Study reveals changes in brain activity in response to withdrawal of life support

5. May 2010

At a time when "donation after cardiac death" (DCD) has become an important approach to increasing the number of transplant organ donors, a provocative new study shows changes in brain activity occurring in response to withdrawal of life support, reports the May issue of Anesthesia & Analgesia, official journal of the International Anesthesia Research Society (IARS).

Some transplanted organs come from living donors, while others come from cadaveric donors shortly after brain death. Society has become comfortable procuring organs from donors following brain death, because the person is believed to no longer "exist" when the brain stops functioning. the rest