The vegetative and minimally conscious states: ethical implications.

Modern medical technology has created new syndromes of severe and permanent brain damage. In the first 25 years of the right-to-die debate, the permanent vegetative state has been the paradigmatic neurologic syndrome for decisions to discontinue treatment. In the near future, however, a far more problematic syndrome may be even more important in the right-to-die debate, the minimally conscious state. This paper presents a few of the medical and ethical similarities and differences between the permanent vegetative and minimally conscious states and discusses how value-laden these decisions may become in the future.