Late-recovery from "permanent" vegetative state in the context of severe traumatic brain injury: A case report exploring objective and subjective aspects of recovery and rehabilitation.

This article provides a detailed outline of the recovery of a young male patient during his emergence from a vegetative state (VS) 19 months after suffering a severe traumatic brain injury. Several similar cases have been documented, but these tend not to consider the subjective experience of the patient or family; our aim was therefore to provide a detailed account that emphasises our neuropsychological exploration of the impact of the injury on this person, and looks at the experience of his mother along the timeline from his accident to the end of a successful period in rehabilitation. Clinical details are presented including standardised and non-standard assessments, neuropsychological interventions, as well as reflections from the patient himself.