Voice that made coma victim weep

[didymus]

The Telegram:

Voice that made coma victim weep

Mathew Taylor, 31, had been unconscious since suffering severe head injuries in a motorcycle accident on the island of Bali, Indonesia, last July.
In what has been hailed as a victory for methods of stimulating coma patients, he has been showing signs of recovery since hearing his Indonesian girlfriend’s voice on the phone from his bed at the Royal Derby Hospital.

Mr Taylor had been teaching English in Indonesia for 18 months and was making plans to marry Handayani Nurul, known as Anda, when the motorbike crash left him critically ill.

After undergoing surgery in Bali for a fractured skull, he slipped into a coma and was returned to Britain, where doctors told his parents that their son may never regain consciousness.

He showed no signs of movement until three weeks ago, when his mother, Heather, called Miss Nurul in Indonesia.

“He had tears in his eyes as he held the phone to his ear,” said Mr Taylor’s stepfather, Simon Moore. “She asked him something and he said a silent 'yes’. Then tears were coming down his face. It was brilliant.”

Mr Moore said his stepson was now in a low-awareness coma, which meant he showed signs of responding to certain stimuli. “He’s really come on the past three weeks,” he said. “Heather calls Anda while we are with Mathew and as soon as he hears her voice he lifts his hand for the phone. He listens to her and you can see this change in him.
“We spend most of our days at hospital and some days are good and others bad, but we take what we can get. We are just happy he is responding.”

I’ve been listening to back episodes of the BBC podcast “In Our Time” on Consciousness, the Brain, Dreams, Artificial Intelligence. For all the experts have learnt (which is impressive) they still are far from really understanding our brains, much less minds.

God bless Matthew & speed his further recovery.