Good news, they all saved...

thank god!!

More of ´what caught my nose today´. I was just wondering how it was possible that the peel of the mandarine I just ate was smelling so profoundly and nice. I realized that, being uncareful, I put half of it over the ash tray and it started burning. Does smell n ice though

Stunning view, this owl!

Attack!

 Wow...it´s a bit frightening!!

This is probably one of the most horrific medical stories I have ever heard of.  This man has been laying down in a hospital bed, presumed to be in a coma, for 23 years - completely unable to communicate that he was conscienous.  A living hell....

A Belgian man who doctors thought was in a coma for 23 years was conscious all along, it has been revealed.

Medical staff believed Rom Houben had sunk irretrievably into a coma after he was injured in a car crash in 1983.

The University of Liege doctor who discovered in 2006 that, although Mr Houben was paralysed, his brain was working, said the case was not unique.

Mr Houben said that at first he felt angry at his powerlessness, but eventually learned to live with it.

"Other people had an opinion of me," Mr Houben, now 46, told the BBC.

"I knew what I could do and what I was capable of but other people had a rather pathetic image of me. I had to learn to be patient and now finally we are on an equal footing."

´He´s an optimist´

It was only in 2006 that a scan revealed Mr Houben´s brain was in fact almost entirely functioning.

He now communicates by using a special keyboard attached to his wheelchair.

His mother, Fina Houben, told the BBC that she always believed her son could communicate.

"He is not depressed he is an optimist," she said. "He wants to get out of life what he can."

The BBC´s Dominic Hughes, in Belgium, says the case raises the issue of how many other people believed to be in comas are actually trapped inside their bodies, desperate to communicate.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8375326.stm

 Actually this news story gives a lot of food for thought.  I have NEVER carried an organ donation card as I am aware that you are not always "dead" when they remove organs.  Brain death has been a legal form of "death" and organs are removed from a patient such as the one above for transplantation.  It is lucky for the Belgian man that his mother did not give permission for the venilator to be switched off.

The following article shows why I never carry an Organ Donation card:-

"Some form of anesthesia is needed to prevent the donor from moving during removal of the organs. The donor’s blood pressure may rise during surgical removal. Similar changes take place during ordinary surgical procedures only if the depth of anesthesia is inadequate. Body movement and a rise in blood pressure are due to the skin incision and surgical procedure if the donor is not anesthetized. Is it not reasonable to consider that the donor may feel pain? In some cases, drugs to paralyze muscle contraction are given to prevent the donor from moving during removal of the organs. Yet, sometimes no anesthesia is administered to the donor. Movement by the donor is distressing to doctors and nurses. Perhaps this is another reason why anesthesia and drugs to paralyze the muscles are usually given."

It is one thing f the material is "harvested" in an ethical manner, which does not always happen....I know it seems very nice and generous to donate one´s body parts....but I am against it. 

One big reason is because it commoditizes the human body. It´s enough to have to worry about being mugged for one´s wallet, but when your tendons, skin, sinews, bones and more.become elegible ...for sale, it changes things somewhat...it opens a door that I don´t think should be opened.

I am more than willing to be an organ donor and carry the card.  I would rather someone with a chance at a "real" life move on with theirs, than me live in a vegetative state year after year.........

 I agree. And I always wonder, for the people out there who don´t carry a card... Let´s say something happens to you and you need a new liver to live. The doctor says, lucky you! We have a match! If we don´t transplant this liver into your body, you will die in two days, but now you can live! Are you going to say, oh no, don´t give me that liver. I don´t know if it was taken from a man in a coma? Would you choose death?

 I would say "I don´t want that liver if it was taken from a man who may have been conscious but was unable to tell anyone, and who may not have been given anaesthetic, so spent his last few moments of his life in torturous pain and effectively was killed so that I could live".