I smell like formaldehyde

[Rogue_Leader]

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I would recommend double gloving your hands when doing dissections, even if you have the purple nitrile gloves. With just one layer of gloves, I found that it left a small scent left in my hands, which wasn't so bad by itself, but when I tried to have dinner after that, the scent from my hands when I brought them near my nose while eating made things kinda nauseating, and this was after I had showered and everything.

 

[deuist]

My lab is new and is negative pressure. It actually smells nice.

 

[myodana]

i've got until november 1st to psych myself up for anatomy lab... we start a little later... november-march. oh, the things i get to look forward to...

 

[digitiminimi]

Still catch a whiff of the phantom lab smells from time to time .... walking down the stairs in the library, sitting on my porch, shopping at the mall .... ahhh I miss those days 🙂

 

[TheFlash]

It's nasty. What sucks the most is leaning over my cadaver and getting your scrubs soaked in it and having pieces of fat stuck to you and then having to go to the bookstore.

yup, part of the m1 experience.

 

[Amy B]

I am so glad to have had anatomy lab in a new school with one of the best air exchange systems in the country. I feel for you all who dont have this elabrate of a system.

I would caution folks that do use vicks vapor rub as it is used to open up nasal passages and thus make your nose even more suseptable to the smell. I would suggest trying a perfumed lotion such as a citrus scented or mint.

 

[LevatorAni]

Beware of Chloroseptic throat spray after you're done with lab. I had a sore throat this spring and sprayed some in my mouth. I almost vomited since there's something in it that is also in enbalming fluid.

BTW: If you take your scrubs home and wash them they won't smell at the end of the semester. I still have my anatomy scrubs and they smell like Snuggle fabric softener.

 

[Dr Who]

I hate to say this, but ladies, it doesn't hurt to wash your bra and panties too, if ya know what I mean...

enlighten us guys. 🙄

 

[marooner]

i actually don't mind the smell of the cadaver... i even don't use scrubs nor lab gowns... i don't mind smelling formaldehyde outside. smelling like one is part of being a medical student... hahahahaha.....

 

[aparecida]

Report from the first week:
I've been wearing a lab coat, double nitrile gloves with soap in between the layers, and one of those flimsy clear shower caps like you get at hotels. And scrubs, of course. My boyfriend reports that I don't smell at all like cadaver or preservative even when I come straight from lab. The shower cap works like a charm to keep the smell out of your hair. I've also been using a sugar scrub when I shower, which seems to help get off any lingering stuff in my skin.

I also spray my lab coat and scrubs down with Febreze and seal them in big ziplock bags in my locker. It does a remarkable job of keeping my locker from stinking.

just thought I'd share, for those of us who have significant others whom we'd like to spare the stench.

 

[Deleted member 72527]

Report from the first week:
I've been wearing a lab coat, double nitrile gloves with soap in between the layers, and one of those flimsy clear shower caps like you get at hotels. And scrubs, of course. My boyfriend reports that I don't smell at all like cadaver or preservative even when I come straight from lab. The shower cap works like a charm to keep the smell out of your hair. I've also been using a sugar scrub when I shower, which seems to help get off any lingering stuff in my skin.

I also spray my lab coat and scrubs down with Febreze and seal them in big ziplock bags in my locker. It does a remarkable job of keeping my locker from stinking.

just thought I'd share, for those of us who have significant others whom we'd like to spare the stench.

That sounds like a whole freaking lot of work - I just beeline for the shower (although my SO is 6 states away). Of course, we also have a REALLY well-ventilated lab, so it might be different other places.

 

[Cholinergic]

There are some good suggestions here.

Are folks wearing the same set of scrubs for more than one lab session or just stashing them in their locker until the end of the week? I was planning on buying enough sets of scrubs to get me through the week, then washing.

 

[Amy B]

That would be a waste of money. How many times a week do you have anatomy lab? We had it twice a week. Most of us wore the same scrubs and wore them a numerous of times without washing them. They really didnt get messed up, especially if you wear a lab coat over them.

 

[X.O.]

Where do you get nitrile goves? Ive been to a CVS, Target, and Eckards and none of those place have them or have heard of what nitrile is.

 

[humuhumu]

Beware of Chloroseptic throat spray after you're done with lab. I had a sore throat this spring and sprayed some in my mouth. I almost vomited since there's something in it that is also in enbalming fluid.

phenol

 

[liverotcod]

Our cadavers seem to be soaking in ethanol, mostly. Maybe there's something else in there, but it smells like ethanol + corpse.

 

[aparecida]

Nitrile gloves - they have them at our medical bookstore, and also at the medical supply place down the street (same place I got scrubs and lab coat).

New problem: I'm allergic to something in the cadavers, I don't know if it's the preservatives or the cadavers themselves or what. But not only do I start sniffling in lab (which sucks when your hands are covered in anatomy goo and you can't blow your nose), I'm even allergic to the people around me in lecture; a lot of people come in their scrubs, and I wind up miserable all through lecture. Allergy medicine doesn't seem to help.

 

[Cholinergic]

Where do you get nitrile goves? Ive been to a CVS, Target, and Eckards and none of those place have them or have heard of what nitrile is.

Got mine at walmart. Look around the diabetic section or where the gauze and bandages are.

 

[8744]

Aren't most cadavers preseved with "formalin" and not formaldehyde? Or is it the same thing?

At our school, the cadavers were prepared on-site by our director of anatomical services. They kept the just-dead bodies in a walk-in cooler just off of the gross-lab before they were embalmed. The director of anatomical services was a very nice (and pretty) woman who I understand was an undertaker by training.

Some people in my class made extra money at the end of the year helping the anatomy lab staff essentially butcher and dispose of what was left of the cadavers after we had picked over em'. Not a pretty sight. Of course, by that time nothing really bothers you about cadavers except the pervasive smell which is very hard to eliminate.

My wife made me strip naked in the carport and stuff all of my clothes into a bucket of detergent when I got home. When the weather was warm I had to hose off and scrub in the back yard before I was allowed in the house. When the weather was cooler I had to go straight to the shower and clean the shower after I was finished before I was fit company.

My dogs were initially kind of freaked out when I came home. I suspect they believe their master is a serial killer but now, in their canine wisdom, have come to accept this.

The smell got into my car. Fortunantly shortly after my last gross lab we decided to buy a minivan so I was able to trade in my strange smelling but otherwise immaculate car towards the minivan.

Somewhere, some guy is driving my car oblivious to the lingering smell of anatomy lab.

I hated gross lab. Since my school had a system based curriculum we had gross lab intermittantly for two years. I went religiously during first year but decided in October of second year that I had had enough of picking through goop. Henceforth I skipped the lab (except for practical exams, of course) and studied my Rohen's Photographic Atlas which was a good deal more high-yield than digging through somebody's rancid adipose tissue looking for the pudendal nerve. I actually did pretty well in anatomy. The only As I got on tests in medical school were all in gross anatomy.

Oh, and we had to wear scrubs in the lab. I had two pairs of scrubs that I used for lab as well as a pair of running shoes just for lab. After I stopped going I threw them all out. Unfortunantly, gross-lab is not the only thing you do on lab days. Some people change after lab before they go to lecture. To my mind there is no point doing this. The smell doesn't just get in your clothes, it also pervades your hair and skin. All you do by changing clothes is to contaminate another set of clothes.

This is why the eighth floor lecture hall at LSU Shreveport always smells like gross lab. You might not notice it as a first year but after you've been away from gross lab for a while it is obvious.

Another thing my lab group did was to keep one copy of Netters and one dissection manual ("Dissector") in a plastic bag in the tank with our cadaver. Would you really want to put in your locker, much less take home, any book that was routinely splashed with corpse-goo? I don't think so.

I sometimes saw people in the library studying from books that had only a few hours before been resting on some dead guys dissected ass. This is pretty inconsiderate of others, if you ask me.

It all seems so long ago.

 

[Amy B]

Where do you get nitrile goves? Ive been to a CVS, Target, and Eckards and none of those place have them or have heard of what nitrile is.

I got mine at CVS in the first aid section. The people working there didnt know what I was talking about. I found them on my own in the first aid part. They are purple. Try To look again in the first aid section.

 

[palminator2003]

Can anyone tell me how many mil are the nitrile gloves they are buying? They come in multiple grades and I'm not sure which to get.