Karen Quinland became one of the most famous persons in the field of Bioethics because of the controversies over her right to die. Due to a drug overdose, she went into a coma for an extended period of time. Because of many peoples misconceptions about comatose conditions, controversies about her case arose as the public tried to rationalize the decision of allowing her to die. Because of popular culture, the average person believes that a patient in a comatose condition, or a persistent vegetative state (PVS) to be in a state of peaceful slumber. However, persons in such a condition suffer both mentally and physically.The romantic aura to the idea of a person in coma permeates popular culture because of the movies and stories that we hear every day. Movies such as Coma staring Michael Douglas and While You Were Sleeping staring Sandra Bullock falsely portray the state of coma as peaceful and angelic, and true to most popular Hollywood endings, the person in the coma always wakes up at the end and lives happily ever after. Watching these movies, one would certainly see a parallel between them and the stories that are told to young children everyday. Even from childhood, fairy tales influence and mislead people by presenting a false impression of serenity to a, in reality, very serous physiological and psychological problem. For example, Snow White who ate a poisoned apple (possible drug overdose) went in to a coma, and was miraculously awakened by a prince. In sleeping beauty, the princess was again in a coma after injuring her self with a spinning machine (possible head trauma), but a young man again awakened her. Both stories portrayed the victims as beautiful even after weeks and years of unconsciousness, which in reality would be highly unlikely. What makes these stories even more unbelievable is that both victims were awakened to the kiss of a handsome young man.These idealized versions of comas cannot be true, because ...
