Sam Parnia

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Sam Parnia
Born London, England
Fields Intensive-care medicine
Institutions Stony Brook University School of Medicine
Alma mater Guys and St. Thomas' Medical School (MBBS), University of Southampton (Ph.D.), University of London and Weill Cornell Medical Center (residency)
Known for Research on near-death experiences and cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

Sam Parnia is an Assistant professor of Medicine at the Stony Brook University School of Medicine where he also is director of research into cardiopulmonary resuscitation, and he is director of the Human Consciousness Project at the University of Southampton. Parnia is known for his work on near-death experiences and cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

Education and career

Parnia graduated from Guys and St. Thomas' Medical School in London where he received his MBBS in 1995.[1][2] He then went on to the University of Southampton where he worked as a clinical research fellow and earned a PhD in cell biology; he graduated in 2007.[3][4][5] He retained a title as honorary research fellow at University of Southampton, and continued to do work with that group after he graduated[5][6] through the Human Consciousness Project that he founded and directs.[5][7]

Parnia completed his fellowship training in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at the University of London and at the Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City in 2010 and then joined the faculty at Stony Brook University School of Medicine as a member of the Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Division,[5] where he also directs research into cardiopulmonary resuscitation.[5][8] His UK medical credentials were recognized by the State of New York as a medical degree in 2012.[2]

The Horizon Research Foundation was founded in 1987 to fund and foster research into near death experiences;[9] as of 2016 Parnia owned the domain for its website and was a trustee, along with David Lorimer, Peter Fenwick, and John Tomlinson.[9][10][11]

Career

Parnia is known for his involvement and research in the field of emergency medicine and cardiac arrest resuscitation.[12][13] He conducts research on, and advocates for wider application of, best practices for resuscitation when people die; namely better, perhaps automated cardiopulmonary resuscitation techniques, the use of targeted temperature management, extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, brain oximetry, and prevention of reperfusion injury, and wrote his book, Reversing Death (published in in the UK as the Lazarus Effect) as part of that effort.[1][12] He says that many people who are actually dead from heart attacks or blood loss could be resuscitated if contemporary best practices as defined by the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation were used promptly.[12]

The other focus of his work, which he conducts with a team at University of Southampton, is near-death experiences.[1] Parnia is often confronted with the paranormal aspect of his research, and the resistance to the type of studies that he is conducting in the mind/brain-area.[12][13][14]

Near death research

Parnia prefers to use the term "actual death experience" to near death experience (NDE), as much of his research has dealt with people who have no heart beat and no detectable brain activity for periods of time.[1][15] Studying people who have died of a heart attack allows clinical studies to be designed and conducted in emergency rooms and critical care units prospectively.[16]

In 2001, Parnia and colleagues published the results of a year-long study of heart attack survivors. 63 survivors were interviewed; 7 had memories of the time they were unconscious and 4 had experiences that, according to the study criteria, were NDEs. Out of body claims were tested by placing figures on suspended boards facing the ceiling, not visible from the floor. No positive results were reported, and no conclusions could be drawn due to the small number of subjects. [16]

Parnia was the principal investigator of the AWARE Study (AWAreness during REsuscitation), which was launched in 2008.[13] The study included medical centers across the UK, mainland Europe and North America and tested awareness and near-death experiences (NDE) during cardiac arrest, and investigated out of body claims by using hidden targets placed on shelves that could only be seen from above.[17] The results of the study were published in October 2014; both the launch and the study results were widely discussed in the media.[18][17][19]

As of May 2016, a posting at the UK Clinical Trials Gateway website describes plans for AWARE II, a two-year multicenter observational study of 900-1500 patients experiencing cardiac arrest, with subjects being recruited as Aug 1 2014 and a trial end date of May 31, 2017.[20]

Brain/mind hypotheses

Parnia and others have suggested that a mind that is mediated by, but not produced by, the brain, is a possible way to explain NDE.[4][21][22]

Science writer Mike McRae has noted "While Parnia's work contributes valuable data to understanding NDE as a cultural phenomenon, his speculations do indeed sit on the brink of pseudoscience."[23] Neurologist Michael O'Brien has written that "most people would not find it necessary to postulate such a separation between mind and brain to explain the events," and suggested that further research is likely to provide a physical explanation for near-death experiences.[4] The psychologist Susan Blackmore appeared with Parnia and Peter Fenwick on a BBC documentary called "The Day I Died" and disagreed with their interpretations of NDEs, finding purely physical explanations to be more plausible.[4]

Selected bibliography

Books
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Research publications
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  • Parnia S, et al. A feasibility study evaluating the role of cerebral oximetry in predicting return of spontaneous circulation in cardiac arrest. Resuscitation. 2012 Aug;83(8):982-5. PMID 22322284
  • Ahn A, Yang J, Inigo-Santiago L, Parnia S. A feasibility study of cerebral oximetry monitoring during the post-resuscitation period in comatose patients following cardiac arrest. Resuscitation. 2014 Apr;85(4):522-6. Epub 2013 Dec 19. PMID 24361675
  • Parnia S, et al A feasibility study of cerebral oximetry during in-hospital mechanical and manual cardiopulmonary resuscitation Crit Care Med. 2014 Apr;42(4):930-3. PMID 24247475
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  • Singer AJ, et al. Cerebral oximetry levels during CPR are associated with return of spontaneous circulation following cardiac arrest: an observational study. Emerg Med J. 2015 May;32(5):353-6. PMID 24662518
Reviews and editorials
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References

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. 2.0 2.1 The State Education Department. The University of The State of New York. Report of the Committee on the Professions Regarding Licensing Petitions Albany, N.Y: October 2, 2012.
  3. Southampton University Graduation List 2007 Part 1. Ceremony 10: School of Medicine; Doctor of Philosophy. Southern Daily Echo, published online Monday 23 July 2007
  4. 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  5. 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 Nour Foundation, Speaker Profile. Sam Parnia, MD, PhD, MRCP. Page accessed April 25, 2016
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  7. Palchik, Guillermo. Conference Report: The Nour Foundation Georgetown University & Blackfriars Hall, Oxford University Symposium Series Technology, Neuroscience & the Nature of Being: Considerations of Meaning, Morality and Transcendence Part I: The Paradox of Neurotechnology 8 May 2009. Philosophy, Ethics, and Humanities in Medicine, 2009, 4:9. PMID 19615065. Free full text
  8. Peikoff, Kira. CPR Survival Rates Can Differ Greatly by City. New York Times, published online 7 December, 2015. Page accessed, May 18, 2016
  9. 9.0 9.1 UK Charity Commission. 296655 - The International Association For Near-Death Studies UK Page accessed April 25, 2016
  10. Horizonresearch.org domain registration Page accessed April 25, 2016
  11. Horizons Research Foundation Newsletter, Volume 1, Issue 4, Spring 2002
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  15. 16.0 16.1 French CC. Near-death experiences in cardiac arrest survivors. Prog Brain Res. 2005;150:351-67. PMID 16186035
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  19. UK Clinical Trials Gateway. Primary Trial ID Number 17129, entitled "AWARE II (AWAreness during REsuscitation) A Multi-Centre Observational Study of the Relationship between the Quality of Brain Resuscitation and Consciousness, Neurological, Functional and Cognitive Outcomes following Cardiac Arrest" Last updated May 3, 2016. Page archived May 9, 2016
  20. Sleutjes A, Moreira-Almeida A, Greyson B. Almost 40 years investigating near-death experiences: an overview of mainstream scientific journals. J Nerv Ment Dis. 2014 Nov;202(11):833-6. PMID 25357254
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