First Cut is the Deepest: Dissection in Gross Anatomy!

Every med student awaits then day when they get to fulfill their psycho tendencies and cut up a dead body...legally. HAHAHAHAHA

Yesterday we had our first dissection class headed by our uber- awesome Doc JC. There was this kind of crazy panicky feeling in the air when we were putting on our lab gowns and goggles, and Doc Jah, Doc Kent and Doc JC oriented us on the dos and donts.

For our team of 8, we were divided into two where the first four were to dissect first, and the second half stayed in the briefing room to do research, study the bones, and do clinical correlations. 

Walking into the dissection room, we all felt giddy with excitment, heading over to our cadaver in the far end of the room.

"You may now uncover your cadavers."

All of us panicked and were pointing at each other to do it, and then we peeled back the cloth and plastic to reveal....of course, our cadaver.

Honestly, I had a different idea of what a cadaver would like. A little more...fresh, i suppose? The cadaver was black and leathery, average sized male, physically fit i guess because there was minimal fats when we cut him open. 

At first, we were careful with the first cut, a vertical cut from the C7 to the Lumbar area, and we were all, "hey dont cut too deep, we might damage the underlying tissues!" 

And five minutes into the dissection, we didnt even break through the skin yet! We dug in a little deeper, slicing a little deeper, and voila! we could see the pink flesh beneath!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPZ-n_axrfw

This is just an example of what we did since we cant take pictures or video our dissection classes--out of respect for our cadavers also. 

Seriously, dissecting is hard work. The skin is so tough and the connective tissues underneath are sooooo many, one of us was in charge of holding the edges of the skin back so that three of us could slice away at the connective tissue and expose the fascia, and then the underlying muscle. 

In 10 minutes of dissection, we were sweating like pigs, our muscles ached from all the pulling, tugging, slicing, and craning our necks to get a better view of the connective tissue beneath. 

BUT...IT WAS FUN AS HELL. 

We were able to identify and take apart the trapezius muscles, the erector spinae, deltoids, and the fascia. It was awesome to take apart the body and see these structures in real life. And I have to say, the books have it down to the details, except, of course, for the color. For gross ana and dissection we use Netter.

Much better if you studied Netter beforehand so that when you dive into dissection, you dont have to keep guessing what you're looking at or if you already sliced up an important structure.

Before I forget, here's a list stuff that would be handy during your dissection class. For our first dissection, we really had a hard time cleaning up and prepping because we forgot soooo many things.

DISSECTION HANDY PACK LIST:

1. Gloves- you can go for the disposable ones or if you're really icky with those things, you can opt for thicker ones that you wash and use again (kinda gross though, but if its your thing, who am I to stop you :) )

2. Goggles- much better if they were the suction type, not the glasses type since some of the formalin can sneak through your glasses and it hurts like hell. You  can buy this at your local hardware store. 

3. Lab gown- you wouldnt want to smell like the walking dead and have parts of your cadaver staining your uniform.

4. For girls- wear flats, never wear heels to your dissection class, (honest mistake though). standing up for hours and walking around your cadaver in heels messes up your legs, and they hurt.\

5. Bandana, hair ties, clips- keep the hair away from your face, and cover up your hair, because it will smell like your cadaver after several hours of dissection.

6. Feminine Wash aka Betadine- most of my classmates swear by this. We have used rubbing alcohol, all kinds of soap, and nothing else except betadine removed the smell of dead body on our hands.I dont know how they found out in the first place, but it works. HAHAHAHAHAHA

7. Vaseline- and plenty of it. Needed to maintain your cadaver from drying up and preventing unwanted insects from swarming and breeding in your cadaver.

8. Dissecting kit- standard set.