Is it appropriate to use neurological criteria to determine death?
The customary criteria for determining death are “cardio-pulmonary,” i.e., death is declared after breathing and heart-beat cease. Technological advancements in critical care, however, have made continued circulation and respiration possible through mechanical means even after brain function has ceased. The use of neurological criteria for the determination of death is legitimate according to the Catholic Church. Pope John Paul II approved this approach in an address he gave to the 18th International Conference of Organ Transplant Specialists in August 2000. Neurological criteria consist of four key signs: coma or unresponsiveness, absence of cerebral motor responses to pain in all extremities, absence of brain stem reflexes, and apnea. Pope Pius XII and Pope John Paul II both said the Church has no competency in determining death; this properly belongs to medical science.
