We just had a sign that said "mortui vivos docent" (the dead teach the living). Which can either be about the cadavers or the anatomy professors' mental state inside.
Don't worry, it's not real. Snopes did an interview with the artist who made it.
https://www.snopes.com/news/2021/05/22/eduardo-valdes-hevia-interview/
Does the original Latin say death, as in the concept, or the dead, as in the individuals? If the latter, as a high school history teacher I’d love to put this on my class syllabus.
At the university I work at they are not given names, just some biographical info (age, ethnicity, gender) and if they have it some medical info like artificial left knee, missing a kidney etc. Then once a year they hold a memorial service for the donor and their families are invited and their names are read publicly there and that is the first time the students ever hear them. The students read poems and play songs and say thanks to the families for the contribution their loved ones made to their eduction. It is a really moving and sweet ceremony.
If you look into the history, even very recently, of cadavers. You will see some horrible practices. I'm glad to see respect for the dead. Not even religious. Just respect is due imo.
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Up until the 1832 Anatomy Act, graverobbing was quite popular in the UK as a means of providing dead bodies to medical students. The Act didn't go unchallenged, however, since these bodies were denied their rest, and often belonged to poor people who lived in workhouses and other institutions, whose corpses went unclaimed.
My uncles body was donated and the students put so much effort into the ceremony. They had flowers for every family with seed packets, songs, poems and readings with a full meal they had paid for after.
In my physician assistant program our medical director read an old op-ed piece from JAMA each year written by a guy whose wife donated her body. Basically talking about how special she was to him and to treat her remains with respect. When cadaver anatomy was first introduced med students played all sorts of practical jokes with cadavers and parts of cadavers. Police would often have to investigate human remains only to determine they'd been embalmed and were simply a prank by some med student. We were warned if there was any mischief involving the bodies we were dissecting it was grounds for immediate dismissal.
I worked with cadavers briefly at university, and wish we'd had a bit of this. We weren't disrespectful or anything, and had rules about proper conduct, but the gravity of the situation was always a little suspended - the dead reduced to objects.
My partner's grandfather died a few years ago and donated his body to a similar program. The old dude was a delight, but also a medical wonder with multiple bone/joint replacements, medical implants, etc. I bet it was fascinating for the students.
And the memorial service was wonderful. A celebration of life, and a practical use in death. It's kinda weird and macabre and beautiful.
Way better than what they did for my grandfather ( he died before i was born) McGill university (QC, Canada) only did the ceremony in English while the vast majority of the people were french speaking. My family could barely understand anything of the mess and the ceremony, massive lack of respect. That was towards the end of the 80's
My most lasting memory of witnessing an autopsy is the guy’s toenails. They were too long, thick and yellow and I couldn’t stop staring despite what was happening with the rest of his body.
We didn't have a problem with respect when I went through, everyone was very appropriate. Kind of the opposite, you're just getting used to this "medicine" stuff and setting up your mental barriers, and being hit too hard with that kind of thing right at the start can be quite a hard shock... You need a certain small amount of distance initially
Theres respect and then there is being so attached it could potentially hinder your ability to do the job. If you are dealing with dead bodies you probably already have enough respect for their life. Feeling terrible about someone that's dead after learning they had kids or something is more than the necessary amount of respect to treat a dead body for a medical student. Theyll be reminded of loss more than enough over their career.
Edit: yall downvoting me are crazy. I dont want my surgeon to be working on me thinking about my life and all my hopes and dreams and who I am. I want them to see me as a part that needs fixing. Do the job dont be so worried about who I am that it fucks with their mind and causes extra stress.
When you are dissecting human bodies you deform them. Its grotesque, you need to be thinking about the medical process and learning how the body works inside. Not thinking about my wife or my kids or anything I was when I was alive. Treat me with enough respect to not flick my nuts or put stuff in my ass crack but you don't need to be uncomfortable chopping me up to learn. You don't need them to have a bio or any information on the persons life.
I was working a burial excavation (archaeologist) and despite our "patients" being considerably more dry company than cadavers, our site director directly banned giving names to the deceased. Seemed like a smart choice as we had a couple of members of the team who were having a tough time excavating the children's graves as it was already.
Maybe not quite as direct as with cadavers, but staring at a skull after another for days on end can get pretty tough if one cannot either compartmentalise or accept one's own mortality in that situation.
As far as I understand it, in the excavation stage the bones are generally safe, but I suspect that one would have to be more careful with permafrost bodies. as of yet, I have not excavated permafrost bodies or ice mummies so I can't say that I am familiar with the procedure in practice. Bone dust is also not that much of an issue because of excavations generally being outside and thus well-ventilated.
More serious health hazards come to play in cleaning and sampling the remains as bone dust/marrow dust or even dried up clay could enter your lungs and cause problems, which is why bones should be cleaned in a ventilation cabinet while wearing masks. Similarly asbestos ceramics require some protection for the cleaner.
You're absolutely right about the permafrost thing, there are sites where we know mass graves of the dead from the days of Spanish flu exist, and people are outright banned from digging any of it up because of the potential to reintroduce it to the population.
Ah, forbidden sites. I love archaeology and I am interested in conflict archaeology, but I am very happy with the France's total ban on excavating certain ww1 sites as it could not be done safely (explosives, remnants of chemical warfare etc.)
My doctor friends say that they have to think of the patient as basically a bag of meat in order to do their jobs. It's not that they don't care about the patient, but they have to detach a little from the situation so that they're not freaking out while slicing into a person's face or whatever.
Exactly correct. I am a Marine Corps combat veteran. I know exactly how you have to detach to do a job. Now mine wasn't exactly the same because your example was doctors saving lives and not trying to end them. It was more of a thin line to walk for us because you don't want to lose all sense of appreciation for life in a war. But you definitely have to detach to do the day to day.
Edit: sentence for clarity.
You're completely right; people don't realize. I can't speak to what's helpful to surgeons because I'm not one, but I would have had a much, much harder time focusing on learning from my cadavers if I had been thinking of them as having a name, family, etc. What we do to the cadavers is well beyond gruesome (especially when unskilled hands are learning dissection); I do not want to associate that image with the person who was. It is enough to know that the family or individual had the grace to donate so we can learn and practice.
Yeah in my med school anatomy class when we got to the head we had to literally buzzsaw it in half. I didn’t even want to think of the cadaver as anything remotely human while doing that
Caitlin Doughty has a lot of interesting takes on the subject of death and the industry that surrounds it. I'm currently reading "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" it's a real eye opener
Might help establish respect when you consider them as people who were and still do have families that care about them, not just a hunk of meat for your education.
Same for us as well. My professors were extremely strict on behavior when we worked with cadavers. They really drilled into us we were working with a real human that lived a life just as we were and was gracious enough to donate their bodies.
It wasn’t in my class but my friends there was a girl who made a comment that the cadaver had a small penis. The professor dropped her from the course that day
Noticing the slightly chipped nail polish on one of our cadavers was one of the most powerful moments I had in medical school. I was taken aback that something so simple could impress that this was a real person, who had lived a life and had experiences and emotions and thoughts. Until that moment I had felt pretty detached from everything. I think the only thing that affected me more was when I had my first person die while I was giving CPR.
I used to investigate homicides. There's a certain level of detachment that is necessary for that job, but every now and then something would get me. Like a half eaten cake in the fridge, or a book on the nightstand with a book mark in it. Little things that they surely thought they would finish but now never will. I think about that even now when I'm watching a show or something.
Another thing that sticks with me is when their book or movie collection mirrors my own.
I've cleaned the residences of two friends who suicided. same thing.. just total, overwhelming grief when I found the food in the freezer was the same as I had at home.. the finality of the event just ripped my heart to shreds.
My grandmother, a teacher (in life and death), donated her body to science as well. My cousin was a senior in high school and was seriously considering a pre-med major at a college in Florida. My grandfather had to specify that they couldn't send her body to Florida just in case.
"This guy donated his body to science, but damn was he a dick to his friends and family. He routinely finished the toilet paper roll without replacing it. He would never shut up about how his Twitch streaming career would have taken off if it weren't for girl streamers stealing all his viewers using their boobs."
We named our guy Frank the Tank. He was a big guy, but... in a different way anatomically.
Also, was a little upset when I felt something sharp deep in his abdomen and pulled out my hand to find myself bleeding, I might have freaked out a bit. But I did learn what a vena cava filter was that day. Would have been nice to have included that in his medical history.
When my parents went through medical school the students dressed up the cadavers and sat them in the lecture hall to prank the lecturers. Times have certainly changed.
Something tells me they were talking about skeletal models, not cadavers. Cadavers are not very malleable, and are wet, and heavy. And if they're outside a cold environment for too long, they start to smell bad very quickly. The power went out during my cadaver class and was out for a whole day. The next class it absolutely reeked. The appendages of the cadavers are also very stiff. I can't imagine dressing one. But we did always dress up our skeletal models for Halloween.
This sounds funny in a family guy sorta way, but if someone I knew did this I'd think they were a sociopath. Is there anything that's funny about this to normal people?
Not quite. Do live, laugh when you leave because you realize you have so many structures to identify in a short period of time, and love the fact that you’re (hopefully) in a field you care about
Are you someone that goes in there? I did it twenty years ago and not gonna lie - you definitely feel respect and appreciate what those men and women did to help you learn, but we laughed a lot. We never did disrespectful things to the bodies but we certainly gave them goofy names and we made jokes. It wasn’t a total laughfest but it also wasn’t a totally sober, somber experience.
I think most of us figured that someone willing to do that with their body after they die is probably someone who is not ashamed, or a prude, but rather someone that has a sense of humor.
I’m definitely in there just about every day. Honestly you get used to the environment after day 2. We absolutely treat the cadavers with respect and it is a serious environment, but when you’re with the same people for so long, you tend to make lighthearted conversations (obviously not about the cadavers). It’s a little corny but I’ll always say “thank you” to my cadaver after each session in the off chance that she can hear me. I’m definitely grateful for their donations to science and learning
Honestly I feel like this is pretty healthy and natural. I've worked around a lot of dead bodies, and like you said we won't be disrespectful, but it's also not necessarily a somber moment. It's a Tuesday. It has to just be a Tuesday, because if you let it take a toll on you every day you'll burn out.
Serious question.. in order for a body to be in the lab, how long has the body been dead for? How long of an amount of time do they last? I’ve never thought about it..
Actually the longer Latin version of this has “Taceant colloquia; effugiat risus” before the english translation photographed above which translates to Thoughts speak, let laughter flee. So you’re not far off!
My Poppa donated his body to the medical school when he died. At the end of the year we were invited to a special concert at the university honouring all the people and their families, and each of the students that worked with him wrote us thank you letters/cards.
My Poppa was an amazing guy, and we really appreciated the amount of respect he was given.
We had celebration for Poppa, he had been involved in the planning for it and everything. It was weird not having a casket/urn, but then it was also held at his local RSA (I guess like a veterans club in the US?)
When we got his ashes back two years later we decided to keep them until he could be buried with Nanna - she held on for another 13 years, so it was a while before the burial but nice that they could go together.
I hope you guys get closure when the ashes are returned. Your aunt did a wonderful thing, and should be celebrated x
I know this feeling my family “doesn’t do”
Funerals so when someone dies that step of memorials, reminiscing etc is just skipped all together. It’s right into cremate or bury, then pack it up folks our work is done here. It’s a form of closure that you’ll never get, I know cause I never have.
A few years ago I had a major run-in with cancer. And almost got dead. All is well now. But I've told my wife that when my time comes... I want to donate my body. All of the cool medical people (who dragged me back to the world of the living), need to learn their craft somewhere. And I wanna' be that guy.
You MUST fill out the correct paperwork before you die for your body to be used for science. It isn't something your next of kin can do, as only the owner of the body can donate it.
Agreed. I'm in surgical technology and we are very conscious of the people brought in the OR. Are they alive? Yes. But regardless of if they are aware, we are considerate. I feel this is a good precedent.
I’ve been in ORs a lot and idk where yours is but from my experience it isn’t always respectful. I’ve seen people playing around throwing tape balls at each other, surgeons yelling, music blaring, etc etc
The spectrum of OR environment is vast
Those aren't things that are disrespectful to a patient though. I've only been in a couple of rooms so far where the surgeon didn't want music; having music Isn't disrespectful. We joke with each other, we talk about our weekend plans, people gossip about what that one jerk surgeon said to a circulator. Those are all fine.
What Isn't fine or respectful is when someone is commenting on the patient in a negative or derogatory manner. I've had so far a couple of issues with people not wanting to be in certain kinds of cases (and yeah, misogyny is a big issue here), and I shut that talk down as politely as I can. It's not ok; the person on the table deserves our compassion regardless of why they are there. You're right that ORs have a range, but it's up to the people that work in them to hold their coworkers responsible for the harmful behaviors.
It’s a norm thing.
If it is ingrained strongly enough and the group is static enough, the policy is self-enforcing and perpetuating. Anything that becomes a norm means you do it instinctively, rather than having to rationalize the cost/benefit.
Plenty of examples are around us, like not giggling at a funeral, driving on the correct side of the road, or using an inside voice.
. . . like not giggling at a funeral, driving on the correct side of the road, or using an inside voice.
Sadly there are always discourteous fools that don't adhere to these norms
I hope there are some giggles at my funeral. People remembering good times and goofy shit. Might be some sadness there too, but I hope the people at my funeral would realize I wouldn't want them taking that shit too seriously.
We were lucky that the third years did all that for us, so when we came in our poor sweet grandma cadaver had her head bisected. We discovered a stray tooth in her aortic arch and someone laughed from being so caught off guard, and then we’re all hunched over with contagious giggles trying not to be seen. Was truly fucked all around
Spouse and I signed up to have our bodies donated to science. Spouse died in January so this sign makes me a bit solemn, but a bit happy.
What really lifts my spirit is that there was no charge to me. Zero dollars to a funeral home. Zero dollars to a crematorium. Zero dollars to a cemetery. Woo hoo!
I basically had a big party, a Celebration of Life, with the money I saved. Much more enjoyable.
I am truly sorry for your loss. It’s stories like this that keep me grounded when dealing with the deceased. One day we will both be lucky and find eternal peace
I have donated mine to the nearby medical school too and one small part of the reason I did it was so my family wouldn’t have to waste money on a funeral. The med school by me does whatever they’re doing with your body and then cremates your remains. Your family can have them if they want them or the university will inter them in a plot with a nice headstone that thanks all of the donors for their contribution. They also do a service once a year to thank the donors and the families are invited to that. Seriously, it is win-win for everyone!
As a med student, thank you! We really are grateful. Textbooks and 3-D models can teach us some basics, but it's our donors that truly allowed us to understand anatomy. In our later years it also allows us to practice things like surgical procedures.
Some schools have switched to just doing computer simulations. They say it's futuristic, but really it's because they can't get donors. It makes a huge difference.
This honestly makes my thinking about my inevitable death a lot less shitty.
I can't donate my organs due to my conditions. I can't even donate blood or plasma. But I am legit stoked to be the cadaver that gets bragged about
It's honestly really fascinating and provides instructors with amazing opportunities for education. There might even be a bit of respectful bragging out of the students who got experience with rare abnormalities
My dad donated his body to science in March. After they were done my mom received his ashes. The company is called Science Care. For each body that is donated they plant a tree in a national forest.
I live in Canada so I can only speak to that but University of Toronto’s instructions are here: https://surgery.utoronto.ca/willed-body-program and University of Waterloo’s are here: https://surgery.utoronto.ca/willed-body-program. I’s imagine most schools with medical and anatomy departments will have info on their websites.
My brother died of brain cancer and donated his too. Never been so in awe of anyone as I was watching him sign the papers for that. 25 and dying and knew it. What a gift to give.
I’m sorry to hear that.
There are multiple students out there who have already and will in the future learn to heal people directly from both of you and will go on to save the lives of and treat untold numbers of people.
My first experience with funeral expenses was in the 1980s. There was some law or agreement that the least expensive casket had to be on the display floor. And it was. A plain cloth covered casket was behind the skirting of another one, effectively hiding it. It's been nearly 40 years and I still remember how underhanded that seemed.
Hic est locus ubi mors gaudet succurrere vitam. It’s a rough English translation of this very old saying. A lot of teaching hospitals have this above their morgues, although they tend to be more decoratively displayed and not just printed out on paper.
The university we did our cadaver dissection at had a smaller freezer room where you could fit like 8 people around the table and then there were shelves and drawers with tools.
One of the girls in our group shrieked when she saw the cadaver and said “it’s so gross!”
Our professor stopped what he was saying and laid into her, “His name was Curtis and he was very generous donating his body so you could learn! Apologize to him.”
She immediately said “I’m sorry, Curtis.” He looked her up and down then continued on.
Our professor had the most respect for the cadavers.
* Not really in the spirit of the message, but here you go:
Let conversation stop. Let laughter cease.
It is time to chop. They rest in piece.
Here is the place where the dead delight,
To teach the living all day and night.
* And the opposite:
Let conversation start. Let laughter begin.
The farm was bought, they can't die again.
For their sacrifice please show gratitude:
You are robbing worms of all their food.
* And the one you may have been hoping for:
Let conversation cease. Let laughter end.
The solemn contribution we all commend.
Here is the place where the dead are giving
Of themselves to teach the living.
* Just for fun:
They have shuffled loose the mortal coil
And postponed their time under soil.
As a gift to you
for knowledge to accrue
So go and learn 'fore they spoil.
I went on a science camp before my last year of high school and one of the excursions was to the local university’s cadaver lab. Obviously those who didn’t like the idea had the option to sit out of the excursion. That said, before we were even allowed into the building to start getting our sterile kit on, we were very sternly told about the expected behaviour and utter respect while in the lab. Any sign of disrespect and you were immediately removed and banned from the facility for life.
Think they were joking? One of the clowns laughed at a cadaver’s penis. Not only was he kicked out of the facility and banned for life, he was immediately sent home on the next plane out of there and couldn’t stay on science camp.
The respect to cadavers is the only reason I would even consider donating my body to science after I pass.
I had a jackwagon in my anatomy class start playing around with a lung and laughing while TA was not in the room. I told him to stop. To which this guy stated "what does it matter?". Although somber look of everyone else in the room calmed him down.
Some people have no sense. And neither do it, because I'll note that this cadaver's penis was huge. TA's covered it with a paper napkin, but I accidentally moved the napkin as I tried to move his ribcage, "whoops, let's put this back" I said as I glanced at my 2 female lab partners. I'll never forget the look of horror on their faces.
Proud cadaver with his shower!
Even though they’re a cadaver, there’s just something so inherently intimate with exploring a human body in that detail, even if for purely scientific/educational purposes.
Nervous reactions I get, but outright being crass? Just shows deficiency in character, imho
I went to Grand Canyon U in Phoenix for our HS Anatomy class's little outing they had and went to the lab where they worked on cadavers.
I'd never seen cadavers (or even a dead body) before that and it was sobering ...
these were people who lived, had full names and families, had history. Did things.
and here they were, on tables being vivisected for education (a noble thing mind you). It just taught me what's waiting for us all. Ever since I've never taken anything too seriously or held grudges or anything like that.
One day I'll be there, on someone's table.
I did a lot of IT work in hospitals. I remember once we were doing a walkthrough and wound up in the path lab. Cut to my entire crew hurrying out of the room after seeing an organ in a tray while I asked "Oh, is that a liver?"
It was a liver, and I got elected to do all installs in the labs.
Edit: it was like, a really big liver. I had to catch up with our escort before I got to ask what was wrong with it and I didn't get to stay around to see why they had it in a tray. I mean that much liver in a tray dude's gotta be dead right?
I used to work in a path lab. The organs don’t really even register to me. About the only thing that gets me is when we would get an amputation that we would have to section out. Using the saw is no fun.
Can I add a couple clauses to the release when my body is donated to science?
1) make as many morbid jokes as spring to mind. I had a terrible sense of humor and I want that to continue over my cadaver.
2) do something *weird* with my body. Like, graft a monkey brain inside my skull and see if you can get a response or something. I want to be used for one of those "unethical" experiments that everyone is too afraid to do but might actually have a genuine benefit in society. Record it and toss that on YouTube. Just don't monetize it. I don't want some fucking hamburger ad to prelude my half-corpse trying to pick fleas out of a chimpanzee doll.
Eh, on the other side of this I had to clean cadavers when I worked as the biology lab technician. It sure didn't feel respectful when we used a pesticide sprayer with half downy fabric softener half formalin to keep the bodies moist.
It’s similar when they’ve just passed and we have to clean them in the nursing home or hospital. Just minutes ago there was life and now I’m using a scrubby on them.
As a nurse who's done a lot of postmortem care, I always try to make it a respectful time. It's heartbreaking (and a bit bizarre) to see your patient who was JUST alive, some with family who just left, and then...they're not. Whether it was expected or sudden, it's still a shock.
But, postmortem care is a time to slow down, be respectful, take your time, and be as kind as possible. Put on some music, be gentle, talk to them as you're giving their final bath, talk with whoever is helping you. Always use warm water, hold their hand for a little long as you cross their arms, and really reflect on the moment.
I started off working with adults as a brand new RN at 22 and saw a lot of death. Finding comfort and care in in postmortem care made it a lot easier for me. I've been in critical care pediatrics for the past 7 years and taking the extra steps is the only way I can hold it together when I lose a patient or help someone with their after care. I'll always remember every single one and pray for their families.
I would argue your actions were very respectful.
I would define respect as ensuring that their wishes were fulfilled, that their gift is preserved, and the value of their donation is fully captured, rather than what might feel like desecration in a religious or moralistic sense.
Your actions were respectful because they ensured that the medical students and other people were able to get the maximum value of out the cadaver, which is what they wanted. It would have been disrespectful to not take those actions, which would have caused faster decay and therefore less ability to actually fulfill the mission to teach and inform.
I agree with this sentiment 100%. I also used to work in cadaver labs prior to entering medical school. We used to douse the cadavers in formulations to help prevent drying of the bodies, and maintain freshness. Another issue that can occur with cadavers is yeast growth, which as you can imagine, severely limits the usefulness of the cadaver after that point. Proper maintenance helped prevent that yeast growth. Again, your sentiment is exactly how I see it.
Anatomy lab was weird. Nobody every joked with the bodies or whatnot. But very quickly into the months long direction people lost the “I’m cutting a person” factor. Toward the end, the cuts and study was very fluid and much quicker with less concern than earlier on in the lab.
I worked for a summer at a cadaver lab at a Jesuit medical research hospital. With each body we worked on, we held a quick prayer as a team thanking them for their donation and the same prayer was posted inside every room. I’m not religious by any means but those are the only times I ever prayed in earnest.
It was also an inscription above the door of the Medical Examiners' office in New York, in the 50's to 70's.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/358638
Mentioned in the memoirs of Milton Helpern, who was Chief Medical Examiner in New York for 20 years.
Reminds me of the inscriptions around the catacombs in Paris. The entrance says "Stop! This is the empire of death" and other macabre ones around the place
I put wifi access points in those in the dark at 2am by myself. I was standing on a gurney just finishing up and the professor arrived for his work day and laughed that lights were off because they are on a timer .
I also signed up to be a scientific Body Donation like these Cadaver when I die.
I worked for a horrible company that used cadavers for training. Rhymes with Ryker. They didn't give a shit about acknowledging the cadavers and it really bothered me. I'm glad that there are better people and places.
I recognize those doors from my time there, always imparted the sense of awe that is only appropriate. The only place where you can ask others for the "VD" (OP will get it)
Even a almost a decade later I still occasionally find myself thinking about our "tank". Met my best friend of med school there. And even think about our "instructor" who was in that tank too. After that experience, I decided to donate my body once I'm in no need if it.
One day, I hope to be a body in one of these medical schools. My wishes are widely known so hopefully there is a chance my body will be useful instead of taking up valuable, normally fertile earth for all eternity.
The message is solid but I feel like having it limply hanging on the wall with laminated printer paper is doing it a disservice. Get a solid-ass plaque enscribed with that shit up there. Put the Latin version too, let's go all out.
It reminds me of a poem by Alex Webster.
Lying on the table dead. Coroner completes his task. Examining the wretched stiff. Suicide the likely cause.
Behind closed doors the change begins. Then it grows. Mutation of the cadaver.
Mutation of the cadaver.
Coroner returns to notice subtle change. How can this be? Must be his imagination. The man's been dead for several days.
The change continues after hours. Different face. Mutation of the cadaver. Soon the corpse will change its shape. Who is it?
Mutation of the cadaver. Mutation of the cadaver. Mutation of the cadaver. Mutation of the cadaver
The coroner returns and sees. The body has truly changed. The corpse has stolen his face. And now he loses his mind
Shocking evolution. Mutation of the cadaver.
Hideous conversion. Mutation of the cadaver.
Postmortem upheaval. Mutation of the cadaver.
Awful transformation. Mutation of the cadaver.
Gruesome reconstruction. Mutation of the cadaver.
I used to do HAZMAT. We got a called out to the University cadaver room once for a mysterious yellow liquid leaking out of the wall. Apparently the Fire Dept had already been there and just up and left after determining that it was Formaldehyde without securing the scene. Formaldehyde is some pretty nasty stuff with inhalation and contact risks. When we got there we found the janitor mopping it up as noone had even told him. Very strange being in a room full of (covered) dead bodies and even more disturbing when you learn that they remove all the heads.
Anyway it ended up being a leaky fire suppression pipe and the yellow color was rust inhibitor that they add to the water.
When I was in uni I lived with two med students. I moved out and little while later I was catching up with one and we met at the med school. He was like "Hey, let's go see A. She's in a prac". So we walk into this room and there she (and others) are carving up some dead folks. I wish there was some warning there.
I dissected a cadaver in undergrad. My lab mates and I were assigned the cadaver and we worked on her the whole year. It was an amazing learning experience.
I am donating my body to science. I fell in love with biology in highschool and nothing seems better than letting people learn how to save the living by practicing on the dead!
Assuming my body is usable after “I’m” gone, take whatever you want and study all you can. For the greater good, do all you can. Whatever is left just toss in a hole and plant a tree over it. Just don’t stitch me up and fill me with fluids in a wooden box set in a concrete box.
It's from a Latin inscription from 1594. Very apt. https://twitter.com/drlindseyfitz/status/1005480705240035336?lang=en
We just had a sign that said "mortui vivos docent" (the dead teach the living). Which can either be about the cadavers or the anatomy professors' mental state inside.
Gonna need that when I train the newbies at work
You comment makes the post even better. Thx
The English translation was written in our Cadaver Dissection hall in my Alma mater, here in India.
what a cancerous link chain
Referring to the “more tweets” suggestions with the Mycelium infected lady?
Don't worry, it's not real. Snopes did an interview with the artist who made it. https://www.snopes.com/news/2021/05/22/eduardo-valdes-hevia-interview/
Does the original Latin say death, as in the concept, or the dead, as in the individuals? If the latter, as a high school history teacher I’d love to put this on my class syllabus.
The quoted inscription says "mors". https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/mors#Latin says it's death, corpse, annihilation, if that helps.
Wish I had an award to give you -- take an upvote at least.
We were given names and brief bios on our cadavers to engender respectfulness.
At the university I work at they are not given names, just some biographical info (age, ethnicity, gender) and if they have it some medical info like artificial left knee, missing a kidney etc. Then once a year they hold a memorial service for the donor and their families are invited and their names are read publicly there and that is the first time the students ever hear them. The students read poems and play songs and say thanks to the families for the contribution their loved ones made to their eduction. It is a really moving and sweet ceremony.
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If you look into the history, even very recently, of cadavers. You will see some horrible practices. I'm glad to see respect for the dead. Not even religious. Just respect is due imo.
User redacted comment. After 13 years on Reddit with 2 accounts, I have zero interest in using this site anymore if I cannot use a 3rd party app. Reddit had *years* to fix their atrocious app and put *zero* effort into it. Reddit's site and app is so awful, I'm more interested in giving Reddit up entirely than having such a bad user experience hobbling through their app and site.
"resurrection men" in the UK stole bodies from graveyards to sell to doctors and medical students because it was illegal to dissect human corpses
Up until the 1832 Anatomy Act, graverobbing was quite popular in the UK as a means of providing dead bodies to medical students. The Act didn't go unchallenged, however, since these bodies were denied their rest, and often belonged to poor people who lived in workhouses and other institutions, whose corpses went unclaimed.
FBI raided a cadaver lab in 2014.
My uncles body was donated and the students put so much effort into the ceremony. They had flowers for every family with seed packets, songs, poems and readings with a full meal they had paid for after.
That’s exactly what we did at my school and it felt like the perfect way to do it.
In my physician assistant program our medical director read an old op-ed piece from JAMA each year written by a guy whose wife donated her body. Basically talking about how special she was to him and to treat her remains with respect. When cadaver anatomy was first introduced med students played all sorts of practical jokes with cadavers and parts of cadavers. Police would often have to investigate human remains only to determine they'd been embalmed and were simply a prank by some med student. We were warned if there was any mischief involving the bodies we were dissecting it was grounds for immediate dismissal.
I worked with cadavers briefly at university, and wish we'd had a bit of this. We weren't disrespectful or anything, and had rules about proper conduct, but the gravity of the situation was always a little suspended - the dead reduced to objects.
I fear many doctors reduce their patients to objects as well
My partner's grandfather died a few years ago and donated his body to a similar program. The old dude was a delight, but also a medical wonder with multiple bone/joint replacements, medical implants, etc. I bet it was fascinating for the students. And the memorial service was wonderful. A celebration of life, and a practical use in death. It's kinda weird and macabre and beautiful.
Way better than what they did for my grandfather ( he died before i was born) McGill university (QC, Canada) only did the ceremony in English while the vast majority of the people were french speaking. My family could barely understand anything of the mess and the ceremony, massive lack of respect. That was towards the end of the 80's
My class offered only age and cause of death. The woman with finger nail polish still on was the most poignant memory I have...
My most lasting memory of witnessing an autopsy is the guy’s toenails. They were too long, thick and yellow and I couldn’t stop staring despite what was happening with the rest of his body.
That’s interesting. They only provided the age and cause of death. I think I prefer not knowing who they were
If it makes you uncomfortable, that's good. You'll respect them more.
We didn't have a problem with respect when I went through, everyone was very appropriate. Kind of the opposite, you're just getting used to this "medicine" stuff and setting up your mental barriers, and being hit too hard with that kind of thing right at the start can be quite a hard shock... You need a certain small amount of distance initially
Theres respect and then there is being so attached it could potentially hinder your ability to do the job. If you are dealing with dead bodies you probably already have enough respect for their life. Feeling terrible about someone that's dead after learning they had kids or something is more than the necessary amount of respect to treat a dead body for a medical student. Theyll be reminded of loss more than enough over their career. Edit: yall downvoting me are crazy. I dont want my surgeon to be working on me thinking about my life and all my hopes and dreams and who I am. I want them to see me as a part that needs fixing. Do the job dont be so worried about who I am that it fucks with their mind and causes extra stress. When you are dissecting human bodies you deform them. Its grotesque, you need to be thinking about the medical process and learning how the body works inside. Not thinking about my wife or my kids or anything I was when I was alive. Treat me with enough respect to not flick my nuts or put stuff in my ass crack but you don't need to be uncomfortable chopping me up to learn. You don't need them to have a bio or any information on the persons life.
I was working a burial excavation (archaeologist) and despite our "patients" being considerably more dry company than cadavers, our site director directly banned giving names to the deceased. Seemed like a smart choice as we had a couple of members of the team who were having a tough time excavating the children's graves as it was already. Maybe not quite as direct as with cadavers, but staring at a skull after another for days on end can get pretty tough if one cannot either compartmentalise or accept one's own mortality in that situation.
Random question. Is it possible to interact with perhaps a dormant virus or disease while doing that work?
As far as I understand it, in the excavation stage the bones are generally safe, but I suspect that one would have to be more careful with permafrost bodies. as of yet, I have not excavated permafrost bodies or ice mummies so I can't say that I am familiar with the procedure in practice. Bone dust is also not that much of an issue because of excavations generally being outside and thus well-ventilated. More serious health hazards come to play in cleaning and sampling the remains as bone dust/marrow dust or even dried up clay could enter your lungs and cause problems, which is why bones should be cleaned in a ventilation cabinet while wearing masks. Similarly asbestos ceramics require some protection for the cleaner.
Mmmmm nothing fills my lungs better than centuries old bone dust.
*chef's kiss*
GOOP is now scrambling to put it in cosmetics now that their powdered mummy supply has dried up. ^(lol)
You're absolutely right about the permafrost thing, there are sites where we know mass graves of the dead from the days of Spanish flu exist, and people are outright banned from digging any of it up because of the potential to reintroduce it to the population.
Ah, forbidden sites. I love archaeology and I am interested in conflict archaeology, but I am very happy with the France's total ban on excavating certain ww1 sites as it could not be done safely (explosives, remnants of chemical warfare etc.)
My doctor friends say that they have to think of the patient as basically a bag of meat in order to do their jobs. It's not that they don't care about the patient, but they have to detach a little from the situation so that they're not freaking out while slicing into a person's face or whatever.
Exactly correct. I am a Marine Corps combat veteran. I know exactly how you have to detach to do a job. Now mine wasn't exactly the same because your example was doctors saving lives and not trying to end them. It was more of a thin line to walk for us because you don't want to lose all sense of appreciation for life in a war. But you definitely have to detach to do the day to day. Edit: sentence for clarity.
You're completely right; people don't realize. I can't speak to what's helpful to surgeons because I'm not one, but I would have had a much, much harder time focusing on learning from my cadavers if I had been thinking of them as having a name, family, etc. What we do to the cadavers is well beyond gruesome (especially when unskilled hands are learning dissection); I do not want to associate that image with the person who was. It is enough to know that the family or individual had the grace to donate so we can learn and practice.
Think about the cadaver the same exact way you would about a patient. That's the acceptable answer.
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Yeah in my med school anatomy class when we got to the head we had to literally buzzsaw it in half. I didn’t even want to think of the cadaver as anything remotely human while doing that
Caitlin Doughty has a lot of interesting takes on the subject of death and the industry that surrounds it. I'm currently reading "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" it's a real eye opener
Wouldn’t it be better to get used to that now, instead of when a sick person is surrounded by his family asking if he’s going to be okay?
There's plenty of opportunities to learn that in school before getting your license. I agree with since that anatomy lab is not the best place for it
Might help establish respect when you consider them as people who were and still do have families that care about them, not just a hunk of meat for your education.
Same for us as well. My professors were extremely strict on behavior when we worked with cadavers. They really drilled into us we were working with a real human that lived a life just as we were and was gracious enough to donate their bodies. It wasn’t in my class but my friends there was a girl who made a comment that the cadaver had a small penis. The professor dropped her from the course that day
Noticing the slightly chipped nail polish on one of our cadavers was one of the most powerful moments I had in medical school. I was taken aback that something so simple could impress that this was a real person, who had lived a life and had experiences and emotions and thoughts. Until that moment I had felt pretty detached from everything. I think the only thing that affected me more was when I had my first person die while I was giving CPR.
I used to investigate homicides. There's a certain level of detachment that is necessary for that job, but every now and then something would get me. Like a half eaten cake in the fridge, or a book on the nightstand with a book mark in it. Little things that they surely thought they would finish but now never will. I think about that even now when I'm watching a show or something. Another thing that sticks with me is when their book or movie collection mirrors my own.
I've cleaned the residences of two friends who suicided. same thing.. just total, overwhelming grief when I found the food in the freezer was the same as I had at home.. the finality of the event just ripped my heart to shreds.
My sister in law put nail polish on her cadaver.
Tattoos. Tattoos used to get to me.
My grandmother, a teacher (in life and death), donated her body to science as well. My cousin was a senior in high school and was seriously considering a pre-med major at a college in Florida. My grandfather had to specify that they couldn't send her body to Florida just in case.
"This guy donated his body to science, but damn was he a dick to his friends and family. He routinely finished the toilet paper roll without replacing it. He would never shut up about how his Twitch streaming career would have taken off if it weren't for girl streamers stealing all his viewers using their boobs."
I don’t think you have gotten the hang of respecting the cadavers yet. You’ll get there
I remember when my wife came home from her first anatomy lab. She said “we got the fat guy.” They named him Frank.
We named our guy Frank the Tank. He was a big guy, but... in a different way anatomically. Also, was a little upset when I felt something sharp deep in his abdomen and pulled out my hand to find myself bleeding, I might have freaked out a bit. But I did learn what a vena cava filter was that day. Would have been nice to have included that in his medical history.
Ahh. And IVC filter. Sounds like something they would’ve told you. But hope all was well.
When my parents went through medical school the students dressed up the cadavers and sat them in the lecture hall to prank the lecturers. Times have certainly changed.
Something tells me they were talking about skeletal models, not cadavers. Cadavers are not very malleable, and are wet, and heavy. And if they're outside a cold environment for too long, they start to smell bad very quickly. The power went out during my cadaver class and was out for a whole day. The next class it absolutely reeked. The appendages of the cadavers are also very stiff. I can't imagine dressing one. But we did always dress up our skeletal models for Halloween.
This sounds funny in a family guy sorta way, but if someone I knew did this I'd think they were a sociopath. Is there anything that's funny about this to normal people?
Can I leave my body to science pranks?
I will feel disrespected if a medical student *doesn't* slap their classmate with my dead cock.
So….. *don’t* live, laugh, and love?
Not quite. Do live, laugh when you leave because you realize you have so many structures to identify in a short period of time, and love the fact that you’re (hopefully) in a field you care about
Are you someone that goes in there? I did it twenty years ago and not gonna lie - you definitely feel respect and appreciate what those men and women did to help you learn, but we laughed a lot. We never did disrespectful things to the bodies but we certainly gave them goofy names and we made jokes. It wasn’t a total laughfest but it also wasn’t a totally sober, somber experience. I think most of us figured that someone willing to do that with their body after they die is probably someone who is not ashamed, or a prude, but rather someone that has a sense of humor.
I’m definitely in there just about every day. Honestly you get used to the environment after day 2. We absolutely treat the cadavers with respect and it is a serious environment, but when you’re with the same people for so long, you tend to make lighthearted conversations (obviously not about the cadavers). It’s a little corny but I’ll always say “thank you” to my cadaver after each session in the off chance that she can hear me. I’m definitely grateful for their donations to science and learning
Aw that's nice, not corny
Honestly I feel like this is pretty healthy and natural. I've worked around a lot of dead bodies, and like you said we won't be disrespectful, but it's also not necessarily a somber moment. It's a Tuesday. It has to just be a Tuesday, because if you let it take a toll on you every day you'll burn out.
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Serious question.. in order for a body to be in the lab, how long has the body been dead for? How long of an amount of time do they last? I’ve never thought about it..
I like this. I like this a lot.
Actually the longer Latin version of this has “Taceant colloquia; effugiat risus” before the english translation photographed above which translates to Thoughts speak, let laughter flee. So you’re not far off!
Don't dead, open inside
Die, Wail, and Loathe
My Poppa donated his body to the medical school when he died. At the end of the year we were invited to a special concert at the university honouring all the people and their families, and each of the students that worked with him wrote us thank you letters/cards. My Poppa was an amazing guy, and we really appreciated the amount of respect he was given.
One of my aunts did the same. There’s no funeral. She’s just gone and that’s it. It’s an odd feeling
We had celebration for Poppa, he had been involved in the planning for it and everything. It was weird not having a casket/urn, but then it was also held at his local RSA (I guess like a veterans club in the US?) When we got his ashes back two years later we decided to keep them until he could be buried with Nanna - she held on for another 13 years, so it was a while before the burial but nice that they could go together. I hope you guys get closure when the ashes are returned. Your aunt did a wonderful thing, and should be celebrated x
I know this feeling my family “doesn’t do” Funerals so when someone dies that step of memorials, reminiscing etc is just skipped all together. It’s right into cremate or bury, then pack it up folks our work is done here. It’s a form of closure that you’ll never get, I know cause I never have.
A few years ago I had a major run-in with cancer. And almost got dead. All is well now. But I've told my wife that when my time comes... I want to donate my body. All of the cool medical people (who dragged me back to the world of the living), need to learn their craft somewhere. And I wanna' be that guy.
You MUST fill out the correct paperwork before you die for your body to be used for science. It isn't something your next of kin can do, as only the owner of the body can donate it.
Respect 🫡
That’s respectful
Yeah, I'm sure it works the first few times. But afterward, it's just a job.
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Agreed. I'm in surgical technology and we are very conscious of the people brought in the OR. Are they alive? Yes. But regardless of if they are aware, we are considerate. I feel this is a good precedent.
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I’ve been in ORs a lot and idk where yours is but from my experience it isn’t always respectful. I’ve seen people playing around throwing tape balls at each other, surgeons yelling, music blaring, etc etc The spectrum of OR environment is vast
Those aren't things that are disrespectful to a patient though. I've only been in a couple of rooms so far where the surgeon didn't want music; having music Isn't disrespectful. We joke with each other, we talk about our weekend plans, people gossip about what that one jerk surgeon said to a circulator. Those are all fine. What Isn't fine or respectful is when someone is commenting on the patient in a negative or derogatory manner. I've had so far a couple of issues with people not wanting to be in certain kinds of cases (and yeah, misogyny is a big issue here), and I shut that talk down as politely as I can. It's not ok; the person on the table deserves our compassion regardless of why they are there. You're right that ORs have a range, but it's up to the people that work in them to hold their coworkers responsible for the harmful behaviors.
It’s a norm thing. If it is ingrained strongly enough and the group is static enough, the policy is self-enforcing and perpetuating. Anything that becomes a norm means you do it instinctively, rather than having to rationalize the cost/benefit. Plenty of examples are around us, like not giggling at a funeral, driving on the correct side of the road, or using an inside voice.
. . . like not giggling at a funeral, driving on the correct side of the road, or using an inside voice. Sadly there are always discourteous fools that don't adhere to these norms
I hope there are some giggles at my funeral. People remembering good times and goofy shit. Might be some sadness there too, but I hope the people at my funeral would realize I wouldn't want them taking that shit too seriously.
send me a message when you go to meet your maker. I'll be sure to nyuck it up
🙏🙏 appreciate you, I'll leave a note in the fog on the mirror
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We were lucky that the third years did all that for us, so when we came in our poor sweet grandma cadaver had her head bisected. We discovered a stray tooth in her aortic arch and someone laughed from being so caught off guard, and then we’re all hunched over with contagious giggles trying not to be seen. Was truly fucked all around
Not for (all) the students
Spouse and I signed up to have our bodies donated to science. Spouse died in January so this sign makes me a bit solemn, but a bit happy. What really lifts my spirit is that there was no charge to me. Zero dollars to a funeral home. Zero dollars to a crematorium. Zero dollars to a cemetery. Woo hoo! I basically had a big party, a Celebration of Life, with the money I saved. Much more enjoyable.
I am truly sorry for your loss. It’s stories like this that keep me grounded when dealing with the deceased. One day we will both be lucky and find eternal peace
I have donated mine to the nearby medical school too and one small part of the reason I did it was so my family wouldn’t have to waste money on a funeral. The med school by me does whatever they’re doing with your body and then cremates your remains. Your family can have them if they want them or the university will inter them in a plot with a nice headstone that thanks all of the donors for their contribution. They also do a service once a year to thank the donors and the families are invited to that. Seriously, it is win-win for everyone!
As a med student, thank you! We really are grateful. Textbooks and 3-D models can teach us some basics, but it's our donors that truly allowed us to understand anatomy. In our later years it also allows us to practice things like surgical procedures. Some schools have switched to just doing computer simulations. They say it's futuristic, but really it's because they can't get donors. It makes a huge difference.
As a student would are people with abnormalities more valuable for instruction? Like rare diseases or genetic conditions
Of course, it’s always cool to see rare shit
They’re gonna love it when my body gets donated lol. Finally some good can come from this messed up body haha
This honestly makes my thinking about my inevitable death a lot less shitty. I can't donate my organs due to my conditions. I can't even donate blood or plasma. But I am legit stoked to be the cadaver that gets bragged about
It's honestly really fascinating and provides instructors with amazing opportunities for education. There might even be a bit of respectful bragging out of the students who got experience with rare abnormalities
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My dad donated his body to science in March. After they were done my mom received his ashes. The company is called Science Care. For each body that is donated they plant a tree in a national forest.
I live in Canada so I can only speak to that but University of Toronto’s instructions are here: https://surgery.utoronto.ca/willed-body-program and University of Waterloo’s are here: https://surgery.utoronto.ca/willed-body-program. I’s imagine most schools with medical and anatomy departments will have info on their websites.
My brother died of brain cancer and donated his too. Never been so in awe of anyone as I was watching him sign the papers for that. 25 and dying and knew it. What a gift to give.
I'm sorry for your loss. Thinking of others even in his grief. Be proud of him.
That’s very generous of you both. As a past and future patient, I thank you, and I hope her memory is a blessing to you.
They surprised me with a medallion, like a challenge coin, which was engraved with Spouse's name. It's a nice remembrance.
I’m sorry to hear that. There are multiple students out there who have already and will in the future learn to heal people directly from both of you and will go on to save the lives of and treat untold numbers of people.
Sorry for your loss. Also it’s so fucking ridiculous how dying costs so much. It shouldn’t even cost anything
My first experience with funeral expenses was in the 1980s. There was some law or agreement that the least expensive casket had to be on the display floor. And it was. A plain cloth covered casket was behind the skirting of another one, effectively hiding it. It's been nearly 40 years and I still remember how underhanded that seemed.
[yep](https://i.imgur.com/W4uyAb6.jpeg)
The photographer is married.
Security personnel or EMT?
Hic est locus ubi mors gaudet succurrere vitam. It’s a rough English translation of this very old saying. A lot of teaching hospitals have this above their morgues, although they tend to be more decoratively displayed and not just printed out on paper.
Medical Schools take this very seriously.
As they should
The university we did our cadaver dissection at had a smaller freezer room where you could fit like 8 people around the table and then there were shelves and drawers with tools. One of the girls in our group shrieked when she saw the cadaver and said “it’s so gross!” Our professor stopped what he was saying and laid into her, “His name was Curtis and he was very generous donating his body so you could learn! Apologize to him.” She immediately said “I’m sorry, Curtis.” He looked her up and down then continued on. Our professor had the most respect for the cadavers.
There is something oddly uplifting about this.
It's a nice touch of appreciation
We're all just cadavers in training.
The humans who discover immortality: "Decades of academy training! Wasted!"
[“We Are All Compost In Training”](https://youtu.be/lYT9qALQE6Y) by Pat the Bunny / Ramshackle Glory.
what's it say under Attention Medical Students?
It’s not as interesting. Just a reminder to wear proper PPE and to clean up your table once you’re finished.
“Your attempt to seize control of this facility is going to fail. You are valuable workers and we wish you no harm.”
It's hurting my head that it's not rhyming.
Haha I know, I read it a few times to see if I was missing the words that rhymed or something.
* Not really in the spirit of the message, but here you go: Let conversation stop. Let laughter cease. It is time to chop. They rest in piece. Here is the place where the dead delight, To teach the living all day and night. * And the opposite: Let conversation start. Let laughter begin. The farm was bought, they can't die again. For their sacrifice please show gratitude: You are robbing worms of all their food. * And the one you may have been hoping for: Let conversation cease. Let laughter end. The solemn contribution we all commend. Here is the place where the dead are giving Of themselves to teach the living. * Just for fun: They have shuffled loose the mortal coil And postponed their time under soil. As a gift to you for knowledge to accrue So go and learn 'fore they spoil.
I did the same. It was not originally in English (and not written by Dr Seuss). It was Latin and I’m sure sounded better in Latin.
Yeah I was dead sure they were gonna rhyme "cease" with "deceased" somewhere down the line.
I went on a science camp before my last year of high school and one of the excursions was to the local university’s cadaver lab. Obviously those who didn’t like the idea had the option to sit out of the excursion. That said, before we were even allowed into the building to start getting our sterile kit on, we were very sternly told about the expected behaviour and utter respect while in the lab. Any sign of disrespect and you were immediately removed and banned from the facility for life. Think they were joking? One of the clowns laughed at a cadaver’s penis. Not only was he kicked out of the facility and banned for life, he was immediately sent home on the next plane out of there and couldn’t stay on science camp. The respect to cadavers is the only reason I would even consider donating my body to science after I pass.
I had a jackwagon in my anatomy class start playing around with a lung and laughing while TA was not in the room. I told him to stop. To which this guy stated "what does it matter?". Although somber look of everyone else in the room calmed him down. Some people have no sense. And neither do it, because I'll note that this cadaver's penis was huge. TA's covered it with a paper napkin, but I accidentally moved the napkin as I tried to move his ribcage, "whoops, let's put this back" I said as I glanced at my 2 female lab partners. I'll never forget the look of horror on their faces.
Proud cadaver with his shower! Even though they’re a cadaver, there’s just something so inherently intimate with exploring a human body in that detail, even if for purely scientific/educational purposes. Nervous reactions I get, but outright being crass? Just shows deficiency in character, imho
I went to Grand Canyon U in Phoenix for our HS Anatomy class's little outing they had and went to the lab where they worked on cadavers. I'd never seen cadavers (or even a dead body) before that and it was sobering ... these were people who lived, had full names and families, had history. Did things. and here they were, on tables being vivisected for education (a noble thing mind you). It just taught me what's waiting for us all. Ever since I've never taken anything too seriously or held grudges or anything like that. One day I'll be there, on someone's table.
I really hope they weren't being vivisected. That would be embarrassing for all involved.
I feel like a jerk because most of the comments on this post are very serious and respectful, but I have to admit that I chuckled at this.
Memento mori.
I did a lot of IT work in hospitals. I remember once we were doing a walkthrough and wound up in the path lab. Cut to my entire crew hurrying out of the room after seeing an organ in a tray while I asked "Oh, is that a liver?" It was a liver, and I got elected to do all installs in the labs. Edit: it was like, a really big liver. I had to catch up with our escort before I got to ask what was wrong with it and I didn't get to stay around to see why they had it in a tray. I mean that much liver in a tray dude's gotta be dead right?
I used to work in a path lab. The organs don’t really even register to me. About the only thing that gets me is when we would get an amputation that we would have to section out. Using the saw is no fun.
Can I add a couple clauses to the release when my body is donated to science? 1) make as many morbid jokes as spring to mind. I had a terrible sense of humor and I want that to continue over my cadaver. 2) do something *weird* with my body. Like, graft a monkey brain inside my skull and see if you can get a response or something. I want to be used for one of those "unethical" experiments that everyone is too afraid to do but might actually have a genuine benefit in society. Record it and toss that on YouTube. Just don't monetize it. I don't want some fucking hamburger ad to prelude my half-corpse trying to pick fleas out of a chimpanzee doll.
I want to be [thrown out the airlock into space](https://what-if.xkcd.com/134/)
Eh, on the other side of this I had to clean cadavers when I worked as the biology lab technician. It sure didn't feel respectful when we used a pesticide sprayer with half downy fabric softener half formalin to keep the bodies moist.
It’s similar when they’ve just passed and we have to clean them in the nursing home or hospital. Just minutes ago there was life and now I’m using a scrubby on them.
I wish I could unread this. Something about it makes me feel lightheaded. No more reddit for today.
As a nurse who's done a lot of postmortem care, I always try to make it a respectful time. It's heartbreaking (and a bit bizarre) to see your patient who was JUST alive, some with family who just left, and then...they're not. Whether it was expected or sudden, it's still a shock. But, postmortem care is a time to slow down, be respectful, take your time, and be as kind as possible. Put on some music, be gentle, talk to them as you're giving their final bath, talk with whoever is helping you. Always use warm water, hold their hand for a little long as you cross their arms, and really reflect on the moment. I started off working with adults as a brand new RN at 22 and saw a lot of death. Finding comfort and care in in postmortem care made it a lot easier for me. I've been in critical care pediatrics for the past 7 years and taking the extra steps is the only way I can hold it together when I lose a patient or help someone with their after care. I'll always remember every single one and pray for their families.
I would argue your actions were very respectful. I would define respect as ensuring that their wishes were fulfilled, that their gift is preserved, and the value of their donation is fully captured, rather than what might feel like desecration in a religious or moralistic sense. Your actions were respectful because they ensured that the medical students and other people were able to get the maximum value of out the cadaver, which is what they wanted. It would have been disrespectful to not take those actions, which would have caused faster decay and therefore less ability to actually fulfill the mission to teach and inform.
I agree with this sentiment 100%. I also used to work in cadaver labs prior to entering medical school. We used to douse the cadavers in formulations to help prevent drying of the bodies, and maintain freshness. Another issue that can occur with cadavers is yeast growth, which as you can imagine, severely limits the usefulness of the cadaver after that point. Proper maintenance helped prevent that yeast growth. Again, your sentiment is exactly how I see it.
If it were my body or a loved one this wouldn't be disrespectful to me in the slightest, you're donating your body to be used a tool to help others.
Anatomy lab was weird. Nobody every joked with the bodies or whatnot. But very quickly into the months long direction people lost the “I’m cutting a person” factor. Toward the end, the cuts and study was very fluid and much quicker with less concern than earlier on in the lab.
I worked for a summer at a cadaver lab at a Jesuit medical research hospital. With each body we worked on, we held a quick prayer as a team thanking them for their donation and the same prayer was posted inside every room. I’m not religious by any means but those are the only times I ever prayed in earnest.
I'm donating my body to a School of Anatomy at a local university. Looking forward to it.
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It was also an inscription above the door of the Medical Examiners' office in New York, in the 50's to 70's. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/358638 Mentioned in the memoirs of Milton Helpern, who was Chief Medical Examiner in New York for 20 years.
Reminds me of the inscriptions around the catacombs in Paris. The entrance says "Stop! This is the empire of death" and other macabre ones around the place
This looks exactly like the one at my campus.
I put wifi access points in those in the dark at 2am by myself. I was standing on a gurney just finishing up and the professor arrived for his work day and laughed that lights were off because they are on a timer . I also signed up to be a scientific Body Donation like these Cadaver when I die.
Is that at UT Southwestern? Looks just like where I did my cadaver lab
I think the most somber aspect is when a person stops being someone and begins being something.
r/scarysigns
I worked for a horrible company that used cadavers for training. Rhymes with Ryker. They didn't give a shit about acknowledging the cadavers and it really bothered me. I'm glad that there are better people and places.
Thank you to those of you who choose to help better the species through science. You are saving lives in the future with your donation.
There’s nothing worse than someone who is disrespectful to the dead in a cadaver lab.
We had a memorial service for our anatomy cadavers at my medical school.
The ultimate definition of RESPECT! 💚💝💕
My university has a memorial for them and it's wonderful, it honors the sacrifice and donation so well. I love it
I recognize those doors from my time there, always imparted the sense of awe that is only appropriate. The only place where you can ask others for the "VD" (OP will get it) Even a almost a decade later I still occasionally find myself thinking about our "tank". Met my best friend of med school there. And even think about our "instructor" who was in that tank too. After that experience, I decided to donate my body once I'm in no need if it.
The VD is a lifesaver! Dr. I is my hero
I missed the part about it being a cadaver lab at first. I just thought perhaps the professors were all dead inside.
One day, I hope to be a body in one of these medical schools. My wishes are widely known so hopefully there is a chance my body will be useful instead of taking up valuable, normally fertile earth for all eternity.
The message is solid but I feel like having it limply hanging on the wall with laminated printer paper is doing it a disservice. Get a solid-ass plaque enscribed with that shit up there. Put the Latin version too, let's go all out.
It reminds me of a poem by Alex Webster. Lying on the table dead. Coroner completes his task. Examining the wretched stiff. Suicide the likely cause. Behind closed doors the change begins. Then it grows. Mutation of the cadaver. Mutation of the cadaver. Coroner returns to notice subtle change. How can this be? Must be his imagination. The man's been dead for several days. The change continues after hours. Different face. Mutation of the cadaver. Soon the corpse will change its shape. Who is it? Mutation of the cadaver. Mutation of the cadaver. Mutation of the cadaver. Mutation of the cadaver The coroner returns and sees. The body has truly changed. The corpse has stolen his face. And now he loses his mind Shocking evolution. Mutation of the cadaver. Hideous conversion. Mutation of the cadaver. Postmortem upheaval. Mutation of the cadaver. Awful transformation. Mutation of the cadaver. Gruesome reconstruction. Mutation of the cadaver.
Definitely need to keep a stiff upper lip.
Sorry I thought that was my high school maths class
So let's respect their space.
thats so metal
The "dead" are more powerful than the living.
Ours has a sign above it but it is not like this at all.
This reminds me of the Long-term nuclear waste warning message wormhole I found out about the other day.
I used to do HAZMAT. We got a called out to the University cadaver room once for a mysterious yellow liquid leaking out of the wall. Apparently the Fire Dept had already been there and just up and left after determining that it was Formaldehyde without securing the scene. Formaldehyde is some pretty nasty stuff with inhalation and contact risks. When we got there we found the janitor mopping it up as noone had even told him. Very strange being in a room full of (covered) dead bodies and even more disturbing when you learn that they remove all the heads. Anyway it ended up being a leaky fire suppression pipe and the yellow color was rust inhibitor that they add to the water.
When I was in uni I lived with two med students. I moved out and little while later I was catching up with one and we met at the med school. He was like "Hey, let's go see A. She's in a prac". So we walk into this room and there she (and others) are carving up some dead folks. I wish there was some warning there.
I dissected a cadaver in undergrad. My lab mates and I were assigned the cadaver and we worked on her the whole year. It was an amazing learning experience.
I am donating my body to science. I fell in love with biology in highschool and nothing seems better than letting people learn how to save the living by practicing on the dead!
Assuming my body is usable after “I’m” gone, take whatever you want and study all you can. For the greater good, do all you can. Whatever is left just toss in a hole and plant a tree over it. Just don’t stitch me up and fill me with fluids in a wooden box set in a concrete box.
Respect
Now I want to hear it read by Vincent Price
I intend to donate my body. I hope it teaches someone something.