Doctors stunned as brain activity is recorded for 10 minutes AFTER patient dies – mimicking deep sleep
Doctors monitored four patients after their life support machines were turned off and discovered one patient experienced brain waves for as much as 10 minutes after death
BRAIN activity has been recorded in a patient for up to 10 minutes after death, new research has found.
Doctors at a Canadian intensive care unit discovered that one person had persistent brain activity after they turned off their life support machine, but three others did not.
But they had no pulse and unreactive pupils, reports
The team of researchers from the University of Western Ontario reported: "Electrocerebral inactivity preceded the cessation of the cardiac rhythm and arterial blood pressure (ABP) in three patients.
"In one patient, single delta wave bursts persisted following the cessation of both the cardiac rhythm and ABP."
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They also found the experience of death can be very different for individual patients.
Each patient recorded different electroencephalographic (EEG) measures - the electrical activity in the brain - both before and after death.
The "There was a significant difference in EEG amplitude between the 30-minute period before and the 5-minute period following ABP cessation [loss of a pulse] for the group, but we did not observe any well-defined EEG states following the early cardiac arrest period."
Brain scans of the four terminal patients showed the moment clinical death occurred, or when the heart stopped, a few minutes after the life support machines were turned off.
The yellow activity in the images is the brain activity.
As shown in three of the patients, it faded away before the heart stopped beating.
But in the fourth patient it continued for as much as 10 minutes after the heart stopped.
However researchers do not believe this evidence is enough to delve into what it could mean for our post-death experience.
They concluded: "In a case series of four patients, EEG inactivity preceded electrocardiogram and ABP inactivity during the dying process in three patients.
"Further study of the electroencephalogram during the withdrawal of life sustaining therapies will add clarity to medical, ethical, and legal concerns for donation after circulatory determined death."
The researchers did admit the scan could be some sort of error given the lack of a biological explanation for the phenomenon but could not find one, reported Science Alert.
While it is not entirely clear at what point certain parts of the body shut down in death, there have been several other studies that have looked into the experience of death.
Another discovered a burst of brain activities in rats for about a minute after decapitation, which suggested that the brain and heart have different moments of death.
The Dutch research team said: "It is likely that consciousness vanishes within seconds after decapitation, implying that decapitation is a quick and not an inhumane method of euthanasia.
"It seems that the massive wave which can be recorded approximately one minute after decapitation reflects the ultimate border between life and death.
"This observation might have implications in the discussions on the appropriate time for organ donation."
Several other studies have discovered that more than 1,000 genes can still function even days after death.
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