Med Students use Art to describe experiences with cadavers...

[FirstLight]

This was an interesting article about the use of Cadavers in Medical school lessons. I had no idea that Med students only spend one semester with their cadavers...I thought it was (at least) a full year! How many doctors really have the expreience to see their patients as people, much less as people who experience pain and the discomfort and helplessness of death?

http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/articles/2009/08/17/medical_students_use_artworks_to_share_life_and_death_lessons_of_gross_anatomy/


With so much fear running rampant about "Death Panels"...shouldn't we at least be talking about our end of life choices?
I am a donor, and very glad to be one...

It is just so fascinating that we are such a culture that hides death, and illness and infirmity and aging. Perhaps if we were more honest about the realities of life in its uncomfortable-ness and icky-ness, we would be less fucked up and repressed as a nation?

[FirstLight]

1. uh, kick...

[grantcart]

2. I attended one of these ceremonies in Thailand

It was far more moving than any funeral service. The doctors were so grateful.


Most medical schools have a memorial ceremony for the cadavers after classes end in the spring. UMass invites the families of the donors to be there as medical school students honor what they call the “ultimate gift.’’


It convinced me to donate my body to a medical school.

[SPedigrees]

3. I find this touching:

Most medical schools have a memorial ceremony for the cadavers after classes end in the spring. UMass invites the families of the donors to be there as medical school students honor what they call the “ultimate gift.’’

It is reminiscent of the Japanese shrines to hamsters used in medical tests. I find this a reaffirmation of how humanity and science can coexist.

I, too, am a donor, in the hope that something good might come from my death, that I might make a contribution to science, no matter how small.

(Of course my first wishes would have been to 1) be ground up for petfood or 2) to have my remains tossed out on the plains for the hyenas to fight over. But society apparently is not having any of those options. Oh well... next best thing.)

[surrealAmerican]

4. Interesting article.

It's a shame the didn't show more of the student art.

[FirstLight]

5. I know, huh?

I read the article looking for the art shots...but it was still fascinating enough to share.

I remember being a 1st year biology student and being really freaked out about the fetal pig and frogs...but a cadaver is beyind my comprehension !!!