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A Sleeping Pill that Wakes the Dead


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  • 2 weeks later...

More info:-

http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2006/s1753801.htm

Coma tablet trialled in South Africa

 

PM - Monday, 2 October , 2006 18:30:00

Reporter: Zoe Daniel

MARK COLVIN: An extraordinary medical trial is about to begin in South Africa, to test whether a simple sleeping tablet can wake patients with severe brain injuries from their coma.

 

The trial is the result of an extraordinary case in which a doctor gave a restless coma patient a sleeping pill as a sedative.

 

Instead, it woke the man up.

 

Almost 200 patients, with varying degrees of brain injury, have since been given the same medication.

 

At least two other vegetative patients in other parts of the world have also woken up after the treatment.

 

There'll now be an official medical trial to test this apparent miracle.

 

Zoe Daniel reports from Johannesburg.

 

ZOE DANIEL: Louis is now 31 years old.

 

Seven years ago, he was hit by a truck when riding a bicycle in his hometown of Springs. The accident put him in a form of coma for three years. During that time he was completely unresponsive.

 

Now, he's awake, and he can talk.

 

DOCTOR: Okay, now I'm going to introduce you to, this is Zoe.

 

ZOE DANIEL: Hello Louis.

 

DOCTOR: Do you know any Wallaby rugby player?

 

LOUIS: One.

 

DOCTOR: Which one?

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More info:-

http://www.guardian.co.uk/medicine/story/0,,1870279,00.html

Reborn

 

We have always been told there is no recovery from persistent vegetative state - doctors can only make a sufferer's last days as painless as possible. But is that really the truth? Across three continents, severely brain-damaged patients are awake and talking after taking ... a sleeping pill. And no one is more baffled than the GP who made the breakthrough. Steve Boggan witnesses these 'strange and wonderful' rebirths

 

Tuesday September 12, 2006

The Guardian

 

For three years, Riaan Bolton has lain motionless, his eyes open but unseeing. After a devastating car crash doctors said he would never again see or speak or hear. Now his mother, Johanna, dissolves a pill in a little water on a teaspoon and forces it gently into his mouth. Within half an hour, as if a switch has been flicked in his brain, Riaan looks around his home in the South African town of Kimberley and says, "Hello." Shortly after his accident, Johanna had turned down the option of letting him die.

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