A HIGH Court judge has ruled that a severely brain damaged patient being treated by doctors at Oxford University Hospitals (OUH) NHS Foundation Trust should be allowed to die.

The ruling has prompted calls for a review of the legislation surrounding such situations after both doctors and the woman’s husband believed that treatment to keep her alive should be stopped.

On Tuesday Mr Justice MacDonald said the patient’s husband had been left ‘angry’ that his wife’s suffering had been prolonged because of ‘uncertainty’ around the law.

OUH lawyers told the court how the woman, who is being artificially fed through a tube, had suffered complications after an operation during the summer of 2017 and had been left with brain damage.

Barrister Victoria Butler-Cole, who led the trust's legal team, said the woman had been diagnosed as being in a 'minimally conscious state'.

She said doctors thought that artificial feeding should stop and the woman should be allowed to die.

The woman's husband agreed.

Ruling that doctors could indeed stop treatment, Mr Justice MacDonald added: "All I will say is that (the man's) anger and dismay demonstrates that the sooner current uncertainty in this area of the law is resolved the better for families."

Court justices are expected to analyse the legal issues in such cases in the near future.