Post 101

Non-medic friend: “Hey, how was your day?”

CMM: “Oh, yeah it was pretty good…had class all day though.”

Non-medic: “I heard that medical students dissect rats…isn’t that really gross??”

CMM: “Well…erm….we don’t dissect rats actually….we dissect other stuff.”

Non-medic: “What do you dissect then?”

CMM: “Uhhh..people.”

*cue freak out from non-medic, with much proclaiming of “urghghghgh how could you do that?”, “omggggggg I’m gonna be sick?!” etc.*

The medical school that I attend (which shall remain anonymous in case the GMC decide to slay me for anything I may say in the future) uses cadaveric dissection as a way to teach anatomy, alongside lectures obviously.  We dissect from for a considerable amount of time each week, starting in the very first week of first year.

And yes, it was and is really pretty gross.  The first time we dissected, the entire class was silently freaking out, worrying who was going to be the one to faint or vomit or burst into tears.  Interestingly, as far as I am aware, that didn’t happen to anyone, and I have only ever seen one person faint in the dissecting room and I think that was just from standing up for too long rather than from touching a dead body.

Whilst dissecting, most of the time my thoughts are along the lines of “Where the fuck is the bloody nerve…oh there is it…oh wait no.  Aaah don’t cut my fingers off. Oh there it is…is it??  Nah….  I’m hungry, yay only 10 minutes till home time!” but every now and again it’s more like “Muscles muscles muscles omg this person was actually a person with thoughts and feelings and a family.  This person got up every morning and put socks on the feet which I am ripping apart with my scalpel.  They probably ate pizza and sandwiches and knew how to swim.  This was someone’s best friend.  They would’ve started school and been terrified.  They had a job, they had a car, then had a house.  They watched TV and read books.  In short, they are just like me.”.

And I’m relieved I have those thoughts.  Intrusive and distracting as they are, I hope I never forget that these people are not just corpses filled with formaldehyde.  They had stories and lives and dreams.  And they were wondering, generous, thoughtful people who had the courage and selflessness to decide to donate their bodies to my medical school for teaching purposes.

Every time we go into the dissecting room, we come scarily close to death.  With the exception of seeing some horrendous car crash, or having a relative pass away or attending a funeral, most people live their lives avoiding death.  This is not the same for medical students or doctors.  Every day we come are faced with our own mortality, we see the fact that life is so precarious and so finite that when we are gone, we are gone.  I’m going to assume that as I get older, I will become less emotionally involved with these things – people have told me that you never forget your first patient, but after that, it’s only the odd few who really make an impact on you.  Deep down, I hope I never lose the shocking innocence I have.  The fact that every time I interview a patient, I feel sad for them and don’t stop thinking about them for days.  The fact that I will never, ever forget the face of the cadaver I spent the year dissecting.  But then, I suppose it would be hard to practice Medicine like this without ending up in a Psychiatric ward something, and I really hope that doesn’t happen to me!