MRI showed signs of damage but doctors don't know severity till he wakes up

My Brother has had a brain MRI as he is now 12 days off sedation post Covid and hasn't woken up. He is 35 days ventilated and in minimal oxygen but is not taking any spontaneous breaths either now since he had emergency bowel surgery a week ago. The MRI showed some areas of the brain that had been starved of oxygen due to the massive bleed he had last week and he had to be resuscitated. Doctors do not know whether he will wake, or if he does, what kind of damage has been done.. We thought the MRI would give us some answers but it's just given us more uncertainty. Is there anyone else out there that has experienced this?

[Sepsur]

I hope that you get some more promising news over the next few days. If you follow this link to an information page - there is a great pdf on brain injury - this may give you a little more insight

icustepschester.org/informa...

[Hidden in reply to Sepsur]

Thank you so much for the information.. It gives me some idea of what to even ask and what may be ahead.

[Therehastobehope]

Hi there,

First of all I am sorry that your family is going through this tremendously tough time.

My mum(62) had a cardiac arrest 8 weeks ago and has sustained extensive damage to her brain as she was down for around 20 minutes although cpr was started immediately, they have said to us also that she may not wake up at all and if she does she will have no meaningful life.

She now opens her eyes when we walk into the room and say hello or we play her favourite music or a video of her grandchildren laughing and singing. She yawns, sneezes, coughs, swallows and moves her feet and hands when we massage them.

She doesn’t track anyone (just stares blankly) as we enter the room or if we are stood over her bed but I am really hoping that happens soon.

She is awaiting a place in Neuro rehab and we are hoping she makes some progress as she is currently on a cardiology ward. Thankfully her heart now appears to be fine and she is stable in that respect.

The hardest part in all of this that my family have found is the waiting part but he really just needs time.

Hoping you get some improvements soon!

[Angech in reply to Therehastobehope]

Hello Laura, glad mom is making progress! Is she breathing on her own now? How is her health otherwise? I hope she is doing well. When she gets to the brain rehab they have things to help the brain. She will start tracking. Are they doing anything for her brain where she is now? Do they monitor the brain and blood flow at all? My sister has had infections after infections, even 3 at once. They are ready to transfer her soon. I am struggling to get her into a brain rehab, they should send her to one but are leaving it to me to find a dr to take her. Hard job when everyone is focused only on covid. She is holding our hands a lot and sometimes with good strength. She don't open eyes but blinks when we ask questions and even the nurses say she is aware and alert. Yesterday she moved her lips like she was trying to say something. Her eyes tear when i speak to her. This is very, very stressful. Are your moms eyes dilated, does she respond to light and have dolls reflex? Hang in there! Xo

[Hidden in reply to Therehastobehope]

The waiting is just awful. My Brother is getting an EEg done today and I have looked for an update then from neurologist team. I thought he was trying to open his eyes a bit more when I asked him to but the nurses kind of dismissed it. I have taken some hope from your message though so thank you for sharing your story with me.

[rduwhtmm in reply to Therehastobehope]

Hello Therehastobehope, my mother went through the same thing, although slightly older than your mom, mid 60s. We removed life support and she passed. It was a heartbreaking choice to make, but we felt it was best for her. CPR was not started on her right away, although I have learned the amount of time of CPR makes no difference, I have talked to family members were loved ones only had 8 minutes of CPR and they are a year into a family member with UWS (I don't use that other word) and families that had a love one have CPR for 20 or more minutes and they are doing well. There are many factors that play into how effective CPR is, underlying health conditions, weight, how effective the person was able to provide CPR, the list goes on. Your mom sounds to be in the UWS period (unresponsive wakefulness syndrome) also known as that word that we use at the grocery store that I don't like to use that starts with a v. There may be things to help the brain. I am no expert but I did a lot of research and where in a traumatic brain injury (physical damage) the brain can find new ways to work around damaged areas, because that type of damage is to the neurons in the brain, anoxic injuries (oxygen starved to the brain from a stroke, cardiac arrest, drowning etc) the damage can be from mild to severe, and normal affects the whole brain, not just one part. This type of damage destroys the actual cells in the brain, not the connections. The proof of that is after about 6 months, if you do a repeat CT scan or MRI, you will start to see areas of atrophy in the brain, where the cells died. Her eyes should not be dilated, she should respond to light and she would not have dolls reflex. Those are all signs of brain death. Most patients in UWS will respond to light, have a cornea reflex, have correct movement of the eyes, will have a gag reflex, may cough, and will breath on their own. They will cough, cry, grimace, may smile, may move their limbs, may yawn. They will not be able to track a person across a room, communicate or have any interaction with their environment. This stage can be short or can it be permanent. I have have seen a patient in hospice with 9 minutes of CPR, given right away, he has UWS and has been that way for several years now. We all do the best we can for our family members, and I understand wanting to fight for them. I did not know what my mother wanted because she did not tell us, I just did not want to put her through that, though I will be honest and say some days I wish we would have let it play out. But knowing we would not want to leave her like that, we would have had to do it then, and she might have been well enough to breathe on her own, and we would have had to remove her feeding tube, and I did not want to do that to my mother. Some days I wonder if it would not have been as bad as the neurologist said it was. We only gave her 5 days. But we do what we can with the information we have.

[Duck_Meat81 in reply to rduwhtmm]

The things you can do is because of the brain stem cells did alot of reasearch still needing info on brain cells an what the stem can do for them in time far a relearning everything