People who experience NDEs often return with information that would have been impossible to obtain without leaving their physical bodies. This information/experience may include meeting unknown relatives, stillborn children, events yet to come, or knowledge of events occurring in other rooms or distant locations.
Some experiencers are told they must return to their bodies because they have more to do, while others are given a choice to return, but most wish to remain. Many report feeling unconditional love and a sense of finally being "home". Approximately 3-5 percent of the population has experienced NDEs.
Usually, there is an inability to verbalize what they have experienced. They describe vibrant colors, which are far more vivid than anything on Earth. Some have described hearing music from thousands of songs but being able to understand them all simultaneously.
Blind subjects, even those blind from birth, have reported having an NDE and describe visual interactions with others as they finally see for the first time. How could this be unless the individual indeed experienced another realm?
There are also disturbing stories of people who found themselves in a very terrifying place just a moment after death. They describe a dark and evil place. Some were escorted at the moment of death by beings who presented themselves as people but transformed into horrific creatures along the way.
Many describe being thrown into cells by gruesome and horrific creatures. Interestingly, these people know why they are there and understand they deserve to be where they are. It is suspected that there are far more of these experiences than reported, due to shame or not wanting to revisit the trauma.
Dr. John Hagan researched and authored the only medical textbook for physicians about the science behind NDEs. He discovered that about 20% of people who die experience an NDE.
Dr. Jean, an ophthalmologist in Oklahoma, died when she was a 20-year-old medical student and relates her story. She found herself looking down on her body but then realized she was in a place of comfort and familiarity. Then she was given a choice to stay or go back. She was told that if she went back, she would be healed and become a doctor. She was also shown the anguish of her parents should she decide to stay, so she chose to return. She knew she would one day return to the place that she had been shown and would look forward to the return.