Mod+ Article today on NDE in MailOnline.

Jules

New
logo_mol.gif

Friday, Jan 24 2014

Near-death patients do see afterlife
Doctors claim to have found the first scientific evidence that patients have experiences of an afterlife when they are clinically dead.

One in ten heart attack patients experienced emotions, visions and lucid thoughts when they had been unconscious with no pulse and no breathing activity, say the researchers.

The study is believed to be the first to ensure that the patients who reported a near-death experience (NDE) were clinically dead before being resuscitated.

The findings also contradict the notion that lack of oxygen is responsible for NDEs. Those who had the most compelling experiences had the best reserves of oxygen. Debate has raged for more than a century over whether the sense of entering another world, feelings of peace and a light at the end of a tunnel are evidence of an afterlife, or simply hallucinations.

The latest study, by Southampton University researchers, suggests the mind may continue to exist after the brain has ceased to function and the body is clinically dead.

The research team studied 63 survivors of a cardiac arrest who were resuscitated at Southampton General Hospital after they had been clinically dead with no pulse, no respiration and fixed dilated pupils. Independent studies have confirmed that the brain ceases to function at that time.

But seven out of the 63 survivors recalled emotions and visions during their unconsciousness, says a report in the journal Resuscitation. Four patients (six per cent) met the strict criteria used to diagnose NDEs.

They recalled feelings of peace and joy, of time speeding up, heightened senses, lost awareness of body, seeing a bright light, entering another world, encountering a mystical being or deceased relative and coming to a point of no return.

Dr Sam Parnia, a university clinical research fellow and co-author of the study, said accounts of NDEs have been found in many different cultures but there is often a problem in confirming the people involved were actually near death.

The patients involved in the new study had all stopped breathing and had no heartbeat before making a recovery and being questioned about what they remembered.

It has been suggested that the experiences are hallucinations, the result of disturbed brain chemistry caused by medication, lack of oxygen or changes in carbon dioxide levels.

But Dr Parnia said there was no difference in oxygen levels or drug treatment between the heart attack survivors who had not had NDEs and those who had.

'In fact, the four patients who met the criteria for a true NDE actually had higher oxygen levels,' he added.

He said the recollections were not like hallucinations because they were 'highly structured, narrative, easily recalled and clear'.

He added: 'During cardiac arrest, brainstem activity is rapidly lost. It should not be possible to sustain such lucid processes or allow the formation of lasting memories.

'We need a large definitive study to tell us whether the mind is produced by the brain or whether it is a separate entity. If our results are replicated, it would imply that the mind may continue to exist after the death of the body, or an afterlife.'

Dr Parnia is one of four trustees of the Horizon Research Foundation, a charity which aims to raise money for more research into the study of the human mind at the end of life.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-24509/Near-death-patients-afterlife.html#ixzz2rIrjfZsA


 
Back
Top