TWH – The old maxim that your life flashes before your eyes before death might actually be true according to researchers who, by chance, picked up unusual brain patterns on a dying patient.
The research might be described as accidental, much like finding an archeological trove in a backyard or an unprecedented set of dinosaur bones on a hike after a storm.
Dr. Raul Vicente of the University of Tartu, Estonia, and colleagues was treating an 87-year-old male patient suffering from epilepsy using a technique called continuous electroencephalography (EEG). The EEG monitors brain activity more formally known as brain oscillations, often called brain waves.
In the case of this patient, the EEG was being used to monitor seizures while the patient was recovering during treatment for an acute subdural hematoma, a serious condition where blood collects between the skull and the surface of the brain after a head injury. Subdural hematomas can be life-threatening and typically require surgical intervention.
The researchers report that an 87-year-old patient was stable for two days after surgery. The patient worsened suddenly and suffered a heart attack. Attempts to revive the patient failed. After a discussion with family members and in consideration of the patient’s “Do Not Resuscitate” status, the team administered no further treatment and he died.
The patient’s deterioration and death all happened unexpectedly. However, the EEG was still recording and captured the entire death process. It is the first time the activity of a dying human brain has ever been documented.
These brain waves are part of normal human brain functioning. The oscillations are given Greek letter designations like alpha, beta, gamma, delta, and theta waves. Different types of oscillations indicate different types of brain activity including dreaming, concentrating, processing, and remembering.
“We measured 900 seconds of brain activity around the time of death and set a specific focus to investigate what happened in the 30 seconds before and after the heart stopped beating,” said Dr. Ajmal Zemmar, a neurosurgeon at the University of Louisville, Kentucky in the U.S., who organized the study said in a statement.
He added, “Just before and after the heart stopped working, we saw changes in a specific band of neural oscillations, so-called gamma oscillations, but also in others such as delta, theta, alpha, and beta oscillations.”
The researchers’ survey of the EEG measurements found a decrease in the theta activity and an increase in gamma just prior to the patient’s death. That activity, the researchers report, is consistent with an activation of an area of the brain involved in memory recall and flashbacks.
“Through generating oscillations involved in memory retrieval, the brain may be playing a last recall of important life events just before we die, similar to the ones reported in near-death experiences,” Zemmar speculated. “These findings challenge our understanding of when exactly life ends and generate important subsequent questions, such as those related to the timing of organ donation.”
The observation is consistent with previous scholarship and anecdotal findings on near-death experiences, the recollection of life experiences in the moments before death.
Many Pagans and doulas have described the phenomena and some traditions describe the moments before death as the gathering of all experiences.
Previous research on the topic noted that, “Subjective descriptions of this phenomenon are described as intense and surreal and include a panoramic life review with memory recalls, transcendental and out-of-body experiences with dreaming, hallucinations and a meditative state.”
After a major injury from an exploding shell in World War I, Ernest Hemmingway wrote in a letter that “dying is a very simple thing. I’ve looked at death, and really I know. If I should have died it would have been very easy for me. Quite the easiest thing I ever did.” The Nobel laureate would go on to describe the near-death experience in his short story The Snows of Kilimanjaro, when one of the characters dies of gangrene.
Research has supported the authenticity and intensity of the experiences called “life recall.” As high as 35% of individuals who have been close to death have described the Near-Death experience noting the event as “realer than real.” Near-death experiences are reported across all cultures and appear regardless of sociological, psychological, or demographic backgrounds.
Previous research has only looked at individuals who have been close to death yet survived. The current research is the first to document the dying human brain. Even still these measurements have been obtained on a single case and from a man who suffered severe injury, swelling, and seizures. So, it is impossible to extrapolate from the data if this is the physical manifestation of experiences reported near death.
“I never felt comfortable to report one case,” Dr Zemmar said. He also plans to continue this line of research.
“As a neurosurgeon, I deal with loss at times. It is indescribably difficult to deliver the news of death to distraught family members,” Dr. Zemmar said adding “Something we may learn from this research is: although our loved ones have their eyes closed and are ready to leave us to rest, their brains may be replaying some of the nicest moments they experienced in their lives.”
The research was published yesterday in Frontiers of Aging Research.
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