True or False #5: Lack of oxygen to the brain causes Near Death Experience

John Corder is the author of The Trial of Poppy Moon, a legal, medical, race-against-time thriller based on Near Death Experience. It’s available on http://authl.it/dv

Watch the book trailer: http://youtu.be/vmLctSK1FMM

False:  A view commonly held by some is that lack of oxygen is the cause of near death experiences. The idea being that, during its final moments of life, the dying brain enacts its best-loved hopes and fantasies. There are several problems with this. The brain does not exist on a reservoir of oxygen, with performance slowly degrading as it runs out. It needs a continuous, well-oxygenated supply and when that stops, everything stops. In fact, total shutdown takes just three seconds, after which there is no brain activity available to access these hopes and fantasies.

Some have also believed the opposite to be the cause. Namely, rather than a lack of oxygen (anoxia), NDE and OBE is caused by an excess of carbon dioxide (hypercarbia), both now proven wrong in spectacular fashion. They were resuscitating a man who had suffered both a heart attack and a cardiac arrest. During this the process, the man was having an Out of Body Experience. He saw them take a sample of blood from his groin. An analysis of the blood shown that not only was there a higher than normal level of oxygen in his blood (quite normal during resuscitation), but there was a much lower level of carbon dioxide (also quite normal under the circumstances).

Note: If you’re thinking, does that mean that when they executed someone on the guillotine, that the severed head was conscious for about three seconds, the answer is that yes it most probably does. The word probably is there because it’s not sure what the effect would be of zero blood pressure in a head with no body. It might reduce the three seconds a bit.