Dr. Nolan of our philosophy department will present a department colloquium by entitled “When We Circulate Blood in an Organ Donor, Is Their Death a Diagnosis or Prognosis?” at 4 PM on Thursday the 18th of April in Stowe 205.

End-of-life ethical issues are important not only for philosophers, but for anyone interested in healthcare and human rights.

Here’s an abstract of the presentation:

There are two ways that death is currently declared in the US: cessation of brain activity, and cessation of heart and lung function.  Some patients who are declared dead using the latter criteria (their heart and lungs having stopped) are then given oxygenated blood (normothermic regional perfusion) in order to preserve their organs for donation.  Tellingly, the surgeons performing this treatment are careful to block the blood vessels leading to the brain, so that the brain is no longer oxygenated.  In cases like this, is the patient really dead?  I argue that death is merely a prognosis (a prediction of what will probably occur) rather than a diagnosis in these cases.