Deathbed visions, coincidences, and intriguing tales of Grandfather’s Clock November 27, 2007

Dr Peter Fenwick
Honorary Senior Lecturer, Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College.

In our Western culture there are very few studies looking at the process of dying and the mental states that are present just before death. Eastern cultures are much more sophisticated and they not only have detailed descriptions of the phenomena which occur when dying, but also detailed description of the mental states that the dying can expect to experience. To fill this gap we have carried out three studies and collected data in response to a Daily Mail article and an appearance on Richard and Judy. The three studies were interviewing carers of the dying in the Camden palliative care team, interviewing the carers in two hospices and in one nursing home.

Dr. Fenwick was for many years Consultant in charge of the neuropsychiatric and epilepsy unit at the Maudsley Hospital. He is at present Co-Director of both research and clinical programmes at the Department of Neurophysiology at Broadmoor Hospital and Consultant Neuropsychiatrist at the London Sleep Centre, running a clinical and forensic neuropsychiatric practice. For the last seven years he has spent several months at the RIKEN Neuroscience Institute in Japan, studying the use of magnetic field tomography in various psychological and motor paradigms. In the UK he is carrying out research into near death experiences in coronary care units, and surveys of approaching death experiences in hospices and nursing homes in southern England.

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