Republican majority leader and physician Bill Frist opposed the removal of her feeding tube and in a speech delivered on the Senate Floor, challenged the diagnosis of Schiavo's physicians of Schiavo being in a persistent vegetative state (PVS): "I question it based on a review of the video footage which I spent an hour or so looking at last night in my office." After her death, the autopsy showed signs of long-term and irreversible damage to her brain consistent with PVS. Frist defended his actions after the autopsy.