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87 Notre Dame L. Rev. 1749 (2011-2012)
A Call to Reject the Neurological Standard in the Determination of Death and Abandon the Dead Donor Rule

handle is hein.journals/tndl87 and id is 1757 raw text is: A CALL TO REJECT THE NEUROLOGICAL STANDARD IN THE DETERMINATION OF DEATH AND ABANDON THE DEAD DONOR RULE Lauren j Riley * INTRODUCTION Advances in life-saving technologies coupled with the growing demand for solid organs have caused the medical community to chal- lenge its traditional understanding of death. Today, most states have adopted the Uniform Determination of Death Act (UDDA),' which prescribes two criteria for determining death. The UDDA states that a person is dead when he or she has sustained either (1) irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions, or (2) irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain, including the brain stem.2 The Act further specifies that the determination of death must be made in accordance with accepted medical standards.3 These two standards have become known as the cardiopulmonary standard and the neurological standard, respectively. But the standard for determining death was not always twofold. Prior to the second half of the twentieth century, people had long understood death according to the cardiopulmonary standard, that is, when a person's heart and circulatory system have permanently and irreversibly ceased to function.4 However, during the second half of * Candidate forJuris Doctor, Notre Dame Law School, 2013; Bachelor of Arts in Economics & Political Science, Providence College, 2010. I would like to offer my sincere gratitude to Professor John Robinson for his invaluable guidance throughout the research and editing phases of this Note. I would also like to thank my family for their unwavering love and support and the staff of the Notre Dame Law Review for their sacrifices in editing this work. 1 UNIF. DETERMINATION OF DEATH AcT §1 (1981), 12A U.L.A. 777 (2008). 2 Id. 3 Id. 4 Seema K. Shah & Franklin G. Miller, Can We Handle the Truth? Legal Fictions in the Determination of Death, 36 Am. J. L. & MED. 540, 541 (2010). 1749

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