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clinical death can be caused by things other than cardiac arrest, also cardiac arrest does not always cause clinical death. - Cohesion ☎ 07:29, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)
There is already a Wikipedia article on Near-death experiences. Appending a section on NDEs to this article-- a section even longer than the original article itself --is redundant and wholly inappropriate. I am deleting the NDE material, retaining only the Related article link. Cryobiologist 05:36, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
Cardiac arrest can occur many minutes after respiratory arrest, as in near drowning. Cardiac arrest promptly causes respiratory arrest, but respiratory arrest does not promptly cause cardiac arrest. I have reverted the recent edit that confuses these issues. Cryobiologist 21:20, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
The revision introduced by Skeptic06 is actually the definition of legal death, not clinical death. I have therefore reverted the change. Since there is currently no article on legal death in Wikipedia, and one is badly needed, I suggest the UDDA definition of (legal) death cited by Skeptic06 be used to start a new article specifically on Legal death. Cryobiologist 01:48, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
Added PrimarySources tag. Please cite a reference for the claim that "clinical death" is synonymous with "cardiac arrest or cardiac death" instead of with "legal death." The legal (UDDA) determination is "clinical" (based on a direct observation of the patient [1]) "in accordance with the accepted medical standards" at the time of death. I agree that in common usage, "clinical death" is often used to mean a temporary cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions. But the UDDA definition includes both a definition of dead, as well as the clinical determination. So why is this not synonymous with the UDDA definition? Skeptic06 04:53, 3 January 2007 (UTC)Skeptic06
IOW: clinical ("based on direct observation of the patient") + death (irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory, or brain, functions). Of course clinicians are only human, so mistakes are made. But by definition (and US state laws), you can only survive "clinical death" if a mistake was made in the clinical determination. That is, you're not really dead, clinically speaking. Skeptic06 05:13, 3 January 2007 (UTC)Skeptic06
I withdraw what I said about there being people using clinical death to mean conditions beyond circulatory arrest. The about.com page that motivated the comment
http://dying.about.com/od/glossary/g/clinical_death.htm
cites the same Strickland book you did, so it's only realy one reference, the context and interpretation of which we can't easily check. Furthermore, the about.com page has just lost the medical professional endorsement that it had two days ago. The only other reference you cited, the Google "define:" function, uses the text of the unsourced incorrect entry on Clinical Death in Wikipedia that I corrected back in December 2005. So that leaves only one questionable reference.
In the research literature, the equation of clinical death with circulatory arrest is essentially universal. So much so, that I would say any other usage is not merely non-standard, but incorrect.
I will add more to this article in coming days. Cryobiologist 20:34, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
'Clinical death' is not a term that doctors use. It is a term that journalists use in order to sound dramatic. The only reference given in this article to a proper definition is an Internet website of dubious reliability. I don't doubt that the text is useful and encyclopedic, but 'clinical death' is not a medical concept, it is a popular concept. - Richard Cavell 05:36, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
There is a recent (May 7, '07) Newsweek article titled " To Treat the Dead" which talks about new research that indicates it is not oxygen starvation that damages the brain cells, but instead it is the reintroduction of oxygen after circulation had previously stopped that causes the brain cells to "commit suicide" by apoptosis. Could someone find a better source for this information and update the article accordingly? Thanks. -- Hi Ev 20:34, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
basically if you are going use clinical definitions, then you should quote clinical references not a vague etymological reference that itself partially contradicts the premise of the entry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.194.242.187 ( talk) 21:31, 14 April 2012 (UTC)
In Limitations we have both used within paragraphs of each other, with no explanation for the difference:
"The brain, however, appears to accumulate ischemic injury faster than any other organ. Without special treatment after circulation is restarted, full recovery of the brain after more than 3 minutes of clinical death at normal body temperature is rare.[6][7]" [...] "In 1990, the laboratory of resuscitation pioneer Peter Safar discovered that reducing body temperature by three degrees Celsius after restarting blood circulation could double the time window of recovery from clinical death without brain damage from 5 minutes to 10 minutes. " Lamerc ( talk) 14:51, 17 November 2019 (UTC)
I deleted the paragraph claiming that the case of Velma Thomas was some kind of record for survival of clinical death because the 17 hours of absent brain function mentioned is neither a record for survival of absent brain function nor, more importantly, is it a record for survival of clinical death because absent brain function is not circulatory arrest ("clinical death"). Cryobiologist ( talk) 07:15, 29 September 2021 (UTC)
The reasoning Cryobiologist gave for this deletion was substantive information, and therefore well intentioned, but lacked substantiating references. I suggest the reasoning was not only (1) absent necessary references but also (2) overly simple-minded. (1) If there are, as Cryobiologist claims, better examples than Velma Thomas, then those examples should be added. That wouldn't necessarily mean the Thomas info should be deleted, because the Thomas example is controversial, and the counterexamples might either be also controversial, or might involve super high modern tech (and therefore be irrelevant to the point of the Thomas example). (2) The point of the Thomas case is not to teach or prove medical info, and should not be included or deleted on such grounds. It is, rather, an illustration that at any given point in history science sometimes does not know everything about a situation - in fact universally does not know everything about any situation. That's why the Thomas case should be included, not to support superstition or unwarranted skepticism about doctors' end of life decisions, but to illustrate that there are sometimes unexpected results, and that we need to accept and deal with controversy. It's vaguely analogous to how I might wish there were no "anti-vaxxers" and "stolen election" people, but foolish to pretend they don't exist and delete mentions of them from Wikipedia (though those are extreme examples, not saying Thomas is in that league.) Maxwell Gerald Anderson ( talk) 18:12, 29 September 2021 (UTC)\
The very first sentence of the article currently reads "Clinical death is the medical term for cessation of blood circulation and breathing, the three criteria necessary to sustain the lives of human beings and of many other organisms." It says three criteria but lists two. I guess something's missing? 2001:8A0:7C19:2801:201E:A112:AC30:DFC9 ( talk) 11:45, 25 August 2022 (UTC)
This article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||
|
clinical death can be caused by things other than cardiac arrest, also cardiac arrest does not always cause clinical death. - Cohesion ☎ 07:29, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)
There is already a Wikipedia article on Near-death experiences. Appending a section on NDEs to this article-- a section even longer than the original article itself --is redundant and wholly inappropriate. I am deleting the NDE material, retaining only the Related article link. Cryobiologist 05:36, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
Cardiac arrest can occur many minutes after respiratory arrest, as in near drowning. Cardiac arrest promptly causes respiratory arrest, but respiratory arrest does not promptly cause cardiac arrest. I have reverted the recent edit that confuses these issues. Cryobiologist 21:20, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
The revision introduced by Skeptic06 is actually the definition of legal death, not clinical death. I have therefore reverted the change. Since there is currently no article on legal death in Wikipedia, and one is badly needed, I suggest the UDDA definition of (legal) death cited by Skeptic06 be used to start a new article specifically on Legal death. Cryobiologist 01:48, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
Added PrimarySources tag. Please cite a reference for the claim that "clinical death" is synonymous with "cardiac arrest or cardiac death" instead of with "legal death." The legal (UDDA) determination is "clinical" (based on a direct observation of the patient [1]) "in accordance with the accepted medical standards" at the time of death. I agree that in common usage, "clinical death" is often used to mean a temporary cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions. But the UDDA definition includes both a definition of dead, as well as the clinical determination. So why is this not synonymous with the UDDA definition? Skeptic06 04:53, 3 January 2007 (UTC)Skeptic06
IOW: clinical ("based on direct observation of the patient") + death (irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory, or brain, functions). Of course clinicians are only human, so mistakes are made. But by definition (and US state laws), you can only survive "clinical death" if a mistake was made in the clinical determination. That is, you're not really dead, clinically speaking. Skeptic06 05:13, 3 January 2007 (UTC)Skeptic06
I withdraw what I said about there being people using clinical death to mean conditions beyond circulatory arrest. The about.com page that motivated the comment
http://dying.about.com/od/glossary/g/clinical_death.htm
cites the same Strickland book you did, so it's only realy one reference, the context and interpretation of which we can't easily check. Furthermore, the about.com page has just lost the medical professional endorsement that it had two days ago. The only other reference you cited, the Google "define:" function, uses the text of the unsourced incorrect entry on Clinical Death in Wikipedia that I corrected back in December 2005. So that leaves only one questionable reference.
In the research literature, the equation of clinical death with circulatory arrest is essentially universal. So much so, that I would say any other usage is not merely non-standard, but incorrect.
I will add more to this article in coming days. Cryobiologist 20:34, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
'Clinical death' is not a term that doctors use. It is a term that journalists use in order to sound dramatic. The only reference given in this article to a proper definition is an Internet website of dubious reliability. I don't doubt that the text is useful and encyclopedic, but 'clinical death' is not a medical concept, it is a popular concept. - Richard Cavell 05:36, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
There is a recent (May 7, '07) Newsweek article titled " To Treat the Dead" which talks about new research that indicates it is not oxygen starvation that damages the brain cells, but instead it is the reintroduction of oxygen after circulation had previously stopped that causes the brain cells to "commit suicide" by apoptosis. Could someone find a better source for this information and update the article accordingly? Thanks. -- Hi Ev 20:34, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
basically if you are going use clinical definitions, then you should quote clinical references not a vague etymological reference that itself partially contradicts the premise of the entry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.194.242.187 ( talk) 21:31, 14 April 2012 (UTC)
In Limitations we have both used within paragraphs of each other, with no explanation for the difference:
"The brain, however, appears to accumulate ischemic injury faster than any other organ. Without special treatment after circulation is restarted, full recovery of the brain after more than 3 minutes of clinical death at normal body temperature is rare.[6][7]" [...] "In 1990, the laboratory of resuscitation pioneer Peter Safar discovered that reducing body temperature by three degrees Celsius after restarting blood circulation could double the time window of recovery from clinical death without brain damage from 5 minutes to 10 minutes. " Lamerc ( talk) 14:51, 17 November 2019 (UTC)
I deleted the paragraph claiming that the case of Velma Thomas was some kind of record for survival of clinical death because the 17 hours of absent brain function mentioned is neither a record for survival of absent brain function nor, more importantly, is it a record for survival of clinical death because absent brain function is not circulatory arrest ("clinical death"). Cryobiologist ( talk) 07:15, 29 September 2021 (UTC)
The reasoning Cryobiologist gave for this deletion was substantive information, and therefore well intentioned, but lacked substantiating references. I suggest the reasoning was not only (1) absent necessary references but also (2) overly simple-minded. (1) If there are, as Cryobiologist claims, better examples than Velma Thomas, then those examples should be added. That wouldn't necessarily mean the Thomas info should be deleted, because the Thomas example is controversial, and the counterexamples might either be also controversial, or might involve super high modern tech (and therefore be irrelevant to the point of the Thomas example). (2) The point of the Thomas case is not to teach or prove medical info, and should not be included or deleted on such grounds. It is, rather, an illustration that at any given point in history science sometimes does not know everything about a situation - in fact universally does not know everything about any situation. That's why the Thomas case should be included, not to support superstition or unwarranted skepticism about doctors' end of life decisions, but to illustrate that there are sometimes unexpected results, and that we need to accept and deal with controversy. It's vaguely analogous to how I might wish there were no "anti-vaxxers" and "stolen election" people, but foolish to pretend they don't exist and delete mentions of them from Wikipedia (though those are extreme examples, not saying Thomas is in that league.) Maxwell Gerald Anderson ( talk) 18:12, 29 September 2021 (UTC)\
The very first sentence of the article currently reads "Clinical death is the medical term for cessation of blood circulation and breathing, the three criteria necessary to sustain the lives of human beings and of many other organisms." It says three criteria but lists two. I guess something's missing? 2001:8A0:7C19:2801:201E:A112:AC30:DFC9 ( talk) 11:45, 25 August 2022 (UTC)