What Are End-of-Life Visions?

End-of-life visions or deathbed visions are paranormal experiences in which a dying person sees something that isn’t apparent to others in the room. According to many experts in hospice and palliative care, they are extremely common and may occur right before death or weeks earlier. The visions are often of family members who have died (in one study, reported by Marilyn A. Mendoza, Ph.D., in Psychology Today, 57% of deathbed visions fell into this category). The person seen in the vision is very often the patient’s mother or father. Visions of spiritual or religious symbols, such as angels and deities, are also quite common, even in people who have no particular religious beliefs, Mendoza said. Almost universally, the visions are reported as comforting by the people who have experienced them. 

Deathbed visions may also be accompanied by extremely lucid dreaming. According to a study conducted by Dr. Christopher Kerr, M.D., Ph.D., at the Center for Hospice & Palliative Care in Buffalo, New York, nearly 90% of dying patients have at least one dream that they describe as more vivid than their normal dreams. Sometimes, Kerr reports, these dreams seem so real that they are perceived as waking reality.

Most of the dying people Kerr interviewed reported dreams of reuniting with loved ones who had already died, or getting ready to travel somewhere. A smaller number reported dreaming about something that had happened in their past. According to Kerr, these dreams very often had significant emotional significance to the dying, most of whom found them both comforting and meaningful. 

Interestingly, recent animal studies show that the brain becomes highly synchronized in the moments before death. According to Jimo Borjigin, Ph.D., a neuroscientist at the University of Michigan, this synchronization is known as “coherence” and is associated with high-level, focused, cognitive activity in the human brain. This increased coherence in the dying brain seems to be the result of a powerful surge of neurochemicals that occurs (at least in animals) right before death. This surge may be behind the bright lights and sudden, intense clarity of thought that cardiac arrest survivors report, Borjigin believes. 

Sources 

“Deathbed Visions: Part I”. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/understanding-grief/201610/deathbed-visions-part-i 

“End-of-life dreams and visions: a longitudinal study of hospice patients’ experiences”. Journal of Palliative Medicine. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24410369/ 

“What It Feels Like to Die”. The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/09/what-it-feels-like-to-die/499319/