Medical Students First Experience in Human Cadaver Dissection Across Culture

Abstract

While the teaching of anatomy has evolved over the centuries, the cadaver remains its major resource at most medical schools. Approaching the embalmed human body for the first time induces a range of feelings which develop and change throughout an anatomy course. However, the background, cultural views, and experiences students bring to the dissection experience likely influence their reactions and the trajectory of their acclimation to dissection. This survey assessed the self‐rated importance of cultural views and emotional reactions among medical students from different cultural backgrounds. First year medical students from Oakland University William Beaumont School of Medicine (US), American University of Beirut (Lebanon), and Queens University Belfast (Northern Ireland) completed a survey one week before exposure to cadaver dissection (Time 1) and one week after cadaver dissection (Time 2). In terms of self‐reported effect of cultural views on experiences during dissection, the three groups manifested significant differences from each other, with students in the U.S. having the highest levels at Time 1 (Mean=2.30), followed by students in Lebanon (Mean=1.81), and then students in Northern Ireland (Mean=1.46; F=13.07; p<0.001). In terms of the emotions at Time 1, students in Northern Ireland reported the lowest level (Mean=2.28), followed by students in the U.S. (Mean=3.00), and those in Lebanon (Mean=3.16). F= 11.96; p<001). However, the three groups did not show any significant differences on this measure at Time 2. Finally, with respect to dissection as an anxiety‐provoking experience, students in Northern Ireland showed the lowest scores at Time 1 (Mean=1.70), compared to US (Mean=2.45) and Lebanon (Mean=2.36). While both students in the U.S. (Mean=2.11) and Northern Ireland (Mean=1.56) showed some decrease in reported anxiety at Time 2, students in Lebanon showed a much more dramatic decrease (Mean=1.60). Aggregate differences in reported anxiety at Time 2 were significant (F=6.78;p=0.001), driven by the pairwise difference between U.S. students and the other groups. In conclusion, this study suggests that students self‐perceive their cultural views as relatively unimportant in the dissection experience, yet significant group differences between students from different cultural context were observed. There appear to be differences between groups nested these different cultural contexts, not only prior to the dissection experience, but also in terms of how they acclimate to the emotional experiences during dissection. Additionally, while often the U.S. is considered acultural compared to other regions, the U.S. group reports significantly higher levels of importance on this measure than those from Northern Ireland or Lebanon.This abstract is from the Experimental Biology 2019 Meeting. There is no full text article associated with this abstract published in The FASEB Journal.