"Barbara Weller, who is one of the attorneys for the Schindlers, says that the last time she checked in, not very many hours ago, Terri's eyes and tongue were bleeding now.

"Her eyes are sunken and her skin continues to flake off," Weller added.

On Thursday Terri's parents reported that their daughter now resembles "an Auschwitz victim."

At the request of Michael Schiavo's attorney, Judge George Greer has banned cameras and video equipment from her room, precluding the possibility that a photographic record of her deteriorating condition might be kept.

The eyewitness accounts stand in stark contrast to predictions from medical experts cited in numerous media reports who insisted that Terri's starvation death would not be gruesome.

On Wednesday, for instance, the Los Angles Times reported:

"Doctors say that going without food and water in the last weeks of life is not traumatic, and that the body is equipped to adjust to such conditions."

The paper quoted Dr. Perry G. Fine, vice president of medical affairs at the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization in Arlington, Va.

"What my patients have told me over the last 25 years is that when they stop eating and drinking, there's nothing unpleasant about it – in fact, it can be quite blissful and euphoric."

"It's a very smooth, graceful and elegant way to go," Dr. Fine added.

Editor's note: