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brain death

brain death

4 5.8
A condition when all brain activity stops and cannot return, even if the heart still beats
  • noun
  • /breɪn dɛθ/
  • Specialized
translation icon : muerte cerebral
  • The current generally agreed-upon criteria for brain death have simplified some of these confusions, but they have not solved them.
  • brain death and donor
  • brain death notifications
  • brain death cases

And so we start to talk about, you know, brain death as being served the definition of the end of life.

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Examples

  • Otherwise, we would expect to see a difference between the numbers of donors and brain death cases.

    Academic text (2010)
  • However, it is a legal obligation to report every brain death regardless of whether the deceased was a donor or not.

    Academic text (2010)
  • The significant increase in reported brain death cases is particularly important.

    Academic text (2010)
  • In this way, families are offered the option of donation in every brain death case.

    Academic text (2010)
  • We found important agreement and some differences regarding practices around brain death.

    Academic text (2018)
  • Legislation was developed to define brain death and establish guidelines for organ donation and transplantation.

    Academic text (1993)
  • Uncorrected, ventricular fibrillation leads to brain death in about four minutes.

    Fiction book (1994)
  • We aimed to investigate specific practices that currently provoke international discussion in the area of brain death and postmortem organ donation.

    Academic text (2018)
  • The clinical definition of brain death is the complete and irreversible cessation of brain activity.

  • Legislation was developed to define brain death and establish guidelines for organ donation and transplantation.

Synonyms

cerebral death
vsbrain death
  • Specialized
7.9

Complete and permanent loss of all brain activity and consciousness while the body may still have a heartbeat

stresses permanent loss of independent body functioning even if the heart keeps beating

Antonyms

1.0

The time from birth to death when a person is alive

How Unconscious

brain death
  • Specialized
4 5.8
coma
  • Specialized
259 5.4
stupor
  • Specialized
17 7.7
drowsiness
6 1.8
wakefulness
4 4.7

Surface Forms

brain death singular
brain deaths plural

Morphology

brain + death

The compound is compositionally transparent: 'brain death' literally denotes the death of the brain, so a learner who knows 'brain' and 'death' can infer that the brain has stopped functioning. This construction is common cross-linguistically (e.g. muerte cerebral, mort cérébrale) so a B1 learner will grasp the general meaning even if they may not know the precise medical or legal nuances.

Etymology

Brain death comes from the image of the brain as the body's control room: when the brain stops working completely, the body cannot control itself even if the heart still beats. So brain death means the brain has died and the person cannot wake up or live on their own.