There is more to human beings than a physical body Hippocrates observed that the brain was the messenger of consciousness, not the consciousness itself. So our brain is a tool through which we express our consciousness. The livelier our consciousness is the better its vehicle. Our soul produces our consciousness in connection with our I. The more awake these are the more conscious we are.
Speech, thought and standing upright are under the direct control of our “I”. Obviously this man’s “I” has further plans for his incarnation. A story like this tells us that we cannot know the full spiritual purpose behind the incarnation of a human being.
The story also suggests a rebirth, a child-like redevelopment and his first word was “Mom”.
Coma man’s rewired brain astonishes doctors
A MAN who was barely conscious for nearly 20 years regained speech and movement three years ago because his brain spontaneously rewired itself.
US doctors say they now can prove his brain has grown tiny new nerve connections to replace the ones sheared apart in a car crash.
Terry Wallis, 42, spends almost all his waking hours in bed, listening to country music in a cramped, two-room house.
He speaks in a slurred but coherent voice, returning a visitor’s pleased-to-meet-you with “Glad to be met,” and speaking haltingly of his family’s plans to light fireworks at his brother’s house nearby.
For his family, each word is a miracle. For 19 years — until June 11, 2003 — Mr Wallis lay mute and virtually unresponsive in a state of minimal consciousness, the result of a head injury received in a traffic accident. Since his abrupt recovery — his first word was “Mom” — he has continued to improve, speaking more, remembering more.
But Mr Wallis’ progress has also been a kind of miracle for scientists: an unprecedented opportunity to study, using advanced scanning technology, how the human brain can suddenly recover from such severe, long-lasting injury.
In a paper published this week, researchers say they have strong evidence that Mr Wallis’ brain is healing itself by forming new neural connections.
The paper, in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, includes images of Mr Wallis’ brain, the first such pictures ever taken from a late-recovering patient.
The findings raise hopes that doctors will eventually be able to determine which patients with severe brain damage have the best chance of recovering.
“We read about these widely publicised cases of miraculous recovery every few years, but none of them, not one, has ever been followed up scientifically until now,” said Dr Nicholas Schiff, a neuroscientist at Weill Cornell Medical College in Manhattan and the senior author of the new study.
Although Mr Wallis’ progress is exciting and inspiring, doctors said the same cannot be hoped for people in a persistent vegetative state. Nor do they know how to make others with less serious damage recover, as Mr Wallis has.
“Right now these cases are like winning the lottery,” said Dr Ross Zafonte, rehabilitation chief at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre. “I wouldn’t want to over-enthuse family members or folks who think now we have a cure for this.”
Nerve cells that have not died can form new connections; for example, nerves in the arms and legs can grow about 2.5 centimetres a month after they are severed or damaged. This happens far less often in the brain.
The new research suggests that instead of the sudden recovery Mr Wallis seemed to make three years ago, he may have been slowly recovering all along, as nerves in his brain slowly formed new connections until enough were present to make a network.
Researchers used a new type of imaging that tracks the direction of water molecules in and around brain cells, an indicator of brain activity, and makes pictures in red, green and blue — one colour for each direction of movement (up/down, back/front, top/bottom).
“It’s a road map of how the connections are running,” Dr Schiff explained.
NEW YORK TIMES, AP