Rom Houben has been trapped in a series of worst nightmares, including trying for 23 years to alert those around him that he was not in a coma. A new report suggests he’s not alone in his experience.

In 1983, Belgian engineering student and martial arts enthusiast Houben, then 20, was in a car accident that was thought to have left him in a vegetative state. Doctors relied on the widely-used Glasgow Coma Scale, assessing his eyes, verbal, and motor responses. What they failed to notice was that Houben was actually conscious—but completely paralyzed.

“I screamed, but there was no one to hear,” he says in an interview with the German magazine Der Spiegel. Three years ago, neurologist Steven Laureys used modern scanning techniques to discover that Houben’s cerebral cortex was, in fact, functioning. (The doctor has only just now made Houben’s story public.)

Now Houben is now able to communicate via specialized computer that allows him to write with slight hand movements. Here is what he wrote in an interview:

I am called Rom. I am not dead. The nurses came, they patted me, they sometimes took my hand, and I heard them say “no hope.” I meditated, I dreamed my life away—it was all I could do. I don’t want to blame anyone—it wouldn’t do any good. But I owe my life to my family. Everyone else gave up.

I studied what happened around me as if it were a tiny piece of world drama, the bizarre peculiarities of the other patients in the common room, the entry of the doctors into my room, the gossip of the nurses who were not embarrassed to speak about their boyfriends in front of “the extinct one.” That made me an expert on relationships.

This story reminds me of this movie:

h/t: Cnet.com

Grant Brissey covered everything from hard news and technology, to music, film, and visual arts during his time working for The Stranger. Grant's work has also appeared at Geekwire, and in Billboard,...

30 replies on “The Glasgow Coma Scale and Holy Shit: Conscious Man Thought to Be in a Coma for 23 Years”

  1. Yeah, medical technology is always advancing. This guy was mistakenly thought to be in a coma. Centuries ago, people were sometimes buried alive when doctors thought they were dead. Creepy.

  6. I’m surprised he’s so “normal.”

    If I didn’t speak or run around for 20+ years, I think that would have a big impact on my overall intelligence.

  8. The Glasgow Coma Scale is a *preliminary* means to assess neurological status, but it is NOT the sole means complete an assessment of neurological function. CT scanning and EEG are not exactly new – I wonder whether either were used in this case.

    4 – Such technology WAS in fact used in Schiavo’s case:

    “In preparation for the trial, a new computed axial tomography scan (CAT scan) was performed, which showed severe cerebral atrophy. An EEG showed no measurable brain activity. The five physicians chosen were Dr. William Maxfield, a radiologist, and four neurologists: Dr. William Hammesfahr , Dr. Ronald Cranford , Dr. Melvin Greer and Dr. Peter Bambakidis.”

    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terri_Schia…)

  9. It sounds like someone did a terrible job to me. The glasgow coma scale is only meant for ACUTE assessment after trauma. You don’t use it to definitively diagnose a vegetative state.

    The medical standard to confirm a vegetative state in this country is an EEG, which would have immediately revealed that this man was alert and conscious. Those were available back in 1983.

    My guess is that someone made an initial bad decision and he was put in a nursing home where no one bothered to check. Just awful.

  11. If you actually watch the video of this guy “typing”, you’ll see that they’re using faciliated communication, a THOROUGHLY DEBUNKED sham whereby the facilitator is the one doing the actual typing, not the patient. I’m not saying that the patient is not aware — he may very well be — but this fraudulant activity is extremely cruel and misleading, putting someone else’s words into his mouth and giving his family false hope.

    Further write-up on this topic: http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swif…

  14. As a teen reading Johnny Got His Gun, I instantly became a death-with-dignity and even euthanasia supporter.
    Yes, a horrible mistake was made that kept this guy isolated for 26 years. But if I were in his shoes right now, being able to finally communicate, I’d STILL want pillow therapy, and that would be the first thing I’d ask my loved ones to help me with. God- being trapped like that in my own body is my absolute WORST nightmare. So he can communicate? Is what he’s living now a life?
    No thanks very much.

  17. @ 4,

    According to the autopsy, “Terri Schiavo suffered severe, irreversible brain damage that left that organ discolored and scarred, shriveled to half its normal size, and damaged in nearly all its regions…” Technology gave her the semblance of life but she was not alive.

  26. @11, I’m surprised more people haven’t been made aware of this. It looks like this “facilitated communication” is kind of like a Ouija board, and that this man may actually be in a vegetative state. It’s such an exciting and heartrending story, it would be difficult to find out it’s only a sham

  27. @ 27 – The guy has been in a nursing home in Belgium, where they have govmint-run healthcare. Had he been here under BushReaganCare, he would’ve been dead years ago. Bedsores or lack of money for special care would’ve got him.

  29. yeah this SUCKS. Sounds like that could be living hell. I can’t imagine his reaction when he woke up. “Sir, welcome to the year 2009. We’re very sorry.”

    I find it interesting that this guy can write well, with good grammar and vocabulary, after all that time not writing anything

    Another thought, it would be awful to be hearing people having sex in the same room with you while lying there, not in a coma, thinking, fuck, I haven’t been laid since I was in my 20s(?)

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