Uniform Determination of Death Act 1981 (UDDA)
Definition
US model legislation, drafted by the President's Commission, that provides two legally equivalent definitions of death: irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions, and irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain including the brain stem. Adopted in most US states.
Related terms
- Dead-Donor Rule
- The ethical and legal principle that vital organs may only be retrieved from individuals who have already been declared legally dead. It...
- Harvard Criteria (1968)
- The four-point diagnostic criteria for a permanently non-functioning brain published by the Harvard Ad Hoc Committee in JAMA: unreceptivity and unresponsivity, no...
- Molecular Death
- The progressive, tissue-by-tissue irreversible failure of cellular metabolism that follows somatic death. Different tissues undergo molecular death at different rates, ranging from...
- Somatic Death
- The irreversible cessation of vital functions of the organism as a whole: cardiac activity, respiratory activity, and integrated neurological function. The threshold...
- TOHTA 1994
- The Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Act 1994 (India), amended in 2011. Section 2(d) defines brain-stem death as the permanent and...
Explained in
- Death: Brain, Cardiopulmonary and Molecular DefinitionsUS model legislation, drafted by the President's Commission, that provides two legally equivalent definitions of death: irreversible cessation of circulatory a...