Mayo
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Joined: 03 Mar 2006
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 Posted: 07/05/06 - 10:30 Post subject: Brain reconnects after 19-year coma |
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That the brain cells can reconnect shows a case of Terry Wallis who has been in coma for 19 years. Unfortunately, the process is way too slow that is gives us very little hope for brain function improvement.
Terri was just a teenager when he had an accident and crashed through the barrier of a mountain road. His head was severely injured and he was left paralyzed from the neck down leaving little chances of survival. He was in a minimally conscious state, also known as MCS, for 19 years and responded little to the outer world. The only signs of presence he was able to show was limited head nodding and grunting but he was unable to communicate using gesture or verbal output.
Back in 2003, he woke up, thinking he was still twenty and asked his mother for a can of Pepsi. The doctors described it as a medical miracle.
They think that Wollis’s brain has repaired slowly and that neural connection has occurred. The brain images they took showed that the neural cells have made new connections over the set of years in relatively undamaged brain areas. This is medically named as axonal regrowth. The scientists believe that this axonal regrowth could represent the brain’s effort to re-establish connections that would lead to proper functioning of motor control and speech.
Terry Wallis has been through a rehabilitation process and has been introduced to his wife and now 19-years old daughter. His short-term memory is still impaired but he reported he was happy to be alive. |
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