Neurosurgeons have been using hypothermia (cooling down the body) and circulatory arrest (stopping the heart) to treat complicated brain aneurysms since the 1980's. Some of the outcomes have been very good.
When a person is in that state, they have no signs of life - no heartbeat and no blood to the brain, yet a significant portion of the time, they do well.
From the article, it looks like they have done this for up to 50 minutes.
"
The median duration of complete arrest in our series
was 11 minutes; the range was 7 to 53 minutes. This
is consistent with reports from other neurological surgeons who have employed extracorporeal circulation for
intracranial vascular surgery
"
http://ether.stanford.edu/library/neuroanesthesia/SNACC%20Re...
When a person is in that state, they have no signs of life - no heartbeat and no blood to the brain, yet a significant portion of the time, they do well.
From the article, it looks like they have done this for up to 50 minutes. " The median duration of complete arrest in our series was 11 minutes; the range was 7 to 53 minutes. This is consistent with reports from other neurological surgeons who have employed extracorporeal circulation for intracranial vascular surgery "