Unconcioussness vs deep sleep: what are the differences?

[folkhemmet]

What are the main differences between being in a deep sleep vs being in an unconsciouss state due to sickness and/or injury? I know that it is easier to wake someone up from a deep sleep than it is to wake someone up from being "knocked out." Are the brainwaves observably different? Are other vitals observably different? Thanks

[Jeff Root]

This would be appropriate for the General Science sub-board.

Also unconciousness induced by drugs. I've had that once, when
my appendix was removed. The anesthetist told me to count down
from one hundred. I got to 97, and what seemed like about two
minutes later I woke up back in my hospital room, actually about
six hours later. In contrast, this morning it seemed like three or
four hours went by from the last time I fell asleep to the final time
I woke up, but it was really something less than two hours. I was
dreaming vividly, in part because I was cold. (The thermostat is
becoming more and more reticent to change.)

Being unconcious was exactly like I would have expected: Nothing.
Nothing during and no sense of anything afterward, like the sensation
that time has elapsed.

-- Jeff, in Minneapolis

[Gillianren]

For starters, you don't get REM during unconciousness, I'm fairly sure. I'm also pretty sure that a lot of the autonomic functions that get heightened during sleep don't get heightened during unconciousness. But that's a guess on my part.

[toejam]

A pretty full answer is here:

http://www.medicinenet.com/coma/article.htm

Or a simpler description in:


http://www.mamashealth.com/coma.asp