared brain dead twice after a routine tonsil surgery, has slammed doctors who tried to turn off her life support as she was finally laid to rest nearly five years on from her tragic diagnosis.

Nailah Winkfield was given a standing ovation on Friday by the packed congregation of a church in Oakland, California, for waging the long-running legal battle over her daughter's future.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Can you imagine how much it has cost to keep's her body from not decomposing? That costs of WHOLE lotta money that could have been spent keeping other people alive-and-functioning? It could have meant a child wouldn't lose her mother or father to cancer for example. I'm sorry it this offends people but imo the decisions made were very selfish. Very. If I believed in a God I would think that he would want her to come home to him rather than have her in a bed occasionally twitching her finger. I wish that her mother could have accepted it when the doctors had originally told her that Jahi had died. Now her Entire life will be about this very tragic experience and all the things she's going to do now - like suing a lot of people. She will have to tell this story every single day, and sleep with it at night - especially because people want to make her a spokesperson.

We should all do our advance directives Right now to reflect our beliefs and wishes.

 

[Harikari]

No, the fact that her body didn't decay doesn't necessarily mean that medical professionals have to re-think whether she was dead or alive. Imo it means that they learned something they didn't know - which is that it is possible to someone to be dead, and having things done to their bodies by machines, and have them not decompose. And this is only one case. So they just learned something they didn't know before. That's science. Maybe they had never had someone dead on these machines for so long before; who knows? The only people Not calling her dead after the hospital are people who *wanted* her to be alive so badly that they basically cause massive hysteria. Please don't take that personally; I'm not saying you or anyone is really 'hysterical', that's just the outdated word for it in psychology. It's very common for people to see things that they want to see, and that is so, so, so important in this case. They can tell someone else there, "omg, she moved her finger, did you see that"? And the person will think they did. And pretty soon it becomes 'truth'.

Or maybe I misunderstood your comment when I read that maybe the doctors were wrong in her 'diagnosis' of alive or dead.

PS: There is such a thing as an N=1 study - which is where this would fall. Just because it hasn't happened before - so obviously there are no studies you can be linked to. And most people wouldn't want, and their families wouldn't want, to be kept on machines for 5? years - so there are no other people. And I sure hope people aren't encouraged to keep people on machines for 5 years to prove anything. Surely you can understand that. Some things are just a one-off. That doesn't make what happened more or less valid.

 

[MyBelle]

The doctors cited here have long histories of opposing the definition of brain death. They have affiliations with the Shiavo organization and right to life groups. That doesn't necessarily mean they are wrong, but it does mean they are not objective (after all, if the concept of brain death is wrong, then by definition "brain dead" people are alive), and they are definitely outside of the medical mainstream. I think it is important to recognize the potential bias here.

Brain dead people are alive. That's a scientific fact if their heart is still beating naturally. Any physician bias is because there are several religious faiths that believe life begins at conception and ends with the natural cessation of the heartbeat.

I think many physicians, because of their faith, have opposed the concept widely held by laymen that the legal term, "brain death" equals biological death. Physicians know it does not and that is why the laws are very specific. The statutes on brain death require total cessation of ALL brain function including brain stem and proof that it is irreversible.

The proof of reversibility is where Jahi's case took a turn. Despite not being fed for three weeks while the legal arguments were made, Jahi survived a trip cross country and was eventually discharged to her mother's apartment. Jahi started her menstrual cycle and had other signs that some brain function was still present. iow, she no longer met the legal definition of brain dead.

Even though it was extremely minimal, some of Jahi's brain function had either returned or was never accurately evaluated in the first place.