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Severe Neurological Impairment: Legal Aspects Of Decisions To Reduce Care, H. Richard Beresford
Severe Neurological Impairment: Legal Aspects Of Decisions To Reduce Care, H. Richard Beresford
Cornell Law Faculty Publications
Decisions to reduce care for patients with severe neurological impairment may raise legal questions. The laws of most states now authorize physicians to stop care for those who have suffered irreversible cessation of all functions of the brain (“brain death”). Where state law is not explicit, it is nevertheless probably lawful to regard brain death as death for legal purposes so long as currently accepted criteria are satisfied. Several courts have ruled that it is lawful to reduce care for patients in vegetative states, but have prescribed differing standards and procedures for implementing such decisions. The issue of whether parents …