(NewsReady.com) – Funerals are an opportunity for family and friends to say goodbye to their loved ones. And while they are sad, there generally aren’t any big surprises. That was not the case at a service in Ecuador recently.
On Friday, June 9, Bella Montoya, a 76-year-old retired nurse, was admitted to the hospital. Doctors believed she might have had a stroke and been in cardiopulmonary arrest. Physicians tried to resuscitate her, but when they received no response, they pronounced her dead.
Speaking to The Associated Press, Montoya’s son, Gilberto Barbera, said his mother was unresponsive when she was taken to the hospital. Doctors told him a few hours later that she died and gave him a death certificate. He said the family decided to hold a wake for her later that day at a local funeral home. During the service, her relatives heard a knocking coming from the coffin.
“It gave us all a fright,” Barbera said. He said that about 20 people were at the wake at the time.
The knocking was Montoya waking up inside the coffin. When her family realized what happened, they rushed her to the hospital. Ecuador’s Health Ministry said Montoya was in the intensive care unit receiving treatment.
Montoya is still in the hospital, and her prognosis isn’t known at this time.
This wasn’t the first time someone has woken up after they were declared dead. In January, employees at Glen Oaks Alzheimer’s Special Care Center in Urbandale, Iowa, pronounced a woman dead. She was taken to the Ankeny Funeral Home and Crematory in a body bag. At the funeral home, an employee unzipped the bag and noticed the woman’s chest was moving up and down, then she gasped for air. EMS took her back to the hospital, and then doctors sent her to the care center again. She died two days later with her family by her side.
Glen Oaks was later charged a $10,000 fine for the mistake.
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