"Persistent vegetative state"
Persistent vegetative state is the standard usage (except in the UK) for a medical diagnosis, made after numerous neurological and other tests, that due to extensive and irreversible brain damage a patient is highly unlikely ever to achieve higher functions above a vegetative state. This diagnosis does not mean that a doctor has diagnosed improvement as impossible, but does open the possibility, in the US, for a judicial request to end life support. Informal guidelines hold that this diagnosis can be made after four weeks in a vegetative state. US caselaw has shown that successful petitions for termination have been made after a diagnosis of a persistent vegetative state, although in some cases, such as that of Terri Schiavo, such rulings have generated widespread controversy. In the UK, the term is discouraged in favor of two more precisely defined terms that have been strongly recommended by the Royal College of Physicians (RCP). These guidelines recommend using a continuous vegetative state for patients in a vegetative state for more than four weeks. A medical determination of a permanent vegetative state can be made if, after exhaustive testing and a customary 12 months of observation, a medical diagnosis is made that it is impossible by any informed medical expectations that the mental condition will ever improve. Hence, a "continuous vegetative state" in the UK may remain the diagnosis in cases that would be called "persistent" in the US or elsewhere.
DTaP-IPV vaccine is a combination vaccine whose full generic name is diphtheria and tetanus toxoids and acellular pertussis adsorbed and inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV).It is also known as DTaP/IPV, dTaP/IPV, DTPa-IPV, or DPT-IPV. It protects against the infectious diseases diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, and poliomyelitis.Branded formulations marketed in the USA are Kinrix from GlaxoSmithKline and Quadracel from Sanofi Pasteur.Repevax is available in the UK.Within Japan, the formulation is called  四種混合（shishukongou - "mixture of 4"). Astellas markets it under the クアトロバック (Quattro-back) formulation, while another is available from Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma named テトラビック (Tetrabic). A previous product by Takeda Pharmaceutical Company has been withdrawn by the company. == References ==