In an Unexplained Case, Brain Activity Has Been Recorded as Much as 10 Minutes After Death

Doctors in a Canadian intensive care unit have stumbled on a very strange case - when life support was turned off for four terminal patients, one of them showed persistent brain activity even after they were declared clinically dead.

For more than 10 minutes after doctors confirmed death through a range of observations, including the absence of a pulse and unreactive pupils, the patient appeared to experience the same kind of brain waves (delta wave bursts) we get during deep sleep. And it's an entirely different phenomenon to the sudden 'death wave' that's been observed in rats following decapitation.

"In one patient, single delta wave bursts persisted following the cessation of both the cardiac rhythm and arterial blood pressure (ABP)," the team from the University of Western Ontario in Canada reports.

They also found that death could be a unique experience for each individual, noting that across the four patients, the frontal electroencephalographic (EEG) recordings of their brain activity displayed few similarities both before and after they were declared dead.

"There was a significant difference in EEG amplitude between the 30-minute period before and the 5-minute period following ABP cessation for the group," the researchers explain.

Before we get into the actual findings, the researchers are being very cautious about the implications, saying it's far too early to be talking about what this could mean for our post-death experience, especially considering their sample size is one.

In the absence of any biological explanation for how brain activity could possibly continue several minutes after the heart has stopped beating, the researchers say the scan could be the result of some kind of error at the time of recording.

But they're at a loss to explain what that error could be, as the medical equipment show no signs of malfunction, meaning the source of the anomaly cannot be confirmed - biologically or otherwise.

"It is difficult to posit a physiological basis for this EEG activity given that it occurs after a prolonged loss of circulation," the researchers write.

"These waveform bursts could, therefore, be artefactual [human error] in nature, although an artefactual source could not be identified."

You can see the brain scans of the four terminal patients below, showing the moment of clinical death at Time 0, or when the heart had stopped a few minutes after life support had been turned off:

The yellow brain activity is what we're looking for in these scans (view a larger version here), and you can see in three of the four patients, this activity faded away before the heart stopped beating - as much as 10 minutes before clinical death, in the case of patient #2.

But for some reason, patient #4 shows evidence of delta wave bursts for 10 minutes and 38 seconds after their heart had stopped.

The researchers also investigated if a phenomenon known as 'death waves' occurred in the patients - in 2011, a separate team observed a burst of brain activity in rat brains about 1 minute after decapitation, suggesting that the brain and the heart have different moments of expiration.

"It seems that the massive wave which can be recorded approximately 1 minute after decapitation reflects the ultimate border between life and death," researchers from Radboud University in the Netherlands reported at the time.

When the Canadian team looked for this phenomenon in their human patients, they came up empty. "We did not observe a delta wave within 1 minute following cardiac arrest in any of our four patients," they report.

If all of this feels frustratingly inconsequential, welcome to the strange and incredibly niche field of necroneuroscience, where no one really knows what's actually going on.

But what we do know is that very strange things can happen at the moment of death - and afterwards - with a pair of studies from 2016 finding that more than 1,000 genes were still functioning several days after death in human cadavers.

And it wasn't like they were taking longer than everything else to sputter out - they actually increased their activity following the moment of clinical death.

The big takeaway from studies like these isn't that we understand more about the post-death experience now than we did before, because the observations remain inconclusive and without biological explanation.

But what they do show is that we've got so much to figure out when it comes to the process of death, and how we - and other animals - actually experience it, from our bodies to our brains.

The research has been published in The Canadian Journal of Neurological Sciences.

The human brain is a transmitter and receiver to communicate with the soul or spirit consciousness.

I have encountered this type of situation several times in the past. Last year I had a 97 year old woman who stopped eating for three weeks, the last week she stopped drinking anything. No IV or stomach tube.

She continued purging all three weeks, every day with bowel and urine discharge that filled and over flowed the depends, even though she was less than 100 lbs and very thin prior to the three weeks beginning.

Finally, her body shut down after the three weeks... heart stopped, breathing stopped, no pulse.. (dead per MD examination)

I waited until the next morning to take care of the body... 12 to 14 hours later and there was no rigor mortis. I expected to cut the clothing down the back to put it on the deceased, but the body was full flexible and I was able to put on a long sleeved blouse and pants with no difficulty.

Her consciousness was still in the body as I could feel it even though the body was dead. I had to separate her consciousness and help her soul cross over prior to her body being processed.

The same is true for all spirits after they let go of the body. Usually they leave it, but some hold on. Usually fear causes this. I frequently see the spirit at their own funeral service, often being escorted to cross over during the period when people start telling testimonials about the deceased.

Years ago while I was in the research lab, I put on the EEG probes and sat down to meditate... they showed flatline. It was funny as the prof’s kept trying to fix the machine, but to no avail. When I looked at the results real close, I could see that it was not flatlined, but had very small saw tooth patterns that did not appear unless you looked carefully.

I’ve worked with several people who use electronic equipment to record the electrical activity and voices of ghosts. The electrical activity still shows up even though there is no physical body.

I frequently see the spirit at their own funeral service, often being escorted to cross over during the period when people start telling testimonials about the deceased.

To what do you attribute your remarkable ability to see the spirits of the dead?

Regards,

What do the spirits you have seen look like? Do they resemble the person in life as they were at the time of death, or are they younger - or are they just blobs of light? Do they appear to be clothed? Do they shuffle about, walk, or “float” around? Do they have any facial expressions?
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A spirit that has left the physical body can take on any shape that it desires. What you see is actually an illusion created by the spirit. This is why you must be very careful as there are also impostors and evil tormentors that will appear as a person in order to fool you and manipulate you. (An impostor can’t stand the feeling of Love being projected at them and they will quickly lose their impostor ability and return to their true nature.)((This is why it is important to “Love your enemies.))

When they appear after death, they appear clothed, usually at what ever age they were when they died, but much healthier. Lost limbs... injuries.. are usually healed.. (this is the reason for phantom limb pain.) Two weeks ago I was in a restaurant and the table next to me had a double amputee in a wheel chair.. I could feel the phantom pain in both of his legs just by being near him. When I pray for him the prayerful energy transmutes the pain and I no longer feel it.

Blobs... no
Light... Yes
Clothed... Yes
Move around... Yes
Facial expressions... Yes
Emotions... Yes
Physical feeling...NO
Often the detail is very defined, other times it is more like a fluffy cloud.
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Do they seem to recognize the fact that you can perceive them (e.g., if you wave at them, would they wave back?), or do they seem indifferent to you and/or their surroundings?
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They are aware of me and that I can perceive them. Often they become very emotional at that time. The hard part is that their soul or spirit still has the memory of the physical pain they experienced when they died and left their body, but do not feel it as they have no body any more. When they are near my physical body, I feel the extreme physical and emotional pain they experienced as their memories are manifesting in my physical body.. Yes, it is as much a curse as a blessing.

Often they have messages they want me to share with their surviving loved ones. Often they get real emotional and cry when they see me, which in turn causes their loved ones to which they are still connected to begin to cry as well.
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To what do you attribute your remarkable ability to see the spirits of the dead?
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I died in 1988 and never fully returned to my body.. I sense directly from my consciousness, soul or spirit rather than just my five physical senses.

In Christianity, when you are “Born Again,” or “Born of the Spirit” this is what happens. It’s as though you merge with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is critically important as it gives you discernment and provides the Light so the dark spirits can’t come close to you. They fear your Light will destroy them.

Hope this helps..

You think that lady is in her grave?

She is now in Heaven.

The Holy Spirit was with her for 3 weeks to cleanse the fear from her soul. She was physically hot to the touch for all three weeks as the Holy Spirit cleansed.

Just prior to the 3 weeks she was crying and said to me, “I am afraid I’m going to hell.” Due to this fear she was also afraid of the Light of Heaven. By the end of the 3 weeks, the fear was gone and she could go to Heaven.

I’ve found this same fear and feeling of being lost in babies that are aborted or miscarried.

I really wish that everyone could physically see soul fields.. Not just what the physical body looked like, but all the memories of every experience the soul has ever encountered since its creation. Some souls are really big... others are relatively small. 30 feet in diameter at the smallest.

The physical body is 100% a creation of the soul or spirit field. Nothing can kill the soul.

When you experience the Bliss of Heaven it is unmistakable and beyond words of description. You truly would let go of everything you own, including your physical body to be there. Having experienced and remembering it... I really don’t want to be here.

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