Abstract
Hamlet: Has this fellow no feelings of his business, that he sings at grave-making? Horatio: Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness. (Hamlet Act V, scene i)1...
Highlights
The practice of dissection in the anatomical education of many medical students provokes many wide ranging and conflicting responses, as reflected in prose and poetry
We come to the crux of this essay; having seen what progressive eVects dissection may have on students, we examine the possible consequences of such eVects for the character of medical students and doctors and glimpse the price to pay for dissection
We have seen the transition in student responses to dissection from horror and disgust to a hardened numbness, described by Abse in the introduction, as a way of coping with the internal conflicts that dissectors have experienced
Summary
The practice of dissection in the anatomical education of many medical students provokes many wide ranging and conflicting responses, as reflected in prose and poetry. This essay follows this progression, through literature, from the first “disgust” and “distaste” upon entering the dissection room and encountering the cadavers within, to the “apathetic neutrality” engendered in students, and the consequences that such attitudes may have for students, doctors and their patients. In his poem Carnal Knowledge, Dannie Abse, a chest physician and a writer, who studied at King’s College, London, during the second world war describes his first sight of the dissection room : “....
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