Evidence of Afterlife, Says Radiation Oncologist

Near-Death Experiences: Evidence of Afterlife, Says Radiation Oncologist

Medscape Medical News, Roxanne Nelson, February 25, 2010

What happens when a person dies?

It is a question that has been pondered since the beginning of the human race, and scientists, theologians, and everyone in between have offered their own beliefs and theories on the subject. But for Jeffrey Long, MD, a radiation oncologist in Houma, Louisiana, the answer to that question has become increasingly clear.

On the basis of his own research and that of many other investigators, he has become convinced that the phenomenon known as near-death experience (NDE) establishes the reality of an afterlife.

For more than 10 years, Dr. Long studied thousands of accounts of NDEs and created the Near Death Experience Research Foundation (NDERF), which has become the largest NDE research database in the world. Dr. Long's new book, Evidence of the Afterlife, which is based on more than 1300 accounts of NDEs that were shared with the NDERF, became a New York Times bestseller almost immediately after its release.

"People from all walks of life have had near-death experiences, and that even includes some physicians," Dr. Long told Medscape Oncology in an interview. "It shakes them up, and it makes it difficult because they are inclined not to let it be known publicly that they've had this experience."

Although there is some variation, NDEs can loosely be defined as mystical or transcendent experiences reported by individuals who are either dying or clinically dead. Common experiences reported to Dr. Long and other investigators are feelings of peacefulness, the sense of leaving one's body, the sense of moving through a dark tunnel toward a bright light, a review of one's life, and meeting up with other "spiritual" beings. Some people have even clearly described their own resuscitations with remarkable accuracy, down to conversations that occurred outside the room and beyond normal hearing range.

Dr. Long first became interested in NDEs in 1984, when he read an article on the subject that was published in a medical journal. Several years later, the wife of a college friend relayed her own experience with it, when she nearly died of an allergic reaction while under general anesthesia. A decade later, he started the NDERF to better study it.

In general, the subject is highly controversial, especially the conclusion that NDEs offer proof of an afterlife. However, Dr. Long pointed out that feedback from his medical colleagues has been positive for the most part. "Everyone respects the success of the book and many of them have thought and wondered about this on their own," he said. "All of my colleagues who read my book were impressed, as it was intended to be scholarly."

He acknowledged that not everyone agrees with his conclusions, but although "they may not agree, they feel that this is a significant point of view," he explained. "If they disagree, it may be due to factors such as their personal religious point of view or the scientific evidence. I can't blame them, because if someone had approached me 20 years ago, I would feel the same way."

Dr. Long believes that NDEs provide powerful scientific evidence that "makes it reasonable to accept the existence of an afterlife." Specifically, he cites "9 lines of evidence" that he has derived from his research.

"I find any 1 of them to be very strong evidence that there's an existence of life after death," Dr. Long explained. "But if you put all of them together, I think that the combination — in my opinion — becomes compelling."

The 9 Lines of Evidence From Evidence of the Afterlife

1. Crystal-clear consciousness. The level of consciousness and alertness during NDEs is usually greater than that experienced in everyday life, even though NDEs generally occur when a person is unconscious or clinically dead. In addition, the elements in NDEs generally follow the same consistent and logical order in all age groups and cultures.
2. Realistic out-of-body experiences. Out-of-body experiences are among the most common elements of NDEs, and what is seen or heard is almost always realistic. Even if out-of-body-experience observations include events that occur far from the physical body, and far from any possible sensory awareness of the patient, they are almost always confirmed to be completely accurate.
3. Heightened senses. Heightened senses are reported by most people who have experienced NDEs, and normal or supernormal vision has occurred in those with significantly impaired vision, and even legal blindness. Several people who have been totally blind since birth have reported highly visual NDEs.
4. Consciousness during anesthesia. Many NDEs occur while a person is under general anesthesia, at a time when any conscious experience should be impossible. Although there is speculation that these NDEs are the result of too little anesthesia, some result from anesthesia overdose.
5. Perfect playback. Life reviews in NDEs include real events that took place in the lives of those having the experience, even if the events were forgotten or happened before the person was old enough to remember.
6. Family reunions. During a NDE, the people encountered are virtually always deceased, and are usually relatives of the person having the NDE; sometimes they are even relatives who died before the patient was born.
7. Children's experiences. The NDEs of children, including children who are too young to have developed concepts of death, religion, or NDEs, are essentially identical to those of older children and adults.
8. Worldwide consistency. NDEs appear remarkably consistent around the world, and across many different religions and cultures. NDEs in non-Western countries are incredibly similar to those that occur in Western countries.
9. Aftereffects. It is common for people to experience major life changes after having NDEs. These aftereffects are often powerful, lasting, and life-enhancing, and the changes generally follow a consistent pattern.

Research and Different Viewpoints

The term "near-death experience" was coined by Ralph Moody, MD, PhD, in 1975 in his classic book Life After Life. Researchers have been studying NDEs for decades, and although most research has concluded that NDEs are real and unexplainable, the idea of consciousness beyond death has not been widely accepted.

"There have been over 20 different explanations of NDEs, and they cover any feasible physiological, biological, cultural, and psychological explanations you can think of," said Dr. Long. "But the truth is that not 1 of them makes any sense, even to skeptics, and that's why there are so many of them. None have been accepted as plausible, even by skeptics."

One proposed theory of the origin of NDEs is physiological changes in the brain, such as hallucinations caused by oxygen deprivation. Other theories are psychological, such as a reaction to approaching death, or are linked to a changing state of consciousness and cognitive functioning.

Kevin Nelson, MD, professor of neurology at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, has hypothesized that rapid eye movement (REM) intrusion contributes to NDEs. "The REM state of consciousness is, by its very nature and definition, activation of the visual system," he told Medscape Oncology. "The very first physiological sign of REM is pontogeniculoocciptal waves electrifying all levels of the visual system."

Because sleep-related hallucinations are most often visual, the REM system can account for the "heavenly" light so often reported in the NDE, he explained.

Dr. Nelson and colleagues investigated the lifetime prevalence of REM intrusion in 55 people who had experienced a NDE, and compared them with age- and sex-matched control subjects. They found that sleep paralysis and sleep-related visual and auditory hallucinations are substantially more common in people with a NDE. Although the results are preliminary, they suggest that REM intrusion could promote subjective aspects of NDEs and the often associated syncope (Neurology. 2006;66;1003-1009).

"The feeling of being in a tunnel and heading to the light can be explained by retinal ischemia, which causes blindness first in the periphery and preserves our central vision," said Dr. Nelson; "hence, the tunnel."

Dr. Nelson explained that the similarities between many NDE accounts exist because all people have similar brain biology. As for the feeling of leaving one's body, he pointed out that "out-of-body experiences are illusions that occur when our brain cannot integrate all of our sensations. They can be created by a trickle of electricity in the temporal-parietal region."

According to Dr. Nelson, brain physiology explains all the features of NDEs. "That is not to say that there isn't a reality beyond the brain," he said. "It's just that the brain is science, and anything beyond the brain is faith."

No Medically Explicable Explanation

In 2001, the Lancet published the results of a 13-year study of NDEs that was conducted in 10 different centers in the Netherlands (Lancet.2001;358:2039-2045). The study, one of the few to be conducted prospectively, tracked 344 cardiac patients who were successfully resuscitated after a cardiac arrest.

The researchers, led by Dutch cardiologist Pim van Lommel, MD, who was affiliated with Hospital Rijnstate in Arnhem at the time of the study, found that 62 patients (18%) reported NDEs. Of that group, 41 (12%) had what is referred to as core (or deep) NDEs.

At 2- and 8-year follow-ups, all surviving patients recalled their NDE experience almost exactly as they originally described it. The researchers found little difference between patients who had experienced a NDE and those who hadn't. They also noted that their findings failed to show any psychological, neurophysiological, or physiological factors that would have caused these experiences after cardiac arrest.

Even though the researchers were unable to uncover a medically explicable explanation for NDEs, they did acknowledge that neurophysiological processes must play some sort of role. But if NDEs are purely physiological — for example, caused by cerebral anoxia — then most patients who have been clinically dead should report one, they write.

Dr. van Lommel and colleagues note that there are similarities between NDEs and various other phenomena, such as electrical stimulation of the temporal lobe of the brain, but that those experiences usually consist of fragmented and random memories. In contrast, the recall after a NDE is clear and sequential.

"How could a clear consciousness outside one's body be experienced at the moment that the brain no longer functions during a period of clinical death with flat EEG?" the authors ask, adding that "NDE pushes at the limits of medical ideas about the range of human consciousness and the mind–brain relation."

For the past several years, Dr. van Lommel has been lecturing all over the world on NDEs and the relation between consciousness and the brain. "It is a challenge to explain to physicians and medical students, in the many lectures I give, why I came to the conclusion that consciousness can be experienced during a period of a nonfunctioning brain," Dr. van Lommel told Medscape Oncology.

"The hypothesis that consciousness is a product of brain function has never been proven whatsoever," he said. "Most physicians are not aware of the medical literature about what happens in the brain during cardiac arrest, and what exactly is really known about how the brain functions."

He explained that, in the Netherlands, more and more physicians seem to be "open to the possibility of a facilitating function of our brain to experience consciousness, and our consciousness being nonlocal — not cemented in place or time."

"But, of course, many neuroscientists have great difficulty in changing their basic concepts," Dr. van Lommel added.

On a personal level, Dr. van Lommel acknowledged that there is no hard scientific proof of an afterlife, and there will never be. "But for me, it seems very likely because it has been scientifically proven that patients experience, paradoxically, an enhanced consciousness during a cardiac arrest and during a period of a temporarily nonfunctioning brain."

Acknowledging NDEs

Physicians need to be aware of NDEs, contends Dr. Long, especially oncologists and others who care for patients with life-threatening illnesses. "I would advocate that if patients bring it up, physicians be ready to talk about it," he said. "But patients are often hesitant, so it's best to wait until they are ready to share [their experiences]."

Patients might just hint around about their experience; under those circumstances, doctors need to be ready to ask and need to know the right response. "These experiences are medically inexplicable, and they can be powerfully life-changing," said Dr. Long. "If physicians don't have the experience or feel uncomfortable discussing them, they need to refer patients to sources and organizations that can help them."

Dr. Long feels that increasing his understanding of NDEs has helped him to be a better physician for his cancer patients. Individuals who experience NDEs often become kinder, more loving, and more accepting of others, and he has begun to reflect those same effects in his own life. He explained that he now "faces life with more courage and confidence."

Dr. Long emphasizes that his years of research have culminated in his own personal conclusion that there is an afterlife, but not everyone is going to be convinced of that. Instead, he urges people to consider the evidence and "come to your own conclusions."

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What the near-death experience reveals about consciousness

"Perceptions of God" – June 6, 2010 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Quantum Teaching, The Fear of God, Near-death Experience, God Becomes Mythology, Worship, Mastery, Intelligent Design, Benevolent Creator,Global Unity.... etc.) (Text version)

“… When a Human almost dies, they get close to the veil, very close. They are ever so close to the creator's energy and just barely touched by it. When their heart was stopping and their breathing was almost gone, before they were brought back to life with science, they got to touch the hand of God for just an instant. What they saw was magnificent! The energy before them was filled with love and light, filled with family, filled with beauty. There was no strife there. There was no punishment there or even the hint of it. And when they came back from that experience, listen to what they told you. It changed their lives, didn't it? Listen to each one talk about it, for they continued to say, "There is nothing to fear and death is something you experience as a normal transition." Blessed is the Human Being who experiences both death and birth and has the wisdom to report, "Oh, it's uncomfortable, but I'll get through it, because I've done it before." The person who has experienced a near-death experience is no longer afraid to die! What does that tell you? They have seen what is there and they embrace it! …”

Transvestites fight an uphill battle

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Ienes Angela remembered back to a long time ago when she sat in a church and felt uncomfortable. It was an unpleasant experience. She felt as though she didn't belong because people were staring at her.

"All I wanted to do was worship God, but they treated me like I didn't belong. So I gave up on going to church," said the slim, tall and tanned transvestite.

"I cannot understand why so many people view waria (transvestites) as not being human. We have basic rights just like them," Ienes, 34, told The Jakarta Post.

Ienes said it was hard to uphold her rights in most aspects of life, not just at church.

Seeking employment in the formal sector was a difficult task, she said.

Work opportunities in the formal sector for transvestites are limited, with most employers reluctant to have waria in their offices. With such restrictions, Ienes said many waria were forced to work as prostitutes or street singers to survive.

She said once she applied for a position as a telemarketer with a company in Jakarta. The job involved selling hotel memberships to people via the telephone.

"The manager told me the company would employ me only if I agreed to cut my long hair and dress in male clothing," she said.

"What do such jobs have to do with appearance? I didn't need to meet customers face-to-face."

It was a difficult choice, Ienes said. She needed the job but also wanted to be accepted the way she was, long hair and all.

"I'm more comfortable when my hair is long. Such discrimination really traumatizes me."

Later, Ienes, a winner of several waria beauty contests, found a job in a beauty parlor.

However, the small salary she was receiving forced her to hit the streets around Lawang Park in Central Jakarta to work as a prostitute.

In this line of work she made many friends, including some waria activists from the Srikandi Sejati Foundation, which is a non-governmental organization that provides transvestites with information on HIV/AIDS.

She was offered a position at Srikandi and took it.

"I thanked God I could finally stop being a prostitute," Ienes, who is now the foundation's finance administrator, said.

The government categorizes transvestites as being a group of people who are "mentally ill", while religious institutions accuse them of being sinners, a recent book published by non-governmental organization Arus Pelangi, Hak Kerja Waria: Tanggung Jawab Negara (Transvestites' Rights to Employment: The State's Responsibility), explains.

Arus Pelangi works to uphold the rights of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered and transsexual people in Indonesia.

Ienes is not the only waria who has had bitter experiences seeking work in the formal sector.

Several years ago Keke Amalia, or Budi Nugraha as he is otherwise known, worked in a department store as customer service officer. He said he was only given the job after he agreed to dress in men's clothing.

"Later on when they realized I had a feminine side, they told me to act more manly," the 30-year-old transvestite, who prefers to be identified as "he", said.

"They threatened to fire me within a month if I didn't change my feminine attitude. But it wasn't even a month before they fired me. They said they didn't need me anymore."

Keke said his manager always found faults in him, despite the fact he never received any complaints from customers. He said the store's customers liked his polite and friendly attitude.

"To my knowledge, there was no official store policy saying employees should act in accordance with their gender," he said.

Keke said the experience had made him pessimistic. He said he did not know whether the attitude of the government and members of the public in relation to waria could ever change.

Arus Pelangi's book, which was published in cooperation with Friedrich Eibert Stiftung, contains 20 testimonies from waria on difficulties they have experienced in the workplace, society and their families.

Emy Mades was forced to leave her job as bartender because her colleagues said bartending was a "macho" job. Emy was told to work in salon instead.

In another case, Lia Asma from Palembang was verbally abused by colleagues in the government office she worked in. Verbal abuse is a common theme in many of the testimonies featured in the book.

"Negative attitudes toward waria are sanctioned by the government and religious institutions," Ienes said.

"Religious institutions only ever reproach us. I don't see them ever attempting to embrace or change us.

Ienes said she still believed in "One Divine Source", but she decided to give up on religion a long time ago.

"I don't even remember the last time I celebrated Christmas," she said. (dia)

ADB Provides $400M to Expand Health, Education Services for Indonesia's Poorest

MANILA, PHILIPPINES - The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved a US$400 million financial assistance package for Indonesia that will make education and health services more readily available for the country’s poorest families.

ADB’s assistance package supports Indonesia’s ongoing efforts to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) and targets on poverty reduction, health, education and gender equity. The program supports these efforts by facilitating the expansion of public sector health and education expenditures and assisting the Government in improving the efficiency and effectiveness of this additional expenditure.

To date, Indonesia’s progress toward meeting MDG benchmarks has been mixed. While the country remains on track to meet MDG targets on primary school enrolment, many children are not making the transition to junior secondary education.

In the health sector, although progress has been made decreasing maternal mortality rates, these rates are still significantly higher than those seen in many neighboring Southeast Asian nations. HIV/AIDS rates remain low, but are on the rise.

Despite the overall progress Indonesia is making in many areas, significant disparities still exist between the country’s most affluent and poorest families on a number of MDG targets, such as infant mortality rates and between regions.

“The primary beneficiaries of ADB’s support will be women and children from poor households who currently lack sufficient access to quality education and health services,” said Alfredo Perdiguero, a senior economist in ADB’s Southeast Asia Department.

“Indonesia’s expansion of social services for the poor will help more children survive their earliest years of life, save more people from HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis, help more women remain healthy during pregnancy, help more children go to school, and reduce regional and socioeconomic differences in social service delivery.”

ADB’s financial assistance package conforms with Indonesia’s medium-term development plan, and will help the government implement ongoing reforms that are needed to improve the quality and effectiveness of the country’s social services.

The eight Millennium Development Goals, which were established in 2001, serve as a blueprint for the world’s nations and the leading global development institutions in alleviating poverty and improving lives. The goals range from halving extreme poverty to reducing child mortality, halting the spread of HIV/AIDS, providing universal primary education and providing access to clean drinking water and sanitation facilities by the target date of 2015.

About ADB

Poor families find affordable health care hard to come by

Adisti Sukma Sawitri, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Sitting near a payment booth at Tarakan Hospital in Central Jakarta, Buce Iman Santoso clutched onto a letter belonging to his ill mother-in-law, Aminah.

The relief letter (SKTM) issued by the Health Agency had just been rejected by the hospital.

Hospital staff members asked Buce to return with more documents if Aminah was to be eligible for medical assistance at a reduced rate.

"How else can I prove that we are poor? I wouldn't ask for our bill to be discounted if we could afford to pay it," he said.

Buce said he submitted a relief letter and other documents stating his family was poor soon after Aminah was admitted to hospital a week earlier.

Hospital staff member Zuraidah said many people had abused the system in the past, and therefore the hospital had to carefully consider each claim.

"In accordance with procedures, patients must submit authentic documents twice - on the day they are admitted to hospital and on the day their payment is due," she said.

The administration launched two special health care plans five years ago. The Poor Family Cards (Gakin) scheme targeted almost 150,000 poor families registered with the Jakarta Statistics Board, while the relief letter scheme was introduced for unregistered low-income earners.

Unregistered people are those who have not been issued with an ID or family card by the Jakarta administration.

Unlike the Gakin system, which covers all of a patient's medical invoice, relief letters only allow for part of a patient's bill to be waived.

To obtain a relief letter, applicants must request notification letters from their neighborhood unit chief and subdistrict officials as well as a verification letter from the nearest community health center to confirm the family's financial status.

Despite this strict and lengthy process, officials often issue letters to people not eligible for medical benefits in return for bribe money.

Brokers offering to simplify the process are also profiting at the expense of low-income families.

Brokers usually offer their services near the payment booths of large hospitals.

Patients often pay brokers between Rp 500,000 (approximately US$54) and Rp 7 million to obtain a relief letter, the Heath Agency's deputy head, Salimar Salim, said.

She said the misuse of the scheme was evident from patient records and health expense claims made at various hospitals around the city.

She said as of September, the agency had to pay Rp 81 billion in hospital claims for 75,391 patients under the letter scheme, while it only had to pay Rp 55 billion for 99,672 Gakin patients.

Most claims made were for major surgery or the treatment of serious illnesses.

"After interviewing several patients, we realized many people were not poor, but just ran out of money due to the expensive treatment they were receiving," Salimar said.

"Sucipto", who works at a city-owned hospital, told The Jakarta Post he applied for a relief letter so surgery he underwent at Gatot Subroto Army Hospital in Central Jakarta would be discounted, despite the fact he had special insurance for civil servants from state-owned insurance company PT Askes.

He was unable to make a claim with the insurance company for his surgery as his policy did not cover treatment for injuries caused in accidents.

"The surgery cost Rp 27 million. I am not poor, but I am also not the kind of person who has that much money," he said.

As he had friends in relevant offices, he was able to get a relief letter within a week.

Sucipto said he knew his actions were wrong and he increased his insurance premium recently so he would be covered in the future.

He said it would be impossible to stop middle-income earners benefiting from the scheme, as many institutions only covered some of the health expenses of their employees.

The administration has discussed providing free health care to all residents in the next few years to avoid the misuse of heath care schemes for the poor.

Public policy expert Untung Afandi from the University of Indonesia said the administration should educate people in the middle and upper classes to acquire health insurance.

"The administration has to take care of a lot of other public services, including transportation and education. It would be very expensive to provide health insurance for everyone," he said.

Residents go overseas for checkup

Apriadi Gunawan, The Jakarta Post, Medan

Poor medical services and equipment lead some 100 Medan residents to leave North Sumatra each day to seek health treatment overseas, mostly in Malaysia and Singapore.

Chairman of the Medan chapter of the Indonesian Doctors Association (IDI), Nur Rasyid Lubis, said it has become a trend lately for Medan residents to seek medical treatment abroad.

Local doctors, he said, are capable of handling all the illnesses but are hampered by the lack of modern equipment and an effective medical system.

"We cannot blame people for seeking treatment overseas. This is understandable because they use state-of-the-art medical equipment overseas. Patients feel comfortable being examined with such equipment," Rasyid told The Jakarta Post.

Chairman of the North Sumatra Surgeons Association, Ronald Sihotang, said equipment used by doctors in the country lagged far behind compared to Malaysia and Singapore.

Both neighboring countries, said Ronald, had acquired the latest equipment in line with the development of medical technology.

"Malaysia and Singapore have the latest version of CT Scan and MRI equipment, while similar equipment in Indonesia is already outdated," said Ronald.

Ronald said almost all hospitals in Malaysia and Singapore were equipped with modern equipment, while in Indonesia CT Scan and MRI machines were only available in provincial level hospitals.

Rasyid cited other factors like quick and cheap services as other benefits of visiting overseas medical facilities. According to Rasyid, no hospitals in Indonesia offer quick and reasonably priced services to patients.

He said the heavy work loads of some doctors in Indonesia -- many work in both state and private hospitals -- meant they were less able to concentrate and thus slower in handling patients.

"State-appointed doctors should not moonlight in private hospitals, because they cannot provide optimum services due to fatigue. This is what patients have been complaining about," said Rasyid.

He added the number of doctors in Medan was sufficient.

"There are 2,000 doctors in Medan, 500 of whom are specialists. But most of them work in state as well as private hospitals."

Rasyid urged the government to draw up a new regulation aimed at curbing doctors from having double jobs, so they could concentrate better on treating patients.

He cited an example in Malaysia where doctors are supervised by the government.

"The Indonesian government should oversee doctors working in state and private hospitals, but it should go together with the improvement of doctors' welfare."