The recent extension by a California judge to continue mechanical support to the body of 13 year-old Jahi McMath magnifies the confusion of the term “brain death” and its inherent implications.
This ruling allows the child’s metabolic activity to be supported by external methods including ventilator and circulatory support even though the status of the child has sufficiently been determined to uphold California state law for brain death according to physicians managing the patient as well as independent evaluators and confirmatory tests.
For most states—including California—criteria for death are based on the Uniform Determination of Death Act Criteria and divided into two categories: cardiac death or brain death. Death is considered both legally and clinically to have occurred by either of these two categories.
The demise of Jahi McMath child is heart-wrenching.
A young girl goes to the hospital for an elective tonsillectomy, wakes up normal, but then develops bleeding complications that result in cardiac arrest and prolonged cerebral oxygen deprivation culminating in the current brain death status.
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