Life Extension Society 990 N. Powhatan St. Arlington VA 22205 703-534-7277 =============================================================== 1995 No. 3 LIFE EXTENSION SOCIETY NEWS July, 1995 =============================================================== LES Open House Held in Philadelphia The LES open house in Philadelphia, PA went off as planned on Saturday, May 13. The turnout included four cryonicists signed up with national cryonics organizations, four active "shoppers" who will begin the signup process soon, and two inquisitive "window shoppers." The attendees spent the afternoon getting to know one another, answering basic questions about cryonics and signup, and enjoying dinner at a local mall. Overall, two thumbs up. For further information about cryonics in the Philadelphia area, contact Guy G*pson, LES Vice President, at 610-825-6939 evenings or by e-mail at lazarus@netaxs.com. LES Board Elects New Officers The LES Board elected officers at its June 11 meeting. Mark Mugler, of Arlington, VA and Joel Finkleman, of Silver Spring, MD were re-elected as President and Secretary-Treasurer. Guy G*pson, of Conshohocken, PA was elected Vice President. Equipment and Training Update Charles Platt, Vice President of the CryoCare Foundation, reports in the latest issue of The CryoCare Report that a prototype collapsible portable ice bath (PIB) has been constructed and now is being tested by BioPreservation, Inc. In addition, Hugh Hixon at the Alcor Life Extension Foundation has been refining PIB designs for a number of years. PIBs are used to chill patients upon deanimation to minimize ischemic injury. Deployment of improved-design PIBs by local groups will improve the quality of cryonic stabilization service to their members. CSNY Stabilization Team Sees Action Again For the second time in a year, members of the Cryonics Society of New York have assisted in the suspension of an Alcor member from the New York area. Below is an excerpt from an item posted to the Cryonet by Steve Bridge, Alcor President. Andy Epstein, a 66-year old history professor, was hospitalized with pneumonia. Alcor received less than an hour's notice before clinical death, which was at about 10:00 p.m. in New York. This precluded a prompt field washout, since our Scottsdale team could not have arrived in New York until late the next morning. This was also too late for the backup washout solution to be flown in from Ft. Lauderdale. However, thanks to some exceptional assistance from hospital personnel, our cooperating New York mortician, and two transport-trained volunteers, the suspension proceeded as well as could be expected in such a situation. The hospital staff packed the patient in ice [and] administered heparin, sodium bicarbonate, and Maalox, and the physician on duty performed closed-chest compressions for 15 minutes to circulate the drugs. The mortician quickly picked up the patient and, with the assistance of Gerry Arthus and Curtis Henderson, packed the patient in water ice for shipment to Phoenix via the first America West flight [the next morning]. (America West's overnight cargo crew in Phoenix was extremely helpful in setting up the shipment.) By the time the patient arrived at Alcor's Scottsdale facility at 11:15 a.m. (Phoenix time) his temperature was about 4 degrees C. The glycerol perfusion went smoothly [and] was completed at 4:10 p.m. We achieved a very high glycerol concentration of approximately 7 molar (measured in effluent from the brain burr hole). This is extraordinary in a no-washout situation after approximately 18 hours of (chilled) ischemia. It is obvious that the hospital intervention provided an immense benefit to the patient. We are grateful to the hospital staff, Curtis and Gerry, and the mortician. A full suspension report will be published in Cryonics [Magazine] in the near future. Life Extension and Cryonics Resources on the Internet Life extension/cryonics resources abound on the Internet. Your ability to take advantage of these resources depends on the nature of your access. The simplest is e-mail. E-mail access providers include AOL, Bix, Cais, CapAccess, Ccil, Clarknet, CompuServe, Delphi, Digex, Fidonet, Genie, Netaxs, Netcom, Panix, and Prodigy. Most of these services provide other forms of access, such as world-wide-web, newsgroup, and FTP access. Life extension/cryonics resources on the Internet include: o The LES world-wide web home page, http://www.access.digex.net/~kfl/les/les.html. This world-wide-web page contains links to all back issues of the LES News and to the home pages of LES members. In addition, through this web page you can obtain information on subscribing to the LES News, joining LES, the next LES meetings and how to get to them, the officers and Board members of LES, reaching LES by e-mail, snail mail, or phone, and current and upcoming LES activities. The LES web page contains links to other cryonics-related web pages, including Ralph Merkle's cryonics page, Tim Freeman's answers to frequently asked questions about cryonics, and the Cryonet page. In turn, the Cryonet page contains links to the pages of the various cryonics organizations and to archived Cryonet messages. o The sci.life-extension newsgroup, for discussion of life extension techniques. There are ten to twenty messages per day on average. o The sci.cryonics newsgroup, for discussion of the science behind cryonics. There are one or two messages per day on average. o The Cryonet mailing list, maintained by Kevin Brown, for all discussions relating in any way to cryonics. The principals of all cryonics organizations (including Alcor, American Cryonics Society, BioPreservation, Inc., Canadian Cryonics Society, CryoCare, Cryonics Institute, Cryonics Society of New York, CryoSpan, Life Extension Society, and TransTime, Inc.) participate regularly in the list. Daily volume is approximately 4 messages, 15k bytes, or 300 lines on average. To subscribe to the list, send an e-mail message to Kevin at owner-cryonet@cryonet.org. o Timothy Freeman's list of answers to frequently asked questions about cryonics. If you don't have access to the web, you can obtain these FAQs via e-mail at tim@infoscreen.com. They also are posted monthly to the sci.cryonics newsgroup and are available via anonymous FTP from rtfm.mit.edu in the /pub/usenet/sci.cryonics directory. o Keith Lynch maintains all of the back issues of the Life Extension Society News, available via world-wide-web as described above, or via anonymous FTP from ftp.digex.net in the /pub/access/kfl/public_html/les directory. Please e-mail Keith Lynch, kfl@access.digex.net, for more information. Signing Up for Cryonic Suspension from A to Z In 1994 issue no. 4 of the News, we reported that Mark Mugler had given a seminar on signing up for cryogenic preservation. By popular demand, a synopsis of the seminar follows. The organizations with which you will contract for cryonics services can do only so much. The rest is up to you. You need to not only select a cryonics provider or providers, but also plan, as best you can, for your own death and for the disposition of your estate. You may not have control over, or the slightest knowledge of, how and when you will deanimate, or how your family and others will behave thereafter. But if you fail to plan, you hurt only yourself. Signing up for cryonic suspension involves five steps: choosing a cryonics organization or organizations; estate planning; research; development; and execution. Of course, the steps overlap greatly in time and vary in level of effort from individual to individual. Selecting a Provider or Providers. This topic could be the subject of a book. Your personal solution is to network and keep asking a lot of questions. A key decision, among many, is whether to go with a "bundled" organization with all cryonics services under one roof, an "unbundled" structure involving a membership organization that contracts for suspension, investment, and storage services, or a hybrid. This step could take years, so start now. (See the 1994 no. 3 issue for a list of providers.) Estate Planning. When you deanimate, your estate and the proceeds of insurance policies, IRAs, trusts, and other instruments will pass to the beneficiaries named in your will and in the financial instruments. Arranging to finance cryonic suspension cannot be done in a vacuum. It must be part of your estate planning. This will protect you by ensuring that the funds pass to the organization as you desire. For example, if you are a married resident of Virginia, your spouse is entitled to a share of your "augmented estate," which includes assets passing through your will as well as insurance, IRAs, etc. You do not want to make the mistake of leaving your spouse less than his or her share, or the court will redistribute the assets to meet state legal requirements. Needless to say, such an occurrence could put your suspension or storage at risk. You need to plan which proceeds go to which beneficiaries. Ordinarily, but not always, cryonic suspension and storage are financed with the proceeds of an insurance policy, or perhaps a trust, naming the cryonics organization (or cryonics membership organization) as beneficiary. You also may designate that organization as a beneficiary under your will or another financial instrument. Prepare an inventory of your financial assets and liabilities. Ascertain costs, as well as acceptable financing methods, from the cryonics provider or providers and identify your financing needs, such as the need for more life insurance. Plan for the disposition of your estate and the proceeds of existing and future financial instruments. Consult with a lawyer to ensure that state property laws and federal estate/inheritance tax laws are considered. Research. Let's assume that you need to rewrite your will and apply for new life insurance. In addition, let's assume that you do not have an advance medical directive or a detailed medical history. You need to research the various types of insurance (whole life, term, and variants thereon) as well as the underwriters (who offers the type of insurance you want, and what are their financial ratings and other attributes) and the features of individual policies. See LES News no. 2, 1994 for more on insurance. You should find out what others have done to develop cryonics-oriented wills and advance medical directives. The advance medical directive is actually two documents in one: a living will, which directs how your final care is to be administered if you are incompetent to do so verbally at the time; and a durable medical power of attorney, which names an agent and authorizes the agent to make medical decisions on your behalf if you cannot do so. Obviously, both parts can be important to a cryonicist under certain medical conditions. You should compile your complete medical history. You will this both to apply for insurance and to apply with a cryonics organization for suspension services. Obtain the cryonics organization's application form and the insurance company's application form to see what information you need. Development. Apply for insurance and cryonic suspension. Designate your spouse or family member as beneficiary for the time being. While the application is pending, draft up a cryonics-oriented will and advance medical directive. Execution. Once your insurance policy is approved, you are ready to execute the necessary documents. These include: a change in beneficiary form designating the cryonics organization as the beneficiary of your insurance; a new will; an advance medical directive; and the cryonics agreement and related documents such as the authorization of anatomical donation and designation of preferred method (whole body or neuro) for suspension. Instruction letters to your executor, health care agent, spouse, and others also should be signed at this time. The cryonics agreement and related documents should be sent at once to your cryonics organization for counter-signature. Upcoming Meetings and Events August 13, 1995, 3:00: Life Extension Society Board meeting at Exhibits, Inc, 4929 Wyaconda Rd., Rockville, MD. August 20, 1995: Cryonics Society of New York bi-monthly meeting. Contact Janet Pinkney at 201-444-7493 for details. August 19-31, 1995: Training in CPR-phase and washout-phase cryogenic preservation methods. Contact Mike Darwin at BioPreservation, Inc., 909-987-3883 for details. The Life Extension Society is a not-for-profit Maryland Corporation, incorporated 1992. LES membership is $60 per year. Donations are welcome. The Life Extension Society News is published quarterly. Subscriptions are $10 per year. First-time subscribers receive reprints of guest articles from previous issues. The LES News also may be accessed on the Internet (see article, this issue). Guest articles are welcome. Contact Mark Mugler at LES to suggest a guest article or to provide information on upcoming and recent events. Life Extension Society 990 N. Powhatan St. Arlington VA 22205 703-534-7277