WASHINGTON (ABP) — The autopsy results for Terri Schiavo, released by Florida officials June 15, conclude that she was not abused prior to collapsing and lapsing into an unconscious state 15 years ago, that she was blind at the time of her death, and that her brain had atrophied to half the normal size.
The report, released more than two months after her March 31 death, also concluded that the 41-year-old Florida woman could not have received enough food or hydration by mouth to sustain life.
Schiavo had been at the center of a protracted and acrimonious legal dispute between her husband, Michael, and her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler. Earlier this year, that dispute burst onto the national stage, with many religious conservatives adopting the Schindlers' position that their daughter be kept alive.
In the process, the dispute reached the federal courts, Congress and the White House, becoming a touchstone in the so-called “culture wars.”
Schiavo had been in what court-appointed physicians diagnosed as a “persistent vegetative state” since 1990, when she collapsed from what was initially diagnosed as a heart attack brought on by an eating disorder. Her brain was denied oxygen for an extended period of time, leaving her with significant neurological damage.
Doctors also concluded, while Schiavo was alive, that most of her cerebral cortex had ceased functioning. Her brain stem, they said, was reflexively regulating the bare essentials of life, such as her heartbeat, breathing and digestive processes.
But the Schindlers contended their daughter was in some minimal state of consciousness — even responding to visual and sound stimuli and trying to speak — and could be rehabilitated. But a series of state courts and state-appointed guardians repeatedly rejected their claims. The tube that supplied her with food and water was removed, at the request of her husband and by court order, 13 days before her death.
Jon Throgmartin, the chief medical examiner for Pinellas and Pasco counties in Florida, answered questions about the autopsy at a televised press conference. The report, and his explanation of it, appeared to contradict many of the arguments that the Schindlers and their allies put forth in their legal and public-relations battles to keep Terri Schiavo alive. Among them:
— Ability to respond to stimuli: Schiavo's brain had shrunk considerably, weighing only 615 grams at the time of death — and one of the most damaged areas of her brain had been the area that controlled vision, rendering her blind, Throgmartin said. The Schindlers repeatedly insisted that Schiavo could see and recognize them and other family members.
— Allegations of abuse: The report found no evidence that Schiavo had been the victim of any form of abuse or poisoning prior to or after her collapse. Representatives of the Schindler family had, on several occasions, implied that Schiavo may have collapsed as a result of domestic violence, or that she had been given drugs designed to hasten her death during her convalescence.
— Ability to be rehabilitated: The report determined that there was no way to reverse the brain damage that had incapacitated Schiavo. It also noted that attempting to feed her or provide her with hydration orally — which the Schindlers argued at one point she was capable of — was not possible and could have resulted in “aspiration,” or choking. The report noted that “[c]laims from caregivers of past oral feedings” were “potentially harmful or, at least, extremely dangerous to Mrs. Schiavo's health and welfare.”
— Not receiving a Magnetic Resonance Imaging, or MRI, scan: Such a scan could have interfered with a thalamic stimulator that was inserted in Terri Schiavo's brain in the early years of her convalescence in an effort to rehabilitate her, the examiner said. That, in turn, could have led to further brain damage. Some of the Schindlers' allies had publicly questioned why such a scan was never performed.
However, the examiner could not conclusively determine the cause of Schiavo's initial collapse, or whether it had been brought about by an eating disorder. Throgmartin's report also said pathologists could not say for certain whether Schiavo had been in a persistent vegetative state or merely a “minimally conscious state,” since both are clinical diagnoses “arrived at through physical examination of living patients” rather than post-mortem examinations.
While the Schindlers had sought the autopsy, news reports indicated June 15 that they would like for other medical professionals to review it.
In a televised news conference, George Felos, the attorney for Michael Schiavo, said his client was “pleased to hear the evidence” in the report and felt vindicated by it.
But some supporters of the Schindlers questioned the report's findings, and said it was irrelevant to the wider moral questions raised by the case.
“The autopsy does not bring closure to this case,” said Patrick Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition, in a June 15 news conference. “It only fans the flames of the moral issue of how we treat the disabled in America.”
Rob Schenck, chairman of the National Clergy Council, told journalists the report “actually leaves more questions unanswered than it answers” and that “medical examiners are doctors, and doctors are often wrong.”