Depression

[luckyzero]

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I was reading something, and it was talking about MS1 (I think)
when you have to start dissecting corpses.

It said that this spread a feeling of depression, and one guy from the class actually hung himself! I have heard about people puking and being squiemish when doing this, but had never heard about it actually making people depressed.

Wanted to know if anyone has heard (or seen) anything like that happen.

Actually, Looking back on it now, who knows how much of a relation there was between the class and the person hanging themselves.

 

[ckent]

I didn't get depressed looking at the bodies, but my school had this big jar full of preservatives with the torso of a pregnant woman and her fetus only (head, arms, side of body and legs chopped off, just showing fetus attached to mother and internal organs of mother with skin over). I didn't notice it until we were taking an exam because it normally hung out on a different side of the anatomy lab, but I finally did see right in the middle of an exam, and that made me sad. It also made me a little angry too, because if her family had offered to donate her body for "Medical education", I seriously doubt that they would ever have approved of it being used like that.

 

[UCLAMAN]

From all of your posts it seems you sound super concerned about the whole anatomy lab deal.

Are you worried you can't hack it(no pun intended) or something?

 

[gwyn779]

It doesn't seem to me like anatomy would be the biggest trigger for depression. Now, having no life because of a huge workload, I could see that.

 

[luckyzero]

Eh, not really afraid that I can't hack it, just trying to
explore all angles of medschool to get a well
rounded view of it, to help make my decisions to
try for medschool or not.

 

[Weil-Felix]

Luckyzero,

I had similar concerns before I started med school. I wondered if I would be bothered by the dead bodies. I was very, very squeamish before med school. But actually, it really wasn't as bothersome as I had imagined. The first day is kind of strange, but you become desensitized to it after a while. Now, I am planning on becoming a pathologist, and I even find doing autopsies rather fun. (Not in the sense that I am happy that anyone has died, of course. Just that they are a fascinating learning experience, and an opportunity to give the patient's family some solid answers about their disease.)

I don't think that it will be depressing for you if you just keep in mind that these people who have donated their bodies are heroes who have made an incredible sacrifice for your education. I agree with the poster who said that the fact that you have no life in med school is much more depressing than the bodies...so true!

 

[raining4days]

I doubt this "one guy from the class" hung himself because he was depressed about anatomy lab. Was this story published? I have a feeling that maybe this suicide had something to do with the third year clinical rotations. But anyways, do you have a link to the story? Can you post it or PM me?

 

[ItsGavinC]

I've found anatomy to be one of the most miraculous things I've ever been associated with.

Very few people have had or will have the privilege of viewing the human body in such enormous detail. To understand how the body works and to experience the things associated with anatomy are truly amazing. Touching an aorta, following the superior vena cava, feeling the brain hemispheres--these are awe-inspiring moments.

Some of those special moments, along with patient contact, make us remember why we are putting ourselves through hours and hours of endless coursework.

 

[peterockduke]

Honestly, for the first 3 weeks of my anatomy lab, I felt an intense amount of guilt/depression. It was especially bad during and after the dissections. After awhile, it lessened, though it never fully went away. My professor said it was common for 1-2 students to feel this way / year. I swear it's as if she seemed proud of me for feeling this way?!

 

[DieselPetrolGrl]

ooohhh im so excited *googly eyes* u med school people..i wanna be just like you..and you..and you! anatomy lab sounds like a hoot, i have a udnergrad id and i tried to peek into one but couldnt 🙁
once my dad let me hold a brain in a jar, im sure it is not the same.

 

[paramed2premed]

I am not yet a med student (starting in 1 week at Albany!), but I have been a paramedic for 6 years.

My wager: The vast majority of those of you worried about doing dissections will, in 2 months time, be discussing, over an open chest, what you are getting for lunch.

Less flippantly: Think of these bodies as the people who are your first patients. Whenever I have seen a person distorted by massive trauma, I try to keep their humanity forefront in my mind. It seems weird, less distancing, not more, but it helps.

 

[miscalculated]

we started dissection in our 2nd week of the 1st yr at med school, when most of us were still only 18 years old and nobody surprisingly fainted or found it disgusting. We were all in awe because like someone said, we are priviliged to be allowed to dissect.

 

[streetdoc]

i , too, have been a paramedic for a while. one the first day of gross, my professor said our cadaver had been alive 5 days ago. that was a little creepy. anyway, we pull back the sheets and he looked oddly familiar. i cut right away and didn't think too much about it. about a week later the list was up of the ages, occupations, and location where the cadaver was from. he was from my county! i'd picked him up (as a paramedic) and had seen him around my small town many times.
talk about a SMALL world!!!
yeah, so to get back to the point of the thread...it didn't really bother me because you treat every cadaver with respect like it is your life-long friend. if you respect him/her, then then you won't be so upset by the cutting part.
just my thoughts

streetdoc

 

[mattorama]

Originally posted by streetdoc
i , too, have been a paramedic for a while. one the first day of gross, my professor said our cadaver had been alive 5 days ago. that was a little creepy. anyway, we pull back the sheets and he looked oddly familiar. i cut right away and didn't think too much about it. about a week later the list was up of the ages, occupations, and location where the cadaver was from. he was from my county! i'd picked him up (as a paramedic) and had seen him around my small town many times.
talk about a SMALL world!!!
yeah, so to get back to the point of the thread...it didn't really bother me because you treat every cadaver with respect like it is your life-long friend. if you respect him/her, then then you won't be so upset by the cutting part.
just my thoughts

streetdoc

That is crazy. I am an undergrad, but took a gross anatomy course this summer with cadavers and all. I asked my prof, who had been doing this for a while, how often he had heard of students getting someone they knew. He said that bodies never leave state lines so while it is rare, it isn't overly so.

Seems funny that your prof said your cadavers were alive 5 days prior. My prof and my TAs all said that the cadavers have to go through the normal embalbming process, then on top of that are soaked in large vats of chemicals for at least 2-3 years. Maybe the process varies by state.

 

[miscalculated]

My prof's anatomy prof left his body to medical science and my prof dissected it, on his prof's wish.

 

[streetdoc]

i didn't mean to led you to believe that ALL the bodies were "fresh." most are a year old. it just so happened that mine was new...the newest in the class infact. most are about 6-12 months past the "expiration date."
it's not like the guy was my best friend, i had just picked him up (he wasn't really a regular), and seen him around, he was a nurses aid.
what would have been totally mind blowing is if i had "worked" him on the day he died as the paramedic answering the call. talk about weird. i might have been sued for wanting his body or something...
i hope noone ever has to dissect a friend...
streetdoc

 

[paramed2premed]

Originally posted by streetdoc
... what would have been totally mind blowing is if i had "worked" him on the day he died as the paramedic answering the call. ...
streetdoc

Given my success rate with codes, it would be less than "mind blowing" to find a former patient on the slab in front of me. 😉

What if you found, when you did the dissection, that you had put the ET tube in the esophagus? Oh boy...

 

[mattorama]

During gross this summer, we found a big wad of surgical gauze in the abdomen of our male cadaver next to an apparent hernia repair. It must have been in there for a while as the body had walled it off with scar tissue. The guy may have had a lawsuit in his abdomen and never knew it. It was also cool because the omentum was wrapped around it. Does anyone else think the greater omentum is the coolest thing they have ever seen? It fascinates me... 🙂

 

[care bear]

today was my first day of anatomy lab, and although i was able to keep up an ok face in class, i couldn't help crying once i got home. i feel so disrespectful to be working in such a way on someone. i don't think most of the ppl in my class felt the same way-at least not those in my lab group. i don't know if i'll ever get used to it. . i hope it won't be 6 months of feeling depressed and dirty all the time, but i could see that happening judging from the way i felt this evening. did anyone ever feel like me and get over it? i'd like to hear abt it. . .

 

[aphistis]

Not to belabor the point with too much detail, but we're just about finished with our anatomy module (we restrict ourselves to head & neck for class, though we're encouraged to do gross dissections on our own time), and for the last few weeks, it's gotten, surprisingly, easier with each dissection. After each progressively more mutilative dissection, the cadaver resembles a human being less and less. Last Thursday, we had to disarticulate the skull from the vertebral column, and today, we did a complete sagittal bisection of the skull. There's really very little left to remind us that this was once a human being, as opposed to simply a very lifelike mannequin.

I guess the moral is that it really <em>can</em> get easier as you progress into it.

 

[DD214_DOC]

Gross anatomy can trigger depression in certain individuals because it brings to the front our own mortality. Some people may become depressed as they begin to seriously consider and realize the inevitibility of death.

Depression isn't directly related to GA lab.

 

[gwyn779]

Originally posted by care bear
today was my first day of anatomy lab, and although i was able to keep up an ok face in class, i couldn't help crying once i got home. i feel so disrespectful to be working in such a way on someone. i don't think most of the ppl in my class felt the same way-at least not those in my lab group. i don't know if i'll ever get used to it. . i hope it won't be 6 months of feeling depressed and dirty all the time, but i could see that happening judging from the way i felt this evening. did anyone ever feel like me and get over it? i'd like to hear abt it. . .

You have to remember, these people willingly donated their bodies so you could learn. I definitely had people say that the best teacher you'll ever have 1st year is your cadaver. You can still be respectful while dissecting.

 

[KyGrlDr2B]

As long as you respect the cadavers, I don't see any reason why you should be so upset. Like another poster said, these people willingly donated their bodies and they know what is going to happen to them. Many people even tour the labs before they agree to donate so they can see what will happen. I can understand a person being upset initially because it can be a shock to see a dead person just lying there and you have to mangle them up. But I think if a person gets in a severe depression during the entire course, then there was something else wrong with them and anatomy is just contributing. I have a way worse depression now that 2nd yr has started than I ever had 1st year. 🙁

 

[raspberry swirl]

i will agree with all the other posters. there is no reason for anyone to feel guilty for dissecting. all of those bodies are in their tanks because they chose to be donated. however, they probably didn't chose to be completley massacred (i've seen some crappy dissections). no one should feel bad about dissecting-- its part of our education, and most likely, the most important part. i'm sure many of the people who donated their bodies were in health care professions, and know what happens to people who donate, and understand the importance of their decision for our benefit. DO NOT FEEL GUILTY. it will only hinder your ability to really get in there and learn. those people who donated WANTED to help you out. its a great gift, albeit one i do not think i could give. . . .
as for feeling dirty, that doesn't go away. at least, it hasn't yet for me and its been 3 weeks. you will stink progressively more and more as the semester goes on . . . .sorry.

 

[carrigallen]

Originally posted by ckent
I didn't get depressed looking at the bodies, but my school had this big jar full of preservatives with the torso of a pregnant woman and her fetus only (head, arms, side of body and legs chopped off, just showing fetus attached to mother and internal organs of mother with skin over). I didn't notice it until we were taking an exam because it normally hung out on a different side of the anatomy lab, but I finally did see right in the middle of an exam, and that made me sad. It also made me a little angry too, because if her family had offered to donate her body for "Medical education", I seriously doubt that they would ever have approved of it being used like that.

i agree, this sounds inconsiderate. I suppose the arms, legs, and head were buried, or disposed of. It must be rare to find a late-term pregant body, but still it doesn't justify treating a body like a piece of artwork.