Karen Quinlan Dies After 10-Year Coma : N.J. Case Prompted Historic Decision to Disconnect Respirator

Karen Ann Quinlan, who lapsed into a coma a decade ago and prompted a historic right-to-die court decision after her parents sought to have her disconnected from a respirator, died Tuesday in her mother’s arms. She was 31.

She died of pneumonia at 7:01 p.m. at the Morris View Home, Dr. James Wolf said.

“They were silent, subdued. They had tears in their eyes,” he said of Joseph and Julia Quinlan.

Ailing for Five Days

Quinlan had been suffering from pneumonia for five days, and by late afternoon death was “clearly imminent,” Wolf said at a news conference at the nursing home.

“The initial cause of death was respiratory failure following acute pneumonia on top of a chronic vegetative state,” Wolf said.

Msgr. Thomas Trapasso, who has served as the family’s spiritual adviser, described the Quinlans as “in some sense relieved.” He said their daughter’s death “had always been on their minds.”

Quinlan lapsed into a coma on April 15, 1975, at her boyfriend’s birthday party. She had apparently consumed several gin and tonic drinks on top of what doctors said was a “therapeutic” amount of a mild tranquilizer and aspirin. The mixture was never firmly established as the cause of her condition.

After doctors said that Quinlan would never return to a “cognitive state,” her parents sought court permission to disconnect her from a respirator.

In the landmark ruling in March, 1976, the New Jersey Supreme Court said Quinlan could be removed from the respirator. It was disconnected on May 22, 1976, but contrary to doctors’ projections, she remained alive in what was described as a “chronic vegetative state.”

“It’s amazing. We never expected her to live,” her mother said in a 1980 interview. The Quinlans adopted Karen at birth.

A Few Gray Hairs

The 5-foot, 4-inch woman, who weighed about 75 pounds and was fed by a tube in her nose, had not changed much in the last several years, except that she had a few gray hairs, her mother said last year.

She had remained in a fetal position, and there was no expression on her face other than an occasional frown, Trapasso said.

Since she lapsed into the coma, her family has annually celebrated a Mass at which her parents and her brother and sister prayed and sang Karen’s favorite song, “Amazing Grace.”