It was Professor Barrett's wife, Lady Florence Barrett, an obstetric surgeon, (pictured left) whose observations led to the serious study of "deathbed visions." She told her husband about a woman who had died at her hospital after having a baby. Just before the woman died, she sat up and became very excited about seeing a wonderful place and said that her father had come to take her there. Then she expressed surprise to see her sister with her father. It seems that the sister had died three weeks before, but Doris had not been told. This story was so interesting to Professor Barrett that he undertook a systematic study of death-bed visions.