Life Flashes Before the Eyes

A new study suggests that life flashes before the eyes upon death (via Wikimedia Commons)

It’s been an age-old trope in works of literature, poetry, and art for ages, but now science confirms it’s true: Life does indeed flash before your eyes when you die.

When an 87-year-old epilepsy patient unexpectedly passed away during a brain scan, the scan found that his brain seemed to replay memories in the 30 seconds before and after his heart stopped beating, according to a recent study published in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience.

The patient, whose name was kept private, suffered a heart attack, and due to his do-not-resuscitate status, the scientists were able to track his brain waves throughout the final moments of his life. The scan was conducted by an international team of 13 neuroscientists led by Raul Vicente of the University of Tartu in Estonia.

The scientists were originally conducting electroencephalography (EEG) scans on the patient to detect and treat seizures. When he unexpectedly died, the EEG machine kept running, providing the scientists a first-of-its-kind glimpse into the brain activity of a dying human.

“This is why it’s so rare, because you can’t plan this,” Ajmal Zemmar, one of the co-authors of the study, told Insider. “No healthy human is gonna go and have an EEG before they die, and in no sick patient are we going to know when they’re gonna die to record these signals.”

The EEG brain scan found an oscillatory brain wave pattern in which activity in the brain’s alpha, beta, and theta bands relatively decreased and activity in the gamma band relatively increased. It’s thought that these oscillatory patterns, and an increase in gamma waves, suggest memory recall (the gamma band decreases external interference, allowing for deep inward concentration like recalling memories). Similar brain oscillations occur during meditation and dreaming.

This is the first time this has been proven in a human, although the concept looms large in our collective imagination. It comes back to us from people who have experienced near-death experiences, defined as when the brain has transitioned into preparing for death. Research into these experiences has reported intense memory recall and a panoramic review of one’s life. They have also reported a hallucinatory and meditative state and a sense of transcendence and bliss. These accounts cross cultures and religions.  READ MORE...

As You AGE

FROM SOCIAL LIFESTYLE MAGAZINE...

As you age, it’s important to make sure that you are taking a greater level of care of your wellbeing. Focusing on your health will ensure that you don’t end up in a situation where your quality of life begins to decline as you get older. There are a lot of health issues associated with age that are not completely curable. However, if you catch them early enough then you often improve the prognosis significantly and enjoy great health well into your later years.

Ear Issues

First, you should be aware that issues with your hearing and ear health become far more common once you reach a certain age. For instance, by the time you reach 60, you are more likely than not to have some form of hearing loss. This can be minor or moderate, depending on your situation. As soon as you notice a change in your hearing, it’s worth speaking to an audiologist. They can check what’s going wrong and the level of the damage. They will also be able to recommend the right treatment option. This is usually going to be a pair of hearing aids. There are lots of different types to choose from.

RSI – arthritis

Next, you should think about painful health issues such as RSI. Repetitive strain injury is caused by typing for long periods, often without breaks and typically with the wrong posture. If you are worried about this, then you should make sure that you do research online the right way to type so that you can avoid this issue. Be aware that this can become more serious and significant as you age because your body will be shifting and adapting over time.

You might also develop more significant health issues such as arthritis. The problem with arthritis is that it can impact your mobility and leave you in near-constant pain. It is possible to reduce your chances of issues with arthritis. For instance, studies suggest that you are more likely to develop a condition like this if you are a runner as it puts more pressure on your joints.

Eye Trouble – Glaucoma, Cataracts, Uveitis

Your eyes can also change as you get older too. For instance, you might develop cataracts. This condition where a thin layer begins to form over the eye is quite common. It predominantly impacts caucasian individuals but anyone can notice signs of this once they reach a certain age. This is easily treated with the support of a professional and the danger of surgery is the only minor. Other conditions such as chronic uveitis are more serious. This condition is inflammation of the iris and needs to be treated as quickly as possible. Chronic uveitis treatments are widely available and can ensure that you see significant changes.

Cancer

It’s impossible to write about health issues that become more common as you age without touching upon the ‘c-word.’ There are certainly cancers that increase in likelihood as you get older. For instance, once you reach a certain age, you need to make sure that you are checking for the signs of colon cancer. This includes blood in your stool. You should also be checking your body regularly for differences including raised lumps and bumps that remain for more than a couple of weeks.

Dementia

Finally, you need to be aware of how your age impacts your cognitive health. As you get older, your chances of developing dementia increase substantially. The first signs of dementia can also become apparent far earlier than most people realize as well. For instance, it is possible that you do see early stages of dementia in your forties. This can feel like a complete nightmare but the good news is that if the signs are noticed early then there are steps you can take. You can essentially train your brain to keep it healthy. The brain is like a muscle. You need to make sure that you are taking steps to work it out. This means completing brain teasers and testing your brain. This is more important as you retire because you’ll have fewer things to focus on and think about.

We hope this helps you understand some of the health issues that you might need to watch out for and can become more significant for you as you age. If you take the right steps here, then you’ll be able to guarantee that you don’t see your health decline rapidly once you reach a certain age. Instead, you can enjoy your twilight years in complete comfort.

The Eyes Have It

It has been said that “the eyes are the window to the soul,” but new research suggests that they may be a window to the brain as well.

Our pupils respond to more than just the light. They indicate arousal, interest or mental exhaustion. Pupil dilation is even used by the FBI to detect deception. Now work conducted in our laboratory at the Georgia Institute of Technology suggests that baseline pupil size is closely related to individual differences in intelligence. The larger the pupils, the higher the intelligence, as measured by tests of reasoning, attention and memory. In fact, across three studies, we found that the difference in baseline pupil size between people who scored the highest on the cognitive tests and those who scored the lowest was large enough to be detected by the unaided eye.

We first uncovered this surprising relationship while studying differences in the amount of mental effort people used to complete memory tasks. We used pupil dilations as an indicator of effort, a technique psychologist Daniel Kahneman popularized in the 1960s and 1970s. When we discovered a relationship between baseline pupil size and intelligence, we weren’t sure if it was real or what it meant.  TO READ MORE, CLICK HERE...