Re: Death of Hisashi Ouchi

["Bjorn Cedervall" <bcradsafers@hotmail.com>]

>months, when he otherwise would have died soon after exposure.  I'm >sure 
>that the medical lessons learned will be invaluable in treating
>future cases and may indeed save the life of Mr. B.
-----------
I have read through ethical aspects discussed already - they are all easy to 
understand but can be difficult in decision making. It is important to 
remember that there is circumstancial information that we do not have 
(family's wishes, hospital policy and so on).

We must also remember that this was a unique situation - it was originally 
impossible to know where this would lead. On the other hand, I think that we 
all understood - especially after 5-6 weeks of medical reports that the 
chances of saving the life of Mr. Hisashi Ouchi were very small - but we 
didn't know: We didn't know for instance whether the intestinal epithelium 
might recover after 6-7 weeks or even longer, or that the white blood cells 
would fail like they did over the last weeks. We don't know yet why Mr. 
Hisashi Ouchi was unconcious throughout the 82 days (was it metabolic 
poisoning, sedative drugs or combinations of these and other mechanisms). 
May be that this information is already "out there" somewhere. I am sure 
that we learned a lot from this unique situation.

Suppose that we have another radiation accident in the future where somebody 
gets similar doses and dose distributions but where one or two organs for 
some reason are shielded. In such a situation, the information we now have 
may be invaluable and may actually be life saving. I tend to agree with the 
statement above - but at the same time it was unpleasant to follow this 
horrible and hopeless situation day after day - and in particular the last 
5-6 weeks or so. I only represent myself with these lines.

Bjorn Cedervall   bcradsafers@hotmail.com

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