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Internal Medicine • Neurology • Pulmonology • Neuro-critical care • Critical Care • Brain Death • Neurohospitalist
In patients being evaluated for brain death, which abnormal movements are definitively known to still be consistent with brain death and which are possibly consistent with brain death but lack definitive evidence?
What are the sources for this and are they reliable by today’s standards? Numerous case series report various abnormal movements but how reliable are these studies, especially older reports when diagnostic tools like MRI were not available?
Answer from: at Academic Institution
This is indeed a challenging question, one that I continue to grapple with as a neurointensivist. Fortunately, most brain-dead patients do not exhibit any movements in response to noxious stimuli, but some case series report reflexive movement in up to 75% of cases. The classic teaching is that only...
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