The minimum state of consciousness is an entity that was revealed in 2002, the year when the work of Joseph Giacino, from the New Jersey Neuroscience Institute, made it possible to distinguish it from a vegetative state. What is its main characteristic? The subject’s inability to follow simple instructions in a “concrete” manner, even though he is conscious of his environment. Therefore, he will sometimes smile at people he knows, and only at them, or will perform voluntary movements from time to time. But if he is asked to respond to simple orders such as “pinch my hand”, he would never be able to communicate his thoughts.

Patients in a vegetative state, to which we have wrongly assimilated patients in a state of minimum consciousness for a long time, have their eyes wide open, but only have reflex, involuntary movements.

Steven Laureys, head of the Coma Science Group at ULg, showed that nociceptive stimuli given to patients in a state of minimum consciousness caused a brain activation pattern identical to the one in normal patients, which is not the case in people in a vegetative state. In other words, everything indicates today that patients in a minimum state of consciousness feel physical pain and emotions, necessitating the administration of analgesics, especially when they are given treatment.