A man thought in a coma for 23 years was actually conscious but paralyzed!

Rob Houben was unfortunate to get involved in a car accident when he was 20 years old. The incident was not a good one at all, for it left him completely paralyzed. He never did fall into a coma though, but he was unable to let those around him know about it, however desperately he tried to, so they assumed he was unconscious.

Following a diagnosis by the doctors, they declared him as in a vegetative state. Houben stayed like this for a staggering 23 frigging years, and all he experienced of the outside world was nothing but his small hospital bed. The doctors determined that he was in a vegetative state using the widely used system that evaluates eye movement and motor responses, the Glasgow Coma Scale. The problem is that while his body was functioning like that of a coma patient, his cerebral cortex was functioning normally.
Later, a new brain scan was carried out and it revealed that the man they thought had been in a coma was all too conscious! He can now communicate using a keyboard that responds to the faintest tremors of his right hand. And this is not the only case. According to neurologist Steven Laureys who performed the scan on Houben, 40 percent of patients he has seen and apparently said to be in a coma revealed some level of consciousness.