Have you ever done something purely because you thought "hmm, I don't think this opportunity will ever come again so I should do it." Well, if you haven't I highly recommend you put some thought into whether or not it's a good idea before you jump in with both feet and say "yes". Case in point:
Our Anatomy & Physiology class was taking a field trip on March 27th and the professor had emailed me a couple weeks ago asking if I wanted to go. I said yes and asked if Dave could come as I thought it would be something he would enjoy. Plus I needed someone to hold my hand. The field trip: a cadaver tour. The "tour" part refers to a tour of the human body, not a tour through a roomful of cadavers. I'll spare you all the gory details (pun intended) and just give you enough of a visual so that if you're ever presented with this very same opportunity, you can think back to this post and then you can make an informed decision (informed decisions are good).
The room, of course, is in the basement level (isn't that where you picture any room that has dead bodies?) and it's a small room at that. Really the only thing this room is used for is for the dissection (and teaching) of a cadaver. There are two holding "cells"...luckily no-one was wheeled in (apparently not uncommon on the weekend). We walk in and had already been prepped for what the smell would be like. They use formaldehyde and phenol. Phenol is what's used in that thing you spray on your sore throat to numb it and was the dominate smell. So not necessarily a "bad" smell but I breathed through my mouth all the same (a couple of the students said their noses burned a little bit after a while...did I mention we were there for four and a half hours?).
Our instructor, Dan, was fantastic. A third year med student and clearly enthusiastic about his field. It was definitely information overload and we learned a ton (most of which I can not recall as I was in shock for the first four hours and 29 minutes). So we all sit around a humidor and the person is in it, covered in a body bag. He explains some more things and then starts to peel back the corner just enough so that I can see the shoulder before he puts the cover back down to tell us something else. If I wasn't trapped between two large males on either side, a huge cabinet behind me and the humidor with a dead body in front of me...I probably would've run. Dan then finishes his thought for real this time and pulls the cover back and my eyes shoot towards the ceiling. I veeeeeery slowly bring them down to the person. It was the weirdest thing I've ever experienced. They cover the head, hands and feet in gauze as that is what most people connect with when they see a body so this helps to make looking at a dissected dead body a little easier if you will. When the med students receive the body for dissection they aren't given any information about the person (age, health problems, cause of death, etc.). Dan said this was his favorite dissection pathologically speaking (I'll get to that in a minute).
So it's obvious that this is a woman and Dan said she was probably in her 70's or 80's when she passed. He talked about the embalming process and the life of a cadaver, how long it takes to dissect, all that good stuff. He then dove in (sorry, I can't help myself) and went through each organ. He talked about it, held it, passed it around (I decided not to partake in the handling of organs until the very end). When we got to the end of the digestive system is when Dan started getting excited (more so than he already was) and where we find out what her cause of death most likely was. Her kidneys were shot (not that I know what a normal kidney looks like but I can now tell you what a crappy kidney looks like) and her bladder was small and atrophied which indicates she was on dialysis for some time. She also had Crohn's disease as her large intestine was all messed up in two sections. She'd also had a total hysterectomy (not related to her cause of death, it's just something I just remembered). Then Dan moved on to the musculoskeletal system and he lifted the flap of her leg skin and then pulled back her knee cap and low and behold...she'd had a total knee replacement!
One thing that Dan said that really stuck out was "women are better". That's it, just women are better. Not women are better human beings or women are better at driving, just "women are better". I made him repeat that in case Dave missed it the first time.
Okay, I think I've provided more than enough details so I'll wrap up here. All in all, I really enjoyed it (even if there are certain foods I can no longer eat due to Dan's references) and if I took anything away from this experience, it's that you need to take care of your body!!! It's not because of things I saw in this woman (other than the things I listed above, she was fairly healthy) but it's what Dan described as he went through each organ. All that crappy, processed food we put in our bodies...not good. Okay, I know we all know that on some level but just go see a cadaver with a med student explaining all the bad stuff that can happen and you'll really *know* that. Don't smoke (we've all seen the black lungs but when you understand how it really affects someone on a deeper level, you'll never take another drag). And of course, exercise! The medical field doesn't keep trying to pound all this into our heads for no reason!! You only have one body so take care of it!
Oh and one other important thing I learned: when you're hung over, don't take Acetaminophen (i.e. Tylenol), any other pain reliever is okay. Processing alcohol and acetaminophen packs a one, two punch on your liver (I can't explain why, I just remember). You need your liver, trust me.
Excuse me now while I go wash my eyes to try and get rid the image I keep seeing courtesy of my hippocampus.
No comments:
Post a Comment