A sense of excitement and apprehension filled my thoughts prior to starting our first anatomy dissection this past January. The remote learning environment of the pandemic allowed my class to learn the structures through diagrams and apps during the fall semester, but dissection represented a powerful milestone within our medical education. The experience brought us face-to-face with our first patients, but I felt unworthy to be the recipient of this gift. As we stood together for a moment of silence, I found myself remembering the many lives I met during my gap year learning about palliative care in Japan. I thought about the months of talking to someone about their family and life adventures to weeks later bowing in front of their silent body surrounded by sobbing loved ones. The memories of these patients’ lives have fueled my commitment to medicine, but here I was about to cut into someone whose name I did not even know.
When facing a new patient, we might ask “What brings you in today?” and perform a physical exam, yet here we were making the first incisions without inspecting the bodies nor learning how this cadaver arrived at the table.
Time soon passed, and with over an hour left of our dedicated time, the room became sparse after most groups finished the assigned task. I sat there next to the body contemplating the thoughts and fears of my classmates about what we had just done. Perhaps there is more to the dissection experience than just the checklist at the end of the lab manual chapter. I believe a humanistic aspect of cadaver dissection can be fostered through creating a platform for student reflection about the dissection and help students feel connected to the donors and families throughout the learning experience.