PeerJ
January 1, 2019
Daniel Kondziella, Jens P Dreier, Markus Harboe Olsen
34 citations
Near-death experiences are reported by 10% of a large, diverse sample of 1,034 lay people from 35 countries. People who have such experiences are more likely to also show signs of REM sleep intrusion: 47% of those with near-death experiences had REM intrusion, compared with 26% of those who had unusual experiences that did not meet the threshold for a near-death experience and 14% of those with no such experiences. This link remained strong after adjusting for age, gender, location, employment, and perceived danger; people with REM intrusion were nearly three times as likely to report a near-death experience.
PeerJ
January 1, 2019
Daniel Kondziella, Markus Harboe Olsen, Coline L Lemale et al.
17 citations
People who experience migraine with aura are more than twice as likely to report a near-death experience (NDE) as those without migraine aura. In a sample of 1,037 adults from 35 countries, 13.0% of those with migraine aura reported an NDE compared to 6.1% of those without, an odds ratio of 2.33 after adjusting for age and gender. This association indirectly supports the idea that NDEs involve rapid eye movement (REM) sleep intrusion, a feature also linked to migraine with aura. The finding may relate to spreading depolarization, a brain wave pattern that occurs both in migraine aura and at the end of life.
European journal of neurology
October 1, 2023
Bianca Raffaelli, Pia Kull, Jasper Mecklenburg et al.
6 citations
Among 808 migraine patients at a tertiary headache center, 2.7% reported having had a near-death experience (NDE) and 5.4% reported REM sleep intrusions. The prevalence of NDEs did not differ between those with and without migraine aura (2.8% vs. 2.6%), nor did REM sleep intrusions (6.3% vs. 4.9%). However, participants with REM sleep intrusions were more likely to have had an NDE (11.4%) than those without (2.2%). Higher depression, anxiety, and stress scores were associated with REM sleep intrusions. The findings suggest that NDEs and REM sleep intrusions may share underlying mechanisms, but migraine aura status does not influence their prevalence.