Out-of-body experiences associated with seizures

Out-of-body experiences are rare but real sensations reported by some people with epilepsy during seizures. In a group of 100 patients, 55% recalled some subjective experience with their seizures, and 7 reported out-of-body experiences. No demographic, medical, or seizure-related traits distinguished those who had out-of-body experiences from those who did not. These experiences did not affect epilepsy-related quality of life. Even among those who reported them, out-of-body sensations were extremely infrequent, often occurring only once or twice many years ago, making it impossible to link them to specific seizure characteristics or medications.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Alterations of consciousness are critical factors in the diagnosis of epileptic seizures. With these alterations in consciousness, some persons report sensations of separating from the physical body, experiences that may in rare cases resemble spontaneous out-of-body experiences. This study was designed to identify and characterize these out-of-body-like subjective experiences associated with seizure activity. Fifty-five percent of the patients in this study recalled some subjective experience in association with their seizures. Among our sample of 100 patients, 7 reported out-of-body experiences associated with their seizures. We found no differentiating traits that were associated with patients' reports of out-of-body experiences, in terms of either demographics; medical history, including age of onset and duration of seizure disorder, and seizure frequency; seizure characteristics, including localization, lateralization, etiology, and type of seizure, and epilepsy syndrome; or ability to recall any subjective experiences associated with their seizures. Reporting out-of-body experiences in association with seizures did not affect epilepsy-related quality of life. It should be noted that even in those patients who report out-of-body experiences, such sensations are extremely rare events that do not occur routinely with their seizures. Most patients who reported out-of-body experiences described one or two experiences that occurred an indeterminate number of years ago, which precludes the possibility of associating the experience with the particular characteristics of that one seizure or with medications taken or other conditions at the time.