Table 2.
NDE intensity (Greyson Scale total score) and content (core features) reported in “NDE-like” and “real NDE” groups–by decreasing order of frequency according to the “real NDE” group (significance level p < 0.05).
| NDE Scale features | “NDE-like” n = 50 (%) | “Real NDE” n = 140 (%) | p | “Real NDE” etiologies | p | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anoxia n = 45 (%) | Trauma n = 30 (%) | Other n = 65 (%) | |||||
| “Did you have a feeling of peace or pleasantness?” | 45 (90) | 127 (91) | 0.88 | 40 (89) | 28 (93) | 59 (91) | 0.81 |
| “Did you feel separated from your body?” | 37 (74) | 111 (79) | 0.44 | 36 (80) | 24 (80) | 51 (79) | 0.98 |
| “Did you see, or feel surrounded by, a brilliant light?” | 42 (84) | 106 (76) | 0.23 | 32 (71) | 20 (67) | 54 (83) | 0.15 |
| “Did time seem to speed up or slow down?” | 41 (82) | 105 (75) | 0.31 | 35 (78) | 24 (80) | 46 (71) | 0.55 |
| “Did you seem to enter some other, unearthly world?” | 35 (70) | 101 (72) | 0.77 | 33 (73) | 21 (70) | 47 (72) | 0.95 |
| “Did you have a feeling of joy?” | 37 (74) | 98 (70) | 0.59 | 32 (71) | 18 (60) | 48 (74) | 0.38 |
| “Did you feel a sense of harmony or unity with the universe?” | 39 (78) | 96 (69) | 0.21 | 33 (73) | 21 (70) | 42 (65) | 0.61 |
| “Did you come to a border or point of no return?” | 31 (62) | 86 (61) | 0.94 | 22 (49) | 20 (67) | 44 (68) | 0.11 |
| “Were your senses more vivid than usual?” | 34 (68) | 84 (60) | 0.32 | 25 (56) | 16 (53) | 43 (66) | 0.38 |
| “Did you suddenly seem to understand everything?” | 25 (50) | 76 (54) | 0.60 | 26 (58) | 20 (67) | 30 (46) | 0.15 |
| “Did you seem to encounter a mystical being or presence, or hear an unidentifiable voice?” | 29 (58) | 71 (51) | 0.38 | 20 (44) | 12 (40) | 39 (60) | 0.12 |
| “Were your thoughts speeded up?” | 20 (40) | 62 (44) | 0.60 | 23 (51) | 15 (50) | 24 (37) | 0.26 |
| “Did you see deceased or religious spirits?” | 17 (34) | 54 (39) | 0.57 | 12 (27) | 9 (30) | 33 (51) | 0.063 |
| “Did you seem to be aware of things going on elsewhere, as if by ESP?” | 14 (28) | 47 (34) | 0.50 | 10 (22) | 9 (30) | 28 (43) | 0.067 |
| “Did scenes from your past come back to you?” | 9 (18) | 37 (26) | 0.23 | 11 (24) | 11 (37) | 15 (23) | 0.35 |
| “Did scenes from the future come to you?” | 9 (18) | 26 (19) | 0.93 | 8 (18) | 5 (17) | 13 (20) | 0.92 |
| Total score (mean ± SD, range) | 17 ± 7, 7–30 | 16 ± 6, 7–30 | 0.10 | 15 ± 6, 7–28 | 16 ± 6, 7–26 | 16 ± 6, 7–30 | 0.29 |