Battle over whether patient is alive returns to Nevada district court
A Nevada hospital is seeking new medical tests for a college student on life support in a legal battle with her father over whether the 20-year-old woman is legally alive.
The dispute over the status of Aden Hailu is back in Washoe County District Court as a result of a Nov. 16 decision by the Nevada Supreme Court, the Associated Press reports. The decision ordered a hearing on whether the Saint Mary’s Regional Medical Center in Reno complied with a Nevada law when doctors determined that Hailu was dead.
Hailu suffered a drop in blood pressure and never awoke from anesthesia during April surgery to remove her appendix and explore the source of abdominal pain. Tests in April showed some brain function, though a doctor said Hailu was rapidly declining, according to prior coverage by the Las Vegas Review Journal.
Hospital physicians determined in May that Hailu can’t breathe on her own, and said she was brain dead according to guidelines by the American Association of Neurology. Those guidelines say death is determined by unresponsiveness, lack of brain stem activity, and an inability to breathe without support.
Hailu’s father, Fanuel Gebreyes, contends his daughter is alive under the AAN guidelines as well as Nevada law. It defines death as an “irreversible cessation” of “all functions of the person’s entire brain,” according to the Las Vegas Review Journal article.
Gebreyes doesn’t want an EEG until his daughter is given a tracheostomy to receive nutrition through her throat, rather than an IV.
