Ohio truck driver says he saw heaven for 45 minutes, then God sent him back

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By Mark Ellis
Senior Correspondent, ASSIST News Service

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA (ANS) -- Truck driver Brian Miller,41, was delivering metal to a warehouse in Streetsboro, Ohio, when he felt a sudden tightness in his chest.

Brian & Roberta Miller

At first he thought the tightness might be due to a frigid blast from the polar vortex or even asthma, but as the pain sharply intensified, he dialed 9-1-1. “I’m a truck driver and I think I’m having a heart attack,” he told the dispatcher.

Paramedics brought him to University Hospitals’ Ahuja Medical Center, where doctors discovered a complete blockage of his main artery, a condition sometimes nicknamed the ‘widow maker’ due to its often-fatal results. Former NBC News Washington Bureau Chief Tim Russert died suddenly from a similar blockage. 

After Dr. William Wolf performed emergency surgery to clear the blockage, Miller seemed to be recovering. He was sitting up in bed, talking, and in good spirits, but then his heart careened into ventricular fibrillation – or V-fib – an acute medical emergency.

“His heart was quivering in there; it wasn’t able to pump,” ICU nurse Emily Bishop told Fox8 News in Cleveland. She frantically called “Code Blue” for CPR and a half-dozen doctors and nurses rushed in to see if they could restore Miller’s heart.

If a V-fib continues for more than a few seconds, it often moves into a “flatline” condition, with cardiogenic shock and complete loss of blood flow. Sudden death usually results in mere moments.

They knew that if Miller was not revived within about five minutes, he could sustain irreversible brain damage and possibly become brain dead.

Despite their heroic efforts, Miller began to slip away. “He had no heart rate. He had no blood pressure. He had no pulse; his brain had no oxygen for 45 minutes,” Bishop recounted. “We shocked him four times and it still didn’t work.”

When his heart stopped, Miller entered another dimension of reality. “I started to see a light and I started walking toward the light,” Miller told News8.

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Source: Assist News Service