Brain Dead

To pull plug or not? What is Brain Dead? By definition Brain Dead is when the entire brain, including the brain stem, has lost all function. Furthermore, the upper part of the brain, the cerebrum, is involved in all conscious functions including sensation, movement, memory, thought and personality. The brain stem is the lower part of the brain and it controls basic vital functions such as wakefulness, breathing, heart rate, blood pressure and temperature. The brain is held in a bony skull and has no room to swell if injured. While a sprained ankle has room for the tissues to swell, the brain does not. As the brain swells, pressure builds up inside the skull causing brain cells to die that are being pushed against the skull. As pressure continues and the brain cannot expand any further, it pushes against the brain stem at the bottom of the brain to expand through the hole at the base of the skull. As all of the blood flow and messages to and from the cerebrum pass through the brain stem, function becomes lost due to the excessive pressure. This is when a person becomes brain dead. With patients who are in intensive care with a severe head injury, the nurse
monitors the patient’s responses and level of consciousness, and carries out frequent observations. The nurse notifies the doctor of any deterioration in the patient's condition. Given this information, the doctor may suspect brain death has occurred and therefore carry out tests to check brain function.
Two independent doctors diagnose brain death.
The tests show whether the brain has any blood flow to it and whether it is functioning. If there is no blood flow the brain dies. A Coma and brain death are different. A coma is an unconscious state from which you may recover; the brain keeps working even while the patient is unconscious. Brain death occurs when the brain has been so badly damaged from the lack of oxygen and blood supply, the brain stops functioning permanently. Both doctors must have at least five years of experience in their chosen specialty, must each perform a special set of tests, 2 to 12 hours apart, to determine brain death. Upon the second set of tests when the patient is pronounced brain dead, medically and legally this is the time, which is entered as the time of
death. The heart of an individual who is pronounced brain dead continues to beat with the help of a ventilator. The ventilator continues to push air into the lungs; it assists in delivering oxygen through the bloodstream to the beating heart and the rest of the body. Also the heart has its own natural pacemaker and so it can continue to beat for a while after brain death has been announced. Because of the ventilator giving oxygen and the heart naturally beating, the tissues continue to receive oxygenated blood; therefore the body stays warm too. The decision to pull the plug or not, is up to the family members of the individual. Some people still have the hope that individual will recover. However, a patient who is brain dead will never recover. There is no point in keeping an individual with artificial life, when they will never be the same. The person will never again be awake, breathe, see, hear, feel, think or remember. Yet to the family members of the person unplugging their loved one is a very difficult thing to do for them. Many family members still have hope that their loved one will recover. To them the person is still alive, even if the person as already has been declared dead by doctors. As you can see, A person who is brain dead is no longer alive, the body no longer functions as a coordinated whole. In this case, all the so-called life support is doing is preventing the body from decomposing. So why should we keep a person plug when they are dead and will never be alive again.