Pam Reynolds

© G.M. Woerlee

 

The famous experience of Pam Reynolds is considered by many to be proof of the reality of the survival of consciousness after death, and of a life after death. This is a story which has gained enormous popularity since its first publication by Dr. Michael Sabom in his book Light & Death in 2008. So What is this popular story?

Pam Reynolds was 35 years old when she underwent a dangerous brain operation performed under general anesthesia during which she was also clinically dead for part of the operation. While apparently unconscious under general anesthesia, she underwent a remarkable out of body experience as well as a profound near death experience. During her out of body experience she made several observations of events occurring around her body, words spoken in the operating theater, and saw some of the instruments used during the operation. All these observations were subsequently verified to be true. Look at a highly romanticized, but visually beautiful account of Pam Reynolds experience on the two video's below. Below are two parts of a very popular BBC documentary on near death experiences called "The Day I Died", which gives a very visually impressive account of her story.

 

 

 

The video is very good and very professional, but incredibly misleading and inaccurate. Even the use of your wildest imagination cannot make it correspond with the account given in the book called "Light & Death" written by Dr. Michael Sabom in which this experience was first revealed to the world. In fact I am quite amazed that Dr. Sabom himself cooperated with the content of this unbelievably imaginative video. The careful account of the Pam Reynolds story in chapter 5 of "Light & Death" written by Dr. Sabom himself, reveals it was actually the malfunctioning of her body that generated Pam Reynolds truly amazing near death experience! I have also written several articles based upon the very good information in the book "Light & Death" revealing how the functioning of Pam Reynolds' body itself that generated her amazing experience (Woerlee 2004, Woerlee 2005). For more information, you can also download a complete copy of Chapter 11 of The Unholy Legacy of Abraham to read an extensive discussion of the remarkable ways the functioning of Pam Reynolds' body generated her astounding near-death experience by clicking here, or read the whole book by clicking on the link for "FREE BOOK" above. So let us look at this story in some detail.

During 1991 CE, the then 35 year-old Pam Reynolds was found to have a large saccular aneurysm of the basilar artery. A personal disaster. Having such an aneurysm is like walking around with a bomb in your head - it may rupture and bleed at any moment, destroying the adjacent brainstem and causing death. Removing such a giant aneurysm is tricky, and this was at a location which was also difficult to approach. So the neurosurgeon wisely decided to operate using a technique called "hypothermic cardiac arrest". This would make it possible to remove the aneurysm without excessive blood loss, as well as protecting the adjacent brain tissue from damage resulting from a temporary lowering of the blood flow. Hypothermia, or extreme lowering of body temperature combined with temporary stopping of the heart (cardiac arrest) is a technique that has been used since the 1950's (see articles by Pretre 2003, Hirotani 2006, Matalanis 2003, Chong 2004). It is a complex technique, but one making some types of otherwise impossible heart, large blood vessel, and brain surgery possible.

The technique used with Pam Reynolds in 1991 was complex, although reasonably straightforward. She was brought into the operating theater. An intravenous drip was inserted, anesthetic drugs were injected, and she was under general anesthesia. The usual technique of general anesthesia then, as now, was a combination of drugs to keep her asleep, painkilling drugs, and muscle paralyzing drugs to prevent involuntary movements in response to the pain of surgery. A person anesthetized with such a combination of drugs cannot move, cannot speak, and cannot breathe. So a person under such a form of general anesthesia is attached to a respirator which takes over their breathing. This is a perfectly normal anesthetic technique used for many operations performed under general anesthesia. The usual monitoring of her vital signs was used by the anesthesiologist, in addition to which her electroencephalogram was monitored, as well as the response of her brain to clicking sounds in two earplugs was measured (VEP = vestibular evoked potentials). (N.B. VEP measurement is a very useful measurement of the depth of general anesthesia.) Her head was fixed in the position needed for the operation with a large clamp. The other parts of her body were covered with sterile drapes, and the neurosurgeon began the operation on her head.

At the same time as the neurosurgeon began to operate on the head of Pam Reynolds, the cardiothoracic surgeon, a Dr Murray, began an operation to insert the tubing of the cardiac bypass machine into the blood vessels in her groin. Cardiac bypass applied via tubing inserted into the blood vessels of the groin is a standard technique, and part of the procedure of hypothermic cardiac arrest. Blood is pumped out of the body, passes through a heat exchanger circuit in the cardiac bypass machine, is cooled, and pumped back into the body. This makes it possible to efficiently cool the whole body, as well as pump blood around the body when the heart eventually stops beating due to cooling of the body.

The body of Pam Reynolds was eventually cooled to about 60 degrees Fahrenheit (15.5 degrees Centigrade), the circulation of blood in her body was stopped, and the aneurysm was successfully operated. At this temperature, the metabolism of the brain and the heart is lowered to such a degree that the circulation can safely be stopped for about 45-60 minutes without causing any brain or other tissue damage. Subsequent to successfully operating on the aneurysm, the cardiac bypass machine was restarted, and used to restore her body temperature back to the normal 37 degrees Centigrade. Normal heart action was restored, the cardiac bypass tubing removed, and all the operation wounds were closed.

The timeline

The report of Pam Reynolds' story was first published in a book called Light & Death written by an American cardiologist, Doctor Michael Sabom (Sabom 1998). This is actually a quite accurate account, and contains more than enough information with which to explain this quite astonishing story. Furthermore, being the first report of this story, it also has the advantage of being free of the inaccuracies, contaminations, and outright fantasies now circulating as a result of the telling and retelling of this story. If you carefully examine the excellent account of her experience in Life & Death (Sabom 1998, pages 37-51) you can construct just such a timeline.

 

07:15-08:40 hours.

• Pam Reynolds arrived in the operating theatre.
• An intravenous line was inserted.
• General anaesthesia was started. Pam Reynolds was now unconscious under general anaesthesia.
• Invasive monitors of vital body functions were inserted. This is often done after starting general anaesthesia because insertion of such monitors can be painful or uncomfortable.
• Electroencephalogram electrodes were attached to monitor her brain electrical activity.
• Closely fitting earplugs, with speakers were inserted into both her ears so as to administer clicking sounds for measuring her brainstem response to clicking sounds (Vestibular Evoked Potentials - VEP's).
• Her head was fastened firmly to the operating table with a three-point head fixation clamp. This clamp prevents small movements of the head that would otherwise make using an operating microscope impossible.
• Her head was shaved, and her body draped for operation.
• Pam Reynolds' body temperature and heartbeat were normal throughout this period, and she received artificial respiration with a machine.

Neurosurgical head clamp such as was certainly used in the type of operation performed upon Pam Reynolds is attached to the operating table, and fixes the head to the side or end rails of the operating table by three screws which are screwed into the bones of the skull. Table and skull then form one immovable whole.

 

08:40-10:50 hours.

• The neurosurgeon began the operation. A scalp incision was made, and the skin covering her skull retracted.
• A pneumatic bone saw was used to remove a piece of bone from her skull in order to give access to the brain and the aneurysm within. This was when Pam Reynolds had her out of body experience where she saw the surgeon and the pneumatic saw.
• The cardiothoracic surgeon exposed the Femoral artery and vein in her right groin, only to find these blood vessels were too small for the cardiac bypass tubing. She told this to the neurosurgeon.
• The cardiothoracic surgeon then proceeded to operate on Pam's left groin to expose the Femoral artery and vein there.
• In the meantime the neurosurgeon also continued operating to expose the giant aneurysm. The last step of this part of the operation was to gently move the tissues of the brain aside to reveal the expected giant Basilar artery aneurysm.
• Pam Reynolds' body temperature and heartbeat were normal throughout this period, and she received artificial respiration with a machine.

Experiences of Pam Reynolds between 08:40-10:50 hours. The first thing Pam Reynolds remembered after losing consciousness due to general anaesthesia, was awakening to the sound of a "natural D" and leaving her body. The next thing I recall was the sound: It was a natural D. As I listened to the sound, I felt it was pulling me out of the top of my head. The further out of my body I got, the more clear the tone became. I had the impression it was like a road, a frequency that you go on .... I remember seeing several things in the operating room when I was looking down. It was the most aware that I think that I have ever been in my entire life.... I was metaphorically sitting on Dr. Spetzler's [the neurosurgeon] shoulder. It was not like normal vision. It was brighter and more focused and clearer than normal vision. . . . There was so much in the operating room that I didn't recognize, and so many people. (Sabom 1998, page 41) Pam Reynolds subsequently described the following experience, and hearing the cardiothoracic surgeon. Someone said something about my veins and arteries being very small. I believe it was a female voice and that it was Dr. Murray, but I'm not sure. She was the cardiologist. I remember thinking that I should have told her about that ... (Sabom 1998, page 42) She was not on cardiac bypass at the time of her out of body experience, because the cardiothoracic surgeon was having trouble introducing the cardiac bypass machine tubing into the blood vessels of her right groin - they were too small for the size of the tubing and the blood flow needed for cardiac bypass. So the cardiothoracic surgeon eventually used the blood vessels in her left groin (1). This means that at this time she had a normal body temperature, and the normal responses of a paralyzed person who was supposedly under general anesthesia. And I say "supposedly under general anesthesia", because what she described was a typical period of conscious awareness under general anesthesia. This is something familiar to all anesthesiologists, and is an event that all anesthesiologists try to prevent (see the website on Anesthesia to read about awareness,and the various types of awareness during anesthesia). She felt no pain, but was clearly able to able to hear and describe what happened to her. How was this possible? She felt no pain because of the effects of powerful painkilling drugs. She was unable to move, breathe, or speak, because all the muscles of her body were paralyzed by a muscle paralyzing drug. This was why she was attached to a respirator which performed her breathing through a tube inserted into her windpipe. She was conscious because the concentrations of drugs used to keep her unconscious were quite evidently insufficient to do so. She could hear clearly because of bone conduction of sounds which directly stimulated her cochlea. The vibrations of the sounds of speech and other sounds in the operating room presumably vibrated the thin metal sheet of the surface of an instrument table clamped to the metal side rails of the operating table (a common neurosurgical practice at the time), or the large metal under surface of the operating table itself, and conducted these sound vibrations to the bones of her skull through the metal clamp directly fixing her skull to the operating table. This was how it was possible for her to hear the "natural D" of the pneumatic bone drill or saw, and this was how it was possible for her to hear speech. I know for certain her head was attached to the operating table with a Mayfield clamp, or a similar device (see pictures of clamp system above), because this is standard neurosurgical practice when using an operating microscope to clamp aneurysms. The simple examples of the Rinne hearing test, as well as the Weber hearing test clearly illustrate how someone with tightly closed ears can hear by means of sound-induced vibrations of a metal operating table to which their skull is affixed by means of a metal clamp attached to the table, as was the case with Pam Reynolds. N.B. the drawing on page 40 of Light & Death of the setup in the operating theatre is inaccurate in several aspects, among which is the absence of the Mayfield, or other head clamp, as well as the small instrument table near the head being free instead of clamped to the table, both of which features were, and still are normal neurosurgical practice (see Mayfield Clinic patient information sheet). The combined effects of these anesthetic drugs caused her to be calm and indifferent, as well as removing any pain from the operation. Furthermore, together with the vibrations of the saw, they caused her to have an out-of-body experience and considerably altered her mental function. She had decidedly abnormal mental function at this time, as is proven by the fact that she said she should have told the cardiothoracic surgeon about the small blood vessels in her right groin before the operation. This is truly weird. I don't know the sizes of the blood vessels in my groins, and I certainly don't expect other people do either. This is one of the most glaring examples of the ways the anesthetic drugs administered to Pam Reynolds altered her mental function.

10:50-11:00 hours.

• The neurosurgeon found, as was expected, that the aneurysm was too large to operate safely without profound body cooling and cardiac arrest.
• The cardiothoracic team inserted cardiac bypass tubing into the already exposed left Femoral artery and vein.
• The cardiac bypass machine was switched on, and started to lower Pam Reynolds body temperature by pumping her blood through the heat exchanger of the cardiac bypass machine.
• Even though Pam Reynolds body temperature was lowered at the end of this time period, her heartbeat was normal throughout this period, and she received artificial respiration with a machine.

 

11:00-11:25 hours.

• Pam Reynolds body temperature was now 22.8 degrees Celsius, at which time she was definitely unconscious (Fay 1941, Stocks 2004).
• Even though Pam Reynolds body temperature was low, her heartbeat was normal, and she received artificial respiration with a machine.

 

11:25-12:00 hours.

• Pam Reynolds body temperature was now 15.5 degrees Celsius.
• At this point no more electroencephalogram or VEP's could be detected.
• Potassium chloride was administered to totally stop the heartbeat and the irregular heart rhythm resulting from her low body temperature.
• Artificial respiration from the respirator was turned off.
• The body of Pam was tilted head-up to drain the blood from her head.
• The neurosurgeon clipped the aneurysm at its neck and excised it.

 

12:00-12:32 hours.

• After successful removal of the aneurysm, the cardiac bypass pump was turned on again to start re-warming Pam Reynolds' body.
• Artificial respiration was resumed.
• As her body warmed up, the VEP's returned.
• Pam developed an abnormal and lethal heart rhythm called ventricular fibrillation - a rhythm where the heart just twitches in an uncoordinated manner without pumping blood.
• Normal heart rhythm was restored with a 50-Joule electrical shock.
• Even though Pam Reynolds body temperature was low, her heartbeat was now normal.

Sometime between 11:00-12:32 hours. Some time during this time period, Pam Reynolds had a typically American near death experience during which she fell into a dark vortex to enter a transcendental world where she was meat by her deceased relatives. This part of her experience is reasonably easy to explain. Her experience of falling into a dark vortex was very likely due to rapid onset of profound muscle relaxation as she descended into unconsciousness during the period of rapid cooling of her body. This is a sensation very similar to the falling sensation people sometimes experience in the period just between awake and falling asleep (see extensive explanation of this phenomenon on pages 152-188 and 281-282 in The Unholy Legacy of Abraham). Her near-death experience in this period was an absolutely stereotype experience undergone by a person expecting to undergo a potentially lethal event. This is why she had a near-death experience with affective and transcendental components, where she entered a transcendental world to meet other deceased persons who acted as guides or mentors in this world. Typically, as a person born and raised in the USA, she saw her deceased close family members, encountered a barrier, and returned to her body. So her experience is exactly what you would expect from a person with her background (see Near Death Experience-Types, and a more extensive explanation on pages 198-213 in The Unholy Legacy of Abraham). Experiences like this don't have to last a long time. They sometimes only last seconds, even though the person themselves feel as if they last a long time. This experience evidently occurred during a period of awareness either before, or after she was unconscious due to cooling of her body. People are simply unconscious below a body temperature of 26 degrees Celsius (see article by Phillips 2008), and while unconscious a person can have no conscious experiences such as a near-death experience, out-of-body experience, or any other type of dream, hallucination, or conscious experience for that matter.

12:32-14:10 hours.

• Cardiac bypass was stopped at a body temperature of 32 degrees Celsius.
• The various wounds in her head and groin were closed to the accompaniment of music, among which a tune called 'Hotel California' composed and sung by a group called "The Eagles".
• Pam Reynolds body temperature and heartbeat were normal throughout this period, and she received artificial respiration with a machine.

Experiences of Pam Reynolds between 12:32-14:10 hours. Pam Reynolds regained consciousness again while ostensibly unconscious under general anesthesia. During this period the surgeons were closing her wounds to the accompaniment of the tune "Hotel California" ... When I came back, they were playing "Hotel California" and the line was "You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave." I mentioned [later] to Dr. Brown that that was incredibly insensitive and he told me that I needed to sleep more. [laughter] When I regained consciousness, I was still on the respirator. (Sabom 1998, page 47) In other words, she was conscious at the time, but felt no pain from the surgical manipulations, and she could hear what was happening about her. She heard the music of "Hotel California" played and sung by "The Eagles" which had reached the line, "You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave." A curious coincidence, and very appropriate. She was still paralyzed by a muscle paralyzing drug, so she still could not move, breathe, or talk - she was indeed locked inside her body - she could not leave. Furthermore, she could not talk because of the muscle paralysis and the tube passed through her windpipe and attached to the respirator. And then she lost consciousness again until she awoke late in the intensive care.

14:10 hours.

• Pam Reynolds body temperature was now a normal 37 degrees Celsius.
• Pam was brought into the ICU while still under general anesthesia.
• Pam Reynolds body temperature and heartbeat were normal throughout this period, and she received artificial respiration with a machine.

 

Sometime later that day.

• Reynolds awoke again.
• When she was able to breathe normally again without assistance, the respirator was turned off, and the respirator tube (endotracheal tube) was removed from her windpipe and larynx.
• Only after she awoke, only after she was able to breathe normally for herself again, and only after the respirator tubing had been removed, was she able to talk and tell of her experience.

 

The ways in which the functioning of the body can generate clear out of body experiences during general anesthesia and other states of consciousness is extensively described in the book "Mortal Minds" and more recently in the book "The Unholy Legacy of Abraham". No immortal and separate mind is required, the functioning of the mechanisms of the body can generate all aspects of these experiences.

Why were Pam Reynolds periods of awareness not signaled by the VEP monitoring, or her electroencephalogram at the time she was able to observe what was happening in the operating room, or during her out of body experience? After all, both the awareness and the out of body experience are conscious experiences, and can only occur in a conscious brain. The embarrassing and humbling truth is that these monitors of consciousness are not 100% reliable. Measurements such as these are affected differently by the various different drugs used during anesthesia, as well as by changes in body temperature. This is why some people are conscious, even though apparatus measuring the VEP or BIS say they are unconscious (see articles on reliability of monitoring depth of anesthesia by Avidan 2008, Bruhn 2006). This is why professional associations of anesthesiologists in nearly all countries, (including the USA), while acknowledging the utility of these measures of consciousness, always recommend they not be relied upon 100%, and that anesthesiologists must also use experience and common sense to guage the level of consciousness (see extensive review and recommendations in ASA 2006).

Pam Reynolds wore tightly-fitting earplugs during her operation. These were attached to the VEP monitor, and continually fed clicking sounds into her ears to arouse VEP signals. These earplugs supposedly excluded all external sounds. This is why some authors make much of the fact that she could hear everything - after all, the earplugs supposedly blocked out all external sounds. But the truth is that earplugs do not totally exclude all external sounds, they only considerably reduce the intensity of external sounds. Proof of this is seen all about us. There are simply enormous numbers of people all around the world, wandering around, listening to loud music played through earplugs, while at the same time able to hear and understand all that happens in their surroundings. So Pam Reynolds was able to hear what happened in her surroundings. And people under general anesthesia can hear things, otherwise this perfectly standard VEP monitoring technique would be useless as a measure of the depth of general anesthesia. Furthermore, she would have been able to hear the bone saw extremely well, because as the saw was cutting through her skull, the sound made by the saw would have been conducted directly through the bones of her skull into her middle ear where she perceived it. This is the normal phenomenon of bone conduction which everyone can test for themselves by pressing a vibrating tuning fork to one of the bones of the skull. So being able to hear, despite the insertion of earphones making clicking sounds is nothing wondrous.

Popular belief has it that the experiences of Pam Reynolds all occurred during her peiod of hypothermic cardiac arrest. But when one looks carefully at the timeline of her experience, one can only conclude that the experiences of Pam Reynolds did not occur during her period of hypothermic cardiac arrest, and that she was definitely not conscious during the whole operation. The timeline of her story as reported by Sabom simply does not support this erronious version of her story in any way!

These things explain most aspects of the wondrous near death experience of Pam Reynolds. Chapters 10 and 11 in the book The Unholy Legacy of Abraham contain a detailed and complete explanation of how the functioning of the human body during anesthesia and surgery resulted in the experience reported by Pam Reynolds. All this means that the experience of Pam Reynolds was not a product of an immaterial soul, or immaterial mind, which can exist for eternity separately from her body. Instead, her experience was a product of anesthetic drugs, abnormal interpretations of bodily sensations, together with a perception of personal imminent death all causing her body to function in such a way that she underwent a series of truly wondrous experiences. And they were wondrous experiences, even though they were products of abnormal body function. They possibly confirmed her vision of the world, possibly even gave her a new vision of the world, possibly even gave her a reason for existence. To her, and to others, these experience were significant. This is also true, for they are powerful and wonderful demonstrations of the functioning of the human body - demonstrations of the true nature of our being.

 

References:

1. Light & Death. By M. Sabom, published by Zondervan Publishing House, USA, 1998, ISBN 0-310-21992-2.
2. Mortal Minds, by G.M. Woerlee, chapters 10, 11, 12.
3. Woerlee GM, (2004), Pam Reynolds: Ein Nahtodeserlebnis aus der Sicht eines Anästhesisten. Skeptiker, 4: 144-150.
4. Woerlee GM, (2005), An anaesthesiologist examines the Pam Reynolds story; Part 1: Background considerations. The Skeptic vol 18, nr 1.
5. Woerlee GM, (2005), An Anaesthesiologist Examines the Pam Reynolds Story; Part 2: The Experience. The Skeptic vol 18, nr 2.

 

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This page last modified 26 November 2008

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Website design G.M. Woerlee, December 2008