X-Message-Number: 5462
Date: Thu, 21 Dec 95 22:02:49
From: Steve Bridge <>
Subject: One Alcor Suspension; One Tragic Loss
To CryoNet
>From Steve Bridge, Alcor Foundation
December 21, 1995
One Alcor Suspension; One Tragic Loss
We have been so busy here at Alcor the past few weeks that I have
been remiss in updating CryoNet readers about two recent developments.
SUSPENSION OF STANLEY PENKSA
On Monday, November 27th, Alcor placed its 12th whole body
patient (number 31 overall) into cryonic suspension. The patient is
99 1/2 year old Stanley Penksa, from upstate New York, the oldest
patient ever placed into cryonic suspension. Stanley had maintained
fairly good health for many years; although he had bouts with
pneumonia the last two winters.
We received a call from Stanley's caregiver at 8:06 a.m. MST
(Phoenix time, 2 hours earlier than New York) on Sunday, November 26,
1995. Stanley's staff had been unable to awaken him and called an
emergency team. The EMTs initiated CPR but could not maintain a pulse
and took him to the hospital. Hugh Hixon and Tanya Jones grabbed our
Transport Kit and headed for the airport.
Shortly after Hugh and Tanya were in the air, the hospital ER
doctor called us and said that Stanley had been pronounced at 11:45
a.m. EST (9:45 a.m. MST). The doctor had already injected heparin,
sodium bicarbonate, streptokinase, and Maalox as instructed on Tanya's
letter to the hospital; packed the patient in ice, and performed 15
minutes of chest compressions. He was in the process of turning over
custody to the local cooperating mortician. No cause of death was
established, and no one was interested in an autopsy.
[NOTE: This is the fourth suspension in a row where, even though we
only had short notice of the impending deanimation, the hospital
personnel followed the cryonics transport instructions on the
patient's chart or on the bracelet. They may not be ready to do a
full cooldown, transport, and washout yet; but this is definitely
progress in a crucial area. Oddly, it was also Alcor's fifth
suspension in a row where less than three hours notice of deanimation
was available.]
The only way to get to this patient's town was through Albany
(and no direct flights from Phoenix), then rent a car for an hour
drive. Tanya and Hugh arrived at the mortuary at 9:30 p.m. EST,
initiated the femoral cutdown, and began replacement of the blood with
ViaSpan at 10:54 p.m., which was completed 13 minutes later.
An interesting complication in all of this was that we had agreed
to let Bill Hayes, producer of the award-winning medical series, *The
Operation*, film our next "appropriate" suspension for a one-hour
documentary on cryonics he is producing for the Discovery Channel. As
soon as I heard that Stanley was going to the hospital, I called Bill
in North Carolina. He flew to Newark, picked up his cameraman, and
drove to meet Tanya and Hugh at the mortician's. They filmed every
step of the suspension process from then on. No air date has been set
for the documentary, but late May is the most likely.
This was too late at night to get the patient on a flight back to
Phoenix. In addition, most airline cargo areas need two hours advance
notice to load "human remains," and their cargo areas at smaller
airports often don't open in time in the morning to catch the first
flight. One more complication was that there were no direct flights
to Phoenix and we had to arrange the quickest flight with enough time
between connections to switch the patient. The Special Cargo desk at
United Airlines was immensely helpful in this. In all patient
transport cases we have had so far, the airline personnel have gone
out of their way to help us in what is obviously a time-critical
situation.
Tanya was able to get on an early flight to help finish operating
room set-up, although our crew here now has enough experience that
little was left for her to prepare. Hugh came back with the patient,
who arrived at Alcor by about 5:00 p.m. Monday. Heart bypass was
completed and glycerol perfusion began at 7:15 p.m. and was completed
at 10:26 p.m. Terminal glycerol concentration was 6.92 arterial; 6.45
venous, and 5.65 at the burrhole.
Cooldown was uneventful until the last step a few days later,
when Murphy's Law took over. While we were lifting the patient pod
out of the nitrogen cool-down dewar with our machine hoist, in order
to transfer the patient to permanent storage in the Bigfoot dewar, the
electrical switch on the hoist shorted out. There was the patient pod
at LN2 temperature stuck in the air above the dewar -- with the
Discovery Channel people filming away. Fortunately we were able to
get the patient's head down in the nitrogen again fairly quickly
(another good reason to store the whole-body patients head DOWN),
while we got the short fixed. We have now added a back-up manual
hoist as a safety measure. (After all, it could have been a total
power failure rather than a wiring short.)
Stanley had visited Alcor when he was 98, and he impressed us all
with his love of life, sense of adventure, and good humor. At the
beginning of this year he ordered a copy of Roy Walford's *120 Year
Diet* from us. He was headed for the future one way or another. I
look forward to meeting Stanley again when he can see what a short
period of time 120 years really is.
Thanks to all of the Alcor staff and volunteers who worked on this
suspension.
Scott Herman Steve Bridge
Victor Ochkur Mike Perry
Judy Muhlestein Tony Cerullo
Nancy McEachern Hugh Hixon
Rhonda Iacuzzo Tanya Jones
Keith Henson Sergei Ochkur
Naomi Reynolds Matt Milkovich
Jay Skeer Derek Ryan
Mathew Sullivan Dave Pizer
Brian Shock Joe Hovey
Ralph Whelan
***************************************************
ALCOR MEMBER DIES WITHOUT SUSPENSION
Also in November, our worst nightmare occurred. Rob Michels, age
29, an Alcor member for about five years, died and was not suspended.
The story is painful and some of the details are not yet known (the
Penksa suspension limited our detective time on this). Here is what
we know.
Robert Michels was working on a Ph.D. in Philosophy at the
University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. Rob was one of the first
members of the Extropy Institute and was a close friend of the leading
Extropians and several Alcor staff. Born and raised in southern
California, he was a cheerful, thoughtful man who had long believed
that cryonics was a reasonable choice.
He had been recently divorced, but was still friendly and in
frequent touch with his ex-wife. When Mrs. Michels had not been able
to contact Rob for several days, she asked the Chapel Hill police to
check on him. The police went into his apartment on November 17th and
found his body lying on his couch, in "an advanced state of
decomposition." The Medical Examiner later estimated that he had been
dead for 5-7 days.
Mrs. Michels told the police of his suspension arrangements and
asked the police to phone Alcor at the number on Rob's bracelet. (Rob
had chosen neurosuspension.) Unfortunately, the police officers in
charge decided on their own that the body was too far decomposed for
cryonics and *did not call us.* The M.E. also did not call us. (None
of these people knew that a legal anatomical donation was involved in
cryonics.)
In fact, we did not find out about Rob's death until Tuesday
night, November 21st, when his ex-wife called to tell us she had just
returned from Rob's *funeral.* We were stunned that no one had
informed us early on; but we began investigating the next morning.
The Medical Examiner told us that the body was severely decomposed,
and that the brain was almost completely so. What remained of the
brain had been removed, examined, and *destroyed,* except for a small
sample, which had been chemically fixed and retained.
Further investigation told us that Rob's body had been shipped
back to California in a sealed casket and that he had been buried
without any embalming at all. This left us with few options. Rob's
default decisions in his paperwork asked us to preserve any part of
his "brain tissue" that we were able to recover, regardless of the
damage done to it. We have considered requesting a temporary
disinterment; but our legal authority appears vague, and the chance of
finding any useful brain tissue seems vanishingly small. We are still
negotiating with the state of North Carolina to get access to that
brain sample; but it is clear that the neural information that made up
Rob Michels is gone.
The cause of Rob's death is still under investigation; although
no foul play is suspected. For us, this is merely a matter of
curiosity. The more important questions relate to why he died without
being suspended.
Apparently Rob was not teaching this semester; but was working on
his thesis. Since he had no place to be on a schedule, he wasn't
missed. Only the fact that his ex-wife stayed in regular
communication with him and that she was expecting a package from him
allowed Rob to be found even after a week. How many of YOU are in the
same situation?
Something that we watch for (and which is likely to be available
in the next two years) is a reliable warning system to tell us when
someone's heart stops. At least one company is working on a
wristwatch with a pulse alarm, so police officers can wear it. The
new two-way pagers being offered this winter could be part of a
similar technology. Getting healthy young members to actually WEAR
such a watch might be harder than finding the technology in the first
place, though. After all, how many cryonicists do you know that
"forget" to wear their cryonics necklaces or bracelets?
Another problem is a matter of legal communications. Rob's
family also did not understand that Rob's Alcor membership included an
*anatomical donation.* Rob's father, for one, said that he would have
called Alcor if he had understood more about Rob's legal paperwork.
Rob may not have explained many details of cryonics to his family,
knowing that they were very religious and uncomfortable with his
arrangements. But again, how many of YOU have explained these kinds
of details to your family? The police are going to assume that your
family has the authority to determine the disposition of your remains.
Even if your family agrees with your decision for suspension, do they
understand that Alcor has the legal authority over your body, no
matter what?
It will be many years, perhaps decades, before a practical
understanding of cryonics becomes a standard part of police and court
procedures. Until then, it will be up to you to better inform the
people around you, who may be your only voice in an emergency.
Steve Bridge, President
Alcor Life Extension Foundation
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