Predicting coma recovery with 100% accuracy: A preliminary study

A new Adaptive Reconfiguration Index has crucial implications for clinical management and decision-making in unconscious and unresponsive brain-injured patients. 

A McGill-led team has developed a new tool that can predict with 100% accuracy whether patients in a vegetative or coma state will recover consciousness. In a preliminary study, the newly developed Adaptive Reconfiguration Index was able to predict in each case whether a patient would recover from an unresponsive state within three months. These results provide families and healthcare professionals with vital information for the difficult clinical decisions that need to be made for the patient.

The preliminary findings, out of the Biosignal Interaction Personhood and Technology (BIAPT) lab of Stefanie Blain-Moraes, Ph.D., P.Eng., School of Physical and Occupational Therapy in the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, appear in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. The team of researchers is now preparing for the next phase of studies which will include patients from across the country with newly diagnosed disorders of consciousness.