The autopsy found no evidence to support her family's accusations that she suffered broken bones or other injuries as a result of abuse, and also cast doubt on allegations that an eating disorder contributed to her 1990 collapse.
The extensive examination of Schiavo's body found that her brain weighed only about half of what a healthy human brain would, Pinellas County medical examiner Jon Thogmartin, said at a news conference.
"Her brain was profoundly atrophied," he said. "This damage was irreversible."
The autopsy found that her brain was so severely damaged that no amount of therapy would have helped to regenerate it. Schiavo's parents had repeatedly said their daughter was responsive to them and could have been helped with therapy.
"She would not have been able to form any cognitive thought," said Dr. Stephen Nelson, a forensic pathologist who assisted in the autopsy. "There was a massive loss of brain tissue."
The autopsy also found no evidence to support allegations that Schiavo had been given poison by her husband or that she had been mysteriously injected with something during or after a visit by her parents to the hospice where she was being cared for.
"No drugs or other substances given to Mrs. Schiavo caused her to die or accelerated the dying process," he said.
