On April 6, 2013 attorney Michael Seidl stepped down from the Alcor board of directors after a decade of distinguished service. Michael cited increased family obligations as the reason for stepping down, acknowledging that being an Alcor director is time-consuming and challenging. Although he has been a steadfast contributor and wise, balanced voice on the board in matters legal, financial, and strategic, he believes he cannot continue to put in the time he feels the position calls for.

The president and the board wish Michael well, and look forward to continuing to consult with him as an Advisor to the board, and perhaps welcome him back in the future if circumstances change.

On March 6, 2013, following pronouncement, we cryopreserved (confidential) 91-year old member A-2605 (neurocryopreservation option), who became Alcor’s 116th patient.

On February 22, 2013, Alcor received a call from the son of one of our members. His father had been admitted to a hospital in Chapel Hill, NC for an infection, but a previously diagnosed condition of normal pressure hydrocephalus (NPH) had progressed to the point of him losing the ability to swallow (eat or drink). His doctors gave him a “failure to thrive” diagnosis”. In absence of low quality-of-life interventions, the doctors were soon suggesting to the family that they move him to a hospice facility for his remaining time.

The family were surprised that he was that sick, but a family friend who is a nurse thought he maybe had a week or two to live. The son, who was very supportive of his father’s wishes, and other family members decided to relocate our member to Scottsdale to enter into hospice. After discussing the options and their costs – including driving, flying a commercial flight, and using a medically equipped jet and medical crew – the eventual decision was made a few days later to use the chartered medical jet.

We made arrangements with a hospice in Phoenix to accept the member. On February 25, the hospice confirmed availability of a place at a hospital in Paradise Valley about 7 miles from Alcor. Our member arrived on Tuesday February 26, early in the evening. Our equipment and the emergency vehicle were stationed at the hospital, and Aaron Drake, Alcor’s Medical Response Director stayed at a hotel down the street that evening. Not knowing how long our member’s decline might take, two trained standby team members from Southern California drove to Scottsdale, arriving late on the 27th.

From the 27th on, someone was on site at all times, with at least two team members on site at all times from 9:00 am on the 28th. Another Phoenix-area team member and one from Florida also participated in the standby. To better monitor the patient’s decline, the patient was put on telemetry so that his vital signs could be monitored continuously by a full-time staff. Our procedures were explained to several members of staff at the hospital, including the Associate Chief Medical Officer of the hospice.

After some ups and downs in the patient’s condition, on the morning of Wednesday March 6, the patient stopped breathing and was officially pronounced at 8:45 am. Five team members participated during the stabilization since it occurred right around shift change. A-2605 arrived in Alcor’s operating room at 9:46 am. Cryoprotective perfusion was concluded at 2:48 pm. The following day, the family of the patient came for a tour of Alcor.

Alcor member Kim Suozzi (A-2643) was pronounced legally deceased on January 17, 2013. A neurocryopreservation, Kim became Alcor’s 114th patient.

In every single case, involuntary clinical death (by today’s standards) is a terrible thing to happen. Kim Suozzi’s situation was especially unfortunate in that she was cryopreserved at the age of 23, following a less-than-two-year battle with recurrent glioblastoma multiforme, a highly aggressive brain cancer. This is the most common and most aggressive malignant primary brain tumor in humans, invariably fatal, and with a median survival time of approximately 12–14 months.

Born in June of 1989, by all accounts Kim was a very bright young woman graduating from Truman State University with degrees in Psychology, Linguistics, and a minor in Cognitive Science. Kim’s desire to study neuroscience in graduate school sparked her interest in cryonics early in college, but, naturally enough, she felt no sense of urgency to make arrangements. That changed after being diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme in March 2011. After undergoing several treatments, including two clinical trials at Dana-Farber beginning in June 2012, her prognosis remained very poor. In August 2012, Kim was told that she probably had only three to six months to live. At that point, she wrote about her situation on her blog on the popular internet forum, Reddit. In part, she wrote:

“I had always planned on establishing cryopreservation plans through life insurance, I was caught off guard when I was suddenly diagnosed during my last month and a half of college.”

“Many of you know that I’m agnostic; I don’t have any clue what happens when you die, but have no reason to think that my consciousness will continue on after death. The only thing that I can think to make me feel a little more at ease with my death is to secure cryopreservation plans on the off-chance that they figure out how to revive people in the future. The way I see it, it’s a better bet than decomposing or getting cremated.”

Kim started a fundraiser, eventually generating almost $7,000. The Society for Venturism took over fundraising efforts, Alcor put up a donations page, and another appeal was made at the Alcor-40 conference in October 2012. Altogether, around 200 people contributed to the funding for Kim’s cryopreservation. Alcor was able to make a special arrangement for Kim – in part based on her agreement to move to the Scottsdale area – that made it possible to take her case.

With the inevitable end in sight – and with the cancer continuing to spread throughout her brain – Kim made the brave choice to refuse food and fluids. Even so, it took around 11 days before her body stopped functioning. Around 6:00 am on Thursday January 17, 2013, Alcor was alerted that Kim had stopped breathing. Because Kim’s steadfast boyfriend and family had located Kim just a few minutes away from Alcor, Medical Response Director Aaron Drake arrived almost immediately, followed minutes later by Max More, then two well-trained Alcor volunteers. As soon as a hospice nurse had pronounced clinical death, we began our standard procedures. Stabilization, transport, surgery, and perfusion all went smoothly. A full case report will be forthcoming.

Speaking through an official announcement, Kim’s boyfriend said:

“Our hope is that technology will continue to progress to the point that Kim may have a real chance of living again in the future. Unfortunately, the development of the requisite technologies could be decades or centuries away. Since Kim is no longer with us to explore and innovate in the field of neuroscience, she is counting on all of us to push for the innovations she had hoped to see in her lifetime.

Until (or unless) the day comes that Kim can be brought back, remember her, celebrate her, and emulate her resilience, so we can create the future of her dreams.

Nobody is too young to make cryopreservation arrangements.

Anyone interested in cryonics or inspired by Kim’s story should contact Alcor for more information on the process. http://www.alcor.org/cgi-sys/cgiwrap/alcor/public/InfoRequest.cgi

In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations to Alcor be made in Kim’s name. You can donate online at: http://www.alcor.org/donate/donate.html.”

The next Alcor Board of Directors meeting is scheduled for Saturday, February 2, 2012, at 11:00 AM (MST) at the Alcor facility, 7895 East Acoma Drive in Scottsdale, AZ. The public part of the meeting will be short, to allow in-depth board discussions. Members and the public may attend the public portion in which announcements will be made and questions taken from members and the public. Full public meetings in 2013 will those in January, March, May, July, September, and November.

The next full public Alcor Board of Directors meeting, to which members and the public are encouraged to attend, is scheduled for Saturday, March 2 , 2013, at 11:00 AM (MST) at the Alcor facility, 7895 East Acoma Drive in Scottsdale, AZ.

John Monts, A-1645, a neuro member of Alcor since January 1997, was declared clinically dead as of October 31, 2012 at age 68. He is Alcor’s 113^th patient.

On the afternoon of Thursday November 1, 2012, several personnel at Alcor received a Telemed emergency call and text concerning member John Monts. (Mr Monts requested privacy prior to cryopreservation, but said his arrangements were public afterward.) Apparently Mr Monts traveled from his home in North Carolina for dental work in his previous neighborhood in South Carolina. Sometime on the evening of October 31, he was robbed. Sometime the following morning, he was found clinically dead in his hotel room. Time of death was estimated as around 11pm by the pathologist. Whether there was any connection between the robbery and his clinical death is not known to us, but the circumstances made this a coroner’s case.

The first we knew of any of this was at 2:08 pm on November 1. Max More immediately contacted one of Alcor’s attorneys who has assisted in the past when we faced a coroner’s case. While we pressed to limit the autopsy we also made arrangements for cooling to dry ice temperature and discussed options for transporting the patient back to Arizona intact or alternatively doing the neuro-separation on site. Aaron Drake spent considerable time talking to various people and departments at the Medical University of South Carolina – Charleston. Initially they seemed very willing to cooperate with limiting autopsy and allowing quick cooling to dry ice temperature, but a change of personnel led to complications. With our legal input, the coroner agreed to conduct a toxicology panel and external head examination while refraining from opening the skull and sectioning the brain. Mr Monts was then released to us on the condition that we conduct a CT scan of his brain and send the results to the coroner.

Aaron flew out to Charleston on November 4 to collect Mr Monts, who was now at dry ice temperature, buying us time. Aaron conducted the neuro-separation then, that evening, topped off the neuro shipper box with dry ice ready for shipment to Alcor the following morning. A medical emergency delayed the flight’s arrival, as it was diverted to El Paso. The patient arrived in Phoenix on November 7 and reached Alcor at 6:30 am. Cooldown to liquid nitrogen temperature began shortly after. It was noted that, on November 9, the dry ice neuro shipper still had some dry ice inside, confirming our previous tests.