Portents in Healthcare

The link between the healthcare field and the paranormal is strong, and understandably so. Suffering and death are ever-present and emotional energy is high for both patients and workers alike. Unsurprisingly medical workers are over all a superstitious lot, whether openly admitted or not.

A perfect example of a “superstition” believed by a large portion of the general population, and very much believed by many medical-workers is that of the full moon being responsible for a manner of, well “lunacy”.

Another is the belief in omens of impending death.
Recently speaking with a nurse (we will call her Katherine) with an unusual awareness of these portents, she made some observations that I had not previously encountered.

She began talking about the common occurrence of patient hallucinations. This can be caused by various illnesses and afflictions , and are often similar in “theme”; dogs, cats and all manner of animals, and even persons are not uncommon. However as she noted, when the hallucinations were that of the patient’s family, especially those that had passed, extra vigilant observation of the patient should be maintained because very often the patient would expire soon after these visits. This is very similar to accounts of those that have experienced a N.B.E. (near-death-experience) were encountering previously passed love ones are quit common. The mirage of passed family are not the only people to be seen by those in a compromised state. Occasionally, and perhaps the most unnerving chimeras reported are those in which the patient state they see themselves, very much in the vein of the folkloric “doppelgänger”. As an example, the patient will ask, “why am I on the ceiling?”. This type experience seem to be a certain prelude to calamity.

Another observed theme she had noticed with patients having hallucinations and their portents while on the job, was the hallucinations of “out of place” water. She gave the example of a patient asking, “why is there water all over the floor?”.
Reports of hallucinations of water spark many questions. Water being one of the four “classical- elements” it’s connection to the occult and all things paranormal are ubiquitous. Water is the element from which all life on Earth sprang, and in it we all begin our lives. What does it say that many “see” it as our lives draw to a close?