SPIEGEL: Basic first aid teaches us that the brain is very fragile. Three to five minutes after the heart stops, the brain incurs permanent damage due to lack of oxygen.
Parnia: This is a widely-held misconception, even among doctors. It’s mostly based on research done in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s. In those days, doctors concluded that brain cell death was inevitable in such a short time. Now we know that if treatment is correct, it really can take hours for brain cells to die. And only if all the treatments that we know today are not implemented, the damage can become apparent after as little as five minutes without blood flow. Part of the problem is that we all live in the past — patients, doctors, nurses and legislatures. We have preconceived ideas about death. For thousands of years, death was a clear, precise moment: The heart stopped beating, and that was it. Nothing could be done from then on. You either were alive or not. But since the arrival of CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) more than 50 years ago, we know that this view is no longer correct. Death is not a fixed moment anymore. From a cellular perspective, it is a process that proceeds at various speeds in the different tissues of the body after the heart stops.
h/t peterj
Yeah well, a morbid matter for sure.
What many of the uninitiated are unaware of is that necrosis frequently starts at the extremities.
Decapitation however accelerates the process….the exception that rules……
This harks back to an aeromedical lecture ca. 1962 when the doctor giving the lecture said, “Don’t worry about being buried alive, parts of you will be”.
Wow, this interview seems ripe with bullshit and misinformation.
If history tells us anything, the medical community was made up of superstitious and fraudulent quacks until the last few hundred years when science grabbed a toe-hold. To this day the medical arena is awash with fraudsters. To claim death was a clearly precise moment for thousands of years is simply untrue. Only one example was the attachment of bells to buried souls to catch their mistakes.
No one, including medical science, has ever brought a single creature back from the dead. If someone regains consciousness who was assumed demised, they were never dead in the first place.
” I think we need more regulation by state or medical authorities. ”
This quack just lost all respect I may have had for him with that comment.Another commie in action.
And CO….you are precisley right.A while back,I had the unfortunate fate of being first on an accident scene.(I really have to stop driving the death highway known as 16,aka the Yellowhead.) Passenger died on impact,driver died in my arms 19 minutes later.If you have ever heard a death rattle,you know it is over.Funny thing was,she knew she was dying,and did more to help me then I could for her.As she put it,God put me there for her.I’m not religous,put when someone dying tells you something like that,it does make an impact.
“…If someone regains consciousness who was assumed demised, they were never dead in the first place.”
That’s basically what I thought Dr. Parnia was saying, we don’t know exactly when they are really dead, he seems to be finding it is sometimes not as soon as we thought, and therefore the not actually dead yet can be recovered.
I for one will not be rehabilitating the person who was “dead” for 24 hours. The better question at that point is what does it mean to be alive? Quality of life – nil. We will start seeing lawsuits on doctors who “save” someone’s life who should have been allowed to die.
TheTooner….re-reading the article,I’m a little confused.I thought you were dead when all brain wave function ceased.Is he saying you can still be brought back after that point?
From my reading the doctor is saying that only brain function is monitored not brain cell death. Under specific condition brain cells can be saved from cellular death and will resume normal function once the heart is restarted.
Wow, thanks for sharing that very powerful story, you managed to stir my emotions quite effectively. Even as an anti-theist myself, I can understand the impact her words must have had.
I will be driving that highway in almost exactly one month and know my thoughts will linger back to your experience. In all my years as a travelling salesman in Alberta I quite fortunately never had to face that experience.
I hope you are able to find solace in the fact you must have been of great comfort to her at her time of death.
Tooner, Parnia may just be a weak communicator but he seems to quite clearly and repeatedly refer to resuscitating people “after death“.
The first 2/3 of the interview is straightforward medical procedures and resuscitation techniques, not reincarnation. The remainder gets into paranormal discussions which while interesting are kind of like putting a giant “kick me” sign on your own back. If the researcher does have proof it better be extraordinarily solid or his career is DOA…beyond reincarnation or resuscitation techniques.
“I thought you were dead when all brain wave function ceased.”
Well, that is one definition of death. As he mentions, not so long ago, the hear stopping used to be considered the moment of death. Then we found that in some cases, the heart could be restarted.
These people either came back from the dead — which would cause all sorts of issues for all sorts of religions, or, much more likely, they were not dead anyway.
When oxygen stops flowing to the brain consciousness disappears very quickly.
You can be resuscitated from that condition fairly easily, by re-establishing oxygen flow.
Leave it a bit longer, and *organized* brain activity, as shown by an ECG decays away.
People have been revived from this condition – which occurs in the famous 3 to 5 minute interval after oxygen flow stops. People have been revived from this too – although many fewer. The good doctor in the article ascribes this to poor treatment causing physical brain damage. There are procedures which have been shown to work in some cases to avoid these issues. That is where he is suggesting more oversight of hospitals, because many hospitals do not (for whatever reason … but I could guess) fully implement these procedures. if they won’t do it to save lives, he is suggesting forcing them to do it. He may have a point.
Now, he is not saying that (in general) it is possible to revive someone after a total lack of oxygen to the brain for three to five minutes , although we have all heard of cases where people are dragged from frozen ponds 30 minutes or more after going under, and being revived. This is a strong indicator that cooling can delay the onset of oxygen starvation damage. The processes that appear to work in successful resuscitation involve cooling to help insulate from poor oxygenation during the recovery phase, and also to reduce swelling of the brain when circulation is restored, which is responsible for a lot of physical brain damage.
Remember, he is dumbing this down for a reporter, and the (dumb) reporter will apply his dumbing metrics to ensure that his readers can get to the end of the story without suffering a stroke due to having to read too many big words and absorb too many new concepts.
(I really have to stop driving the death highway known as 16,aka the Yellowhead.)
You & me both. Its like a driving lottery for death.
Your just waiting for your number to show up.
Very moving story. Your right as well about the death rattle.
Genesis 2:7
then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.
When the last breath is gone back to God, you know the person is to.IMO
My brother was on life support . When he breathed his last. The room was empty of his presence.It may not be Scientific. But a lot of truths aren’t.
From that fateful day when stinking bits of slime first crawled from the sea and shouted to the cold stars, “I am man.”, our greatest dread has always been the knowledge of our mortality. But tonight, we shall hurl the gauntlet of science into the frightful face of death itself. Tonight, we shall ascend into the heavens. We shall mock the earthquake. We shall command the thunders, and penetrate into the very womb of impervious nature herself.
Depends how you define death. I have brought people back more than 40 minutes after the heart has stopped because attentive family and paramedics did excellent CPR.
From no heart motion on Echocardiogram to complete return of circulation with normal recovery of brain function after 24 hours cooling on life support. In facilities with ECMO – a type of device that pumps blood like the heart colleagues have brought people back with no heart activity such as paediatric sepsis or acute heart blockages, or heart failure due myocarditis.
As long as the brain is getting oxygen it is possible.
His points are medically valid in that regard.
CO….watch out for intersections,especially if heading west into the foothills.As we said when I was in the Airforce in SAR, keep your head 5 seconds ahead of the power curve.I spent 25 years purposely looking for aircraft crashes,and knowing that 99.9% of the time,there would be no survivors,but this was onlt the second time I felt so helpless.The only other time was way back in 1985,when we choppered a 14 year old out of a crash site.We had her stabilized,and straight to UofA(back when Namoa was still an airbase). We went to visit her 2 days later,and she had not made it.It’s pretty hard to stand there with her parents,when they are thanking you for bringing her home,and you are crying you eyes out because she didn’t make it due to massive internal injuries.Yeah.Big guys cry.There are now three graves I visit every year and leave flowers(her Mom died 4 years later,from a broken heart,I think).If there is a God,I only hope he/she will stop putting me in these spots.And check back in on your trip.There are to few of us SDA’ers around.
This was taught in Hospital Corps ‘A’ School in 1967. Why are you treating this as a recent discovery?
Justthinkin,
Thanks for the tips and further sharing of your experience. I have driven that highway many times over the decades but was honestly unaware of it’s killer reputation.
As for checking back in……..
I used to be a hardcore regular here 8 or so years ago but found I was becoming a victim of groupthink which was affecting my ability to think for myself. My horizons were shrinking, not expanding. After some time away, while revisiting I then discovered a great disgust for the mindless bigotry and even hatred often displayed towards anyone who dare share a differing view. Time away also helped me recognize some of the holes in my old arguments as well as the herd mentality of many posters, at least back then.
I have returned occasionally when I needed an anti-dote to the MMGW bullshit. Lately, I enjoy challenging some of the more mindless and myopic viewpoints expressed here in a mostly unsuccessful attempt to get people to think outside their partisan bunker. Ha, usually it just gets the more close-minded pissed at me. Really, how dare I challenge anyone to think or question.
I have come to the belief that the self-absorbed party system is slowly decaying western democracies and that hardcore partisan twits combined with an extremely shallow media are enablers. I will push that message to my fellow Canadians until I believe otherwise or see positive change.
Sorry to bore you with that Justthinkin. Ha, it just kinda flowed outta the keyboard so I guess I needed to.
Take care, have a great night.
CO, in response to your statement “No one, including medical science, has ever brought a single creature back from the dead. If someone regains consciousness who was assumed demised, they were never dead in the first place.”:
I believe that Jesus brought three people back from death before he was crucified and resurrected, and Elijah brought one back. Just because the Bible tells me so.
I checked on the success rate for CPR once and found that at that time it was between 2 and 7 percent, and a significant percentage of the survivors had brain damage.
My personal request is “do not resuscitate”. I am at peace with the Lord.
Forest
Yes, I have had that experience also. After 15 years in ICU I have seen many patients “resuscitated” from the dead.
One was an older man who arrested on the floor, he was declared dead after 20 minutes of CPR…when the nurse came to prepare the body he opened his eyes and started talking.
Drownings, patients half frozen and “dead” overnight walking out of the hospital… etc.
Keep in mind he said that those most likely to survive are those who are primarily in good shape in the first place but have cardiac blood flow problems, i.e. those with heart attacks, trauma, drowning etc. Patients with cancer, sepsis are unlikely to benefit from his protocols.
To us working in critical care, none of what he said is news to us, including the NDE stuff. What is interesting is the use of ECMO…this requires lots of specialized expertise and is expensive. Not many ICUs in Canada have easy access.
So far I think the record for a submerged patient is 1 hour underwater (frozen lake, young girl) with full recovery.
One of my pet peeves is this “I was dead for five minutes” thing.
No, you weren’t. As evidenced by you being here talking about it.
Andycanuck: I salute you, sir. Have you ever seen this? It’s the best of the deleted scenes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mb8JzsMc26o