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A woman who suffered a near death experience was able to give an accurate description of the operating room as doctors attempted life-saving surgery while she was deep under anesthesia and had her eyes taped shut.
Pam Reynolds Lowery from Atlanta, Georgia, was just 35 years old when she underwent brain surgery in 1991, and talked about her near-death experience.
She went under the knife with Robert F. Spetzler at the Barrow Neurological Institute back in 1991, and recalled some jaw-dropping experiences when she 'died' on the operating table.
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Podcaster Christina Randall has shared Pam's amazing story on the YouTube series The Day I Died.
She revealed Pam had been suffering from dizziness, as well as losing control of her speech and experiencing paralysis before a brain scan revealed she had experienced an aneurysm close to her brain stem.
Christina said: "As a last resort, a neurosurgeon of the Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix, Arizona decided that a rarely performed procedure called a standstill operation could improve Pam's chance of surviving."
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The surgery involves cooling the patient's body right down and stopping their blood circulation.
Christina continued: 'Pam's body temperature was lowered to 50° Fahrenheit – or 10° Centigrade – her breathing and her heartbeat completely stopped and the blood was completely drained from her head.'
A headset playing clicking sounds was put over her ears, and her eyes were taped shut.
Despite confirmation from the anesthetist that there was no brain activity and that Pam was unconscious, she said she was able to 'watch' her surgery and recall what equipment the surgeons used.
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Reynolds told NPR: "I was lying there on the gurney minding my own business, seriously unconscious, when I started to hear a noise.
"It was a natural D, and as the sound continued — I don't know how to explain this, other than to go ahead and say it — I popped up out the top of my head."
She saw the surgical instruments used during the op, describing one piece of equipment as 'like the handle on my electric toothbrush'.
She added: "I heard a female voice say, 'Her arteries are too small.' And Dr. Spetzler — I think it was him — said, 'Use the other side."
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Eerily, her vision matched up with what happened during the surgery: one piece of equipment did look like an electric toothbrush handle, the cardiac surgeon was a woman and she did have trouble hooking up Reynolds' arteries to the heart machine.
Pam had told NBC after the surgery how she was 'looking down at the body' but 'didn't care' that it was hers.
She recalled: "My vantage point was sort of sitting on the doctor's shoulder. I had assumed that they were going to open the skull with a saw.
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"I had heard the term 'saw' but what I saw looked a lot more like a drill than a saw – he even had little bits that were kept in this case that looked like the case that my father stored his socket wrenches in when I was a child."
She also said her late uncle appeared alongside her as a guide.
She said: "My uncle was the one who brought me back down to the body but then I got to where the body was and I looked at the thing and I for sure did not want to get in it.
"I didn't want to get in but he kept reasoning with me he said, 'It's like diving into a swimming pool, just jump in.' He pushed me, he gave me a little help there."
Sceptics have spoken out saying they believe she was suffering from Anesthesia Awareness.
This condition is thankfully rare, but it means a patient regains some consciousness during surgery.
Pam insists this wasn't the case as her eyes were taped shut and she had the headphones on.
Cardiologist Michael Sabom is convinced Pam was right, and says he has come across many other cases such as this.
He told NBC: "The people who said they watched their resuscitation as an out of body experience gave me a rather accurate visual pictures of what was going on in the room at the time, which would later be documented as accurate.
"I can find no other way that they could of seen it, then from a point separated from their physical body."
Pam sadly passed away in 2010.
