More ways to communicate with patients that we used to think were brain dead.
Scientists have been able to reach into the mind of a brain-damaged man and communicate with his thoughts.
The research, carried out in the UK and Belgium, involved a new brain scanning method.
Awareness was detected in three other patients previously diagnosed as being in a vegetative state.
The study in the New England Journal of Medicine shows that scans can detect signs of awareness in patients thought to be closed off from the world.