A near-death experience (NDE) is the perception reported by a person who nearly died or who was clinically dead and revived. The experience is somewhat common, especially since the development of cardiac resuscitation techniques. According to a Gallup poll approximately eight million Americans claim to have had a near-death experience (Mauro, 1992). The experience often includes an out-of-body experience.
The phenomenology of the NDE
The phenomenology of an NDE usually includes physiological, psychological and transcendental categories (Parnia, Waller, Yeates & Fenwick, 2001) such as subjective impressions of being outside the physical body (an out-of-body experience), transcendence of ego and spatiotemporal boundaries, and other transcendental experiences (Lukoff, Lu & Turner, 1998; Greyson, 2003).