Update: Anatomy and misc. (Go Clones)

I forgot to mention that we already had some patient contact. Well, sorta. We had to dress up in full physician garb (shirt, tie, slacks, and a fancy white coat) and meet with patients and extract information from them. They were actually actors. The woman patient/actor I had was convincing to say the least. I thought I would have trouble taking it 100% seriously, but nope. We get videotaped and are required to watch ourselves interact. I had to do the same thing while student teaching… and let me tell you… videotaping yourself and then watching critically is sheer agony. Everyone is hardest on themselves. It wasn’t so bad. Three more of those this year, and then eleven of them or so the second year. It will be more fun once we start physical diagnosis.

Anatomy! Anatomy lab is interesting to say the least. Gertrude, or Gertie, is our cadaver. What follows are answers to questions I anticipate people might ask….

• We know her age and cause of death, but that’s it.
• There are five people to a body. Two cutters per side of the table and a “navigator” that reads through the lab guide and displays diagrams and tells the others what to do. There is a big LCD TV monitor above each body. It displays the lab manual and anatomical diagrams. Works pretty slick – lab manuals don’t get gross.
• There are probably 30 cadavers in the lab, which means that there are 150 of us in lab at a time – med students and physical therapy students, mostly.
• The bodies are embalmed. So there is no blood and no decay. The lab is extremely well-ventilated, but the smell of embalming fluid can be a little strong.
• From what I’ve heard (lab rumors and insider info from Mr. R. J. Gunderson) the bodies might have been dead for nearly a year. Some definitely look fresher than others.
• We wear scrubs and lab coats. Our tools: scalpels, probes, tweezers, scissors (things you used in high school dissections pretty much)
• It’s harder to tell the sex of a person than you’d think. They are all naked and face down with shaved heads. On day one, we worked for a good twenty minutes on what we thought was a man, until a keen eye alerted us otherwise.
• Elderly people are not the best example of superb muscle anatomy.
• Anything we cut off (lots of loose tissue scraps and fat) gets put in a special bin. The remains of the body, and all the scraps in the bin, will be cremated and given to the family.

That’s about it for now. I have a History of Medicine exam first thing in the morning. Interesting stuff – I will miss that class. Bloodletting and mesmerism and trepanation… we’ve come a long way, baby.  (And yet, crazies still linger: homeopathy, faith-healing, most acupuncture, some chiropractors, GNC stores, magnetic bracelets, Carolyn Walker… don’t get me going…).

We have class/lab six to seven hours per day and then have lots of studying to do aside from that. And eat/sleep. I’m struggling to keep up. I don’t know how anyone could keep up. Maybe no one is.

One more thing: Cyclones will beat the Hawks, 20-17.

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