What is brain death?

Proven content

Brain death is a condition in which the brain eventually and irreversibly loses its functions. It is at this point that organs are most often harvested from the deceased for transplantation.

1. A 5-year-old Afghan boy who has poisoned by mushrooms is dead, doctors from the Children’s Memorial Health Institute announced today
2. – The condition of the five-year-old did not change and brain death was confirmed. We found the child’s death – they added
3. Yesterday, doctors informed that the child’s condition was very bad and that the procedure of brain death had been initiated. What is this? What is it about?
4. More information can be found on the Onet homepage.

Mushroom poisoning and brain death

Poisonous fungi can be toxic not only on internal organs (mainly the liver and kidneys), but also on the brain and the autonomic nervous system responsible for regulating the work of internal organs.

This is exactly what happened with a 5-year-old Afghan boy. His 6-year-old brother, who also consumed poisonous mushrooms, had a liver transplant yesterday. – In the case of a XNUMX-year-old, the transplanted liver works properly, but in the last XNUMX hours we observed increasing symptoms of severe damage to the central nervous system. The prognosis for the boy’s survival is unfavorable, doctors from the Children’s Memorial Health Institute reported on Thursday.

1. Death of a five-year-old Afghan who poisoned himself with mushrooms. Latest facts

The concept of brain death is hard to accept, especially when it happens when a loved one is in this state. The family has to deal with this problem most often when their loved one has already had an accident, was taken to the hospital and hospitalized. It seems to the patient’s family that when doctors who do everything in their power to restore or maintain a patient’s circulation with drugs and to assist in breathing with a ventilator, they are always able to save him. A patient who, for example, has experienced a cerebral hemorrhage does not look like he is dying, but as if he were in a dream. His skin is warm and he looks like he’s breathing.

This is the moment when the doctor tries to explain to the family that their loved one is dead. It is also the moment when the family is informed about the possibility of donating organs from the deceased. In order to make it easier to make a decision, in this situation, first of all, you need to know what the state is.

1. Half of the children who poison themselves with mushrooms die. Doctors are sounding the alarm

What exactly is brain death, and who states it?

Brain death occurs when a person has suffered irreversible damage to the brain, resulting in the cessation of all brain functions. In Poland, brain death is diagnosed in a hospital by K.an omission of doctorswhich consists of specialists from various fields of medicine: one from anesthesiology and intensive care or neonatology, and the other from the field of emergency medicine or internal medicine or cardiology or pediatric cardiology or paediatrics. It is important that the law prohibits physicians who would then perform organ donation or transplantation from participating in this committee. The only task of the commission is to find that brain death is noticed.

Examples of causes of brain death:

1. head trauma (a serious injury in which the patient, for example, was a traffic accident, received a gunshot wound to the head, fell and injured his head),
2. brain vessel damage (e.g. stroke, aneurysm rupture),
3. cerebral hypoxia (e.g. as a result of drowning or a heart attack, when doctors fail to restore circulation quickly enough, before the brain is damaged),
4. a brain tumor.

What does it mean that the closest person is brain dead?

When a person is diagnosed with cerebral death, it means that the person is no longer alive. Her brain is not working and it will never work again. The moment of confirming brain death is the date and time that are entered on the death certificate. If in such a situation the doctors did not intervene and left a person in such a state without artificially supporting the body alive, after a few minutes his whole body would begin to die. Other organs would cease to function, including the heart, kidneys and liver. However, if physicians do manage to keep the blood circulating in the body in the meantime, these organs will continue to function for a while. This is a moment that can be used to donate organs to another person and save his life.

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Why do we consider someone dead while their heart is still beating?

The heart is an organ connected to the autonomic nervous system. This means that the heart works independently of how the brain works. So the heart beats even when the brain is no longer functioning, and it continues to beat until it is supplied with oxygen.

When a human brain dies, its organs continue to function for a short time. This is a very important time, because if doctors manage to keep blood flowing throughout the body, the organs will continue to function and will remain healthy and functional. This means that they will be suitable for transplantation to a person whom they can save their life.

It is important to understand that such artificial respiration support, and therefore keeping blood circulation in the body of a person diagnosed with brain death, is not keeping him alive. This man is no longer alive. Removal of the apparatus will cause his body to undergo natural decomposition processes, as if the doctors had not decided to attach it to the apparatus.

Therefore, disconnection from the ventilator should not be considered a cause of death. Doctors keep people diagnosed with cerebral death connected to apparatus because they know that this way they keep their organs healthy. In this way, you can save someone else’s life or significantly improve their health.

1. The neurologist checked what was happening in the body just before death

How do doctors know and how do they check if someone is brain dead?

To confirm the diagnosis of brain death, the doctor must suspect brain death, and then perform a series of tests to confirm this condition.

The stage of suspicion of cerebral death includes:

1. stating that the patient is in a coma,
2. stating that the patient is artificially ventilated,
3. determining the cause of coma,
4. finding that there is primary or secondary brain damage
5. stating that the damage to the brain is irreversible by using all available treatment options

and at the same time excludes:

1. poisoned patients and those who are under the influence of certain pharmacological agents (drugs, neuroleptics, sleeping pills, hypnotics, muscle relaxants),
2. patients in the state of hypothermia (surface heat),
3. patients with metabolic and endocrine disorders,
4. newborns under seven days of age.

Conducting the above analysis allows you to go to the next stage, in which a series of tests is carried out. It includes, inter alia, Performing tests twice at three-hour intervals, during which the following is stated:

1. absence of trunk reflexes,
2. persistent apnea.

The absence of trunk reflexes is evidenced by:

1. no pupil reaction to light,
2. no corneal reflex,
3. no spontaneous eye movements,
4. no eye movements during the caloric test,
5. lack of any motor reactions to the pain stimulus applied in the innervation of the cranial nerves, as well as the lack of a motor reaction in the face in response to pain stimuli applied in the area of ​​spinal innervation,
6. lack of vomiting and coughing reflexes,
7. lack of oculocerebral reflex.

Additionally, doctors gain confidence by examining the brain’s electrical activity with an electroencephalograph (EEG) for 12-24 hours. Other studies include the assessment of cerebral circulation and multimodal evoked potentials.

The detailed medical procedure of confirming brain death is defined in the announcement of the Minister of Health of 17 July 2007 on the criteria and method of confirming permanent irreversible cessation of brain activity (MP No. 46 item 547).

The death of a man is dramatic for his family. So let’s talk beforehand and find out if our loved ones want to donate their organs to other people after their death and save their lives in this way. It is also worth considering for yourself and informing the family so that they are prepared for this difficult moment. The drama of the death of a loved one can be somewhat mitigated by the awareness that despite the irreversibility of death, she can still offer her neighbor the gift of life.

Read also:

1. Is the mushroom edible? Watch out, granny’s method doesn’t work!
2. Poles eat this dangerous mushroom. Avoid far
3. It resembles the poisonous “Satan”, but it is an edible mushroom

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