THE brain expert who has treated Mr Andrew Devine yesterday said his case was the most extraordinary he had ever heard of.
Dr Keith Andrews acknowledged that it was bound to cause anxiety for families of other patients in vegetative states. But the situation was so unusual he could see no reason for the existing clinical guidelines or legal position on PVS to change.
Dr Andrews cared for Mr Devine for about a year after his admission to the Royal Hospital for Neurodisability, Putney, southwest London, in 1992. Since then he has seen the patient at home at 18 month intervals.
Dr Andrews, medical director at the hospital and consultant in charge of the profound brain damage unit, said yesterday: "I know of no other case in the world literature where someone has emerged as late as five years.
"Inevitably it is going to cause concern in some people's minds, and for very good reasons. One may ask the question: `If it can happen to Andrew Devine, could it, have happened to Tony Bland?'
"But we've now seen a large number of people in the same situation for long periods of time and have not seen anybody else emerged from a vegetative state.
"If this is a one in 100,000 chance, do you really want to make decisions about the other 99,999 patients that mean they are kept alive with tubes and people, doing things to them for decades?
Dr Andrew said the family was highly distressed and had not wanted to attract a deluge of media interest prematurely.
He said: "PVS is not a concrete diagnosis. It's a continuum from a coma though different levels of vegetative state."
A person who is in a state where they can only react by reflex action for three months to a year is described as being in a persistent vegetative state. After a year they are said to be in a permanent vegetative state. Patients in this category, such as Mr Devine are not expected to reemerge.
Dr Andrews was now talking to leading specialists from other countries with the aim of drawing up the first international guidelines on diagnosing PVS.
Since 96 Liverpool soccer fans were crushed to death at the FA Cup semi final in Hillsborough on April 15th, 1989, the disaster has rarely been out of the news.
The tragedy happened in the Leppings Lane terrace end of the Sheffield Wednesday ground at the cup tie between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest. Some 95 fans died that day.
The last victim, Tony Bland, died in 1993 after his parents fought a lengthy legal battle to have his life support machine switched off.
Though some bereaved and injured received out of court settlements from police insurers, others have failed to get compensation.
More than £10 million has been paid out of the Hillsborough disaster fund to bereaved families, and almost 650 fans have received cash payments.
Last November, four police officers won compensation claims in the Court of Appeal for psychological damage they suffered while rescuing victims. Fourteen police officers have already won £1.2 million damages in the courts.
The police, as the people in charge of crowd control at the ground, were held principally responsible for the disaster in an inquiry.