GIVING DEATH ITS DUE : MEDICAL STUDENTS PAY RESPECTS TO CADAVERS THEY'VE DISSECTED.

Byline: Dee-Ann Durbin Associated Press 

Two candles flickered and the smell of incense blended with the stench of formaldehyde as a dozen medical students paid their respects last week to cadavers they had dissected during summer anatomy class.

The memorial to two unnamed bodies was an effort to help fledgling doctors learn to deal with death and dying, said Hugh A. Patterson, the professor who teaches Anatomy 1A at the University of California, Berkeley.

``When I took anatomy 25 years ago, the sorts of things that would help a student prepare for a cadaver simply weren't done,'' he recalled. ``But over the years people have become aware of the emotional element that comes with working with a cadaver.''

The memorial was held in a classroom with sinks, lab tables and a skeleton hanging in the corner. The two bodies the students had cut open, studied and displayed for weeks were now covered by brown tarps.

A bouquet of flowers rested between the cadavers as two students read poems, two others read from the Bible and student Alex Smith strummed a guitar and sang the Elvis Costello song, ``God's Comic.''

``At first it was unsettling to see the dead bodies,'' said Smith, 22, who had lost a relative a month before. ``But the session on death and dying really helped me deal with my emotions.''

Smith said the hardest part of working with the cadavers was looking at the hands and faces.

``Who has this person touched?'' he wondered. ``And all the caring this person has given through these hands.''

Although the cadavers were not publicly identified, the students had the choice of learning about them, their backgrounds and the cause of death.

About half the students sought out the information and the university made sure the facts didn't go further, to protect the feelings of relatives, who were not invited to Thursday's ceremony.

``These two are just a representative of a community of people who have helped us,'' Patterson said at the memorial, which was by no means a funeral.

Anatomy 1A students use about two dozen different cadavers in their labs, and properly preserved, each one can be used for up to 20 years.

``I think it would be a little bit artificial if we were saying eulogies about the cadavers,'' said Henry Gilbert, 26, a graduate student in paleontology. ``But that's not what we're doing. We're recognizing the great gift we've been given.''

In the death and dying classes, students discuss their emotional reactions, not only to ease the shock factor of looking death in the face but also to teach them that a dying patient is not someone to shy away from.

``What we're trying to do is to use this experience in the anatomy lab as a portal to address the whole issue of death and dying rather than sweeping it under the rug,'' Patterson said.

Patterson's approach to gross anatomy is part of a national trend toward more sensitivity in the lab, said Arthur Dalley, president-elect of the American Association of Clinical Anatomists.

``The old way kind of gave the message that the physician was somehow supposed to be above the death process and not be affected by it either in terms of concern for the individual or in terms of their own emotional framework,'' he said.

``Now they're saying, `You have feelings about this, too, and so did these people and so did their families.' ''

As the service ended, student Karl Goldstein produced a small potted tree, which will be kept in the anatomy offices.

``This is dedicated,'' he said, ``to those who in death taught us about life.''

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2 Photos

Photo: (1) Hugh Patterson, a gross anatomy professor atthe University of California at Berkeley, speaks at a ceremony for two cadavers.

(2) Alex Smith performs an Elvis Costello song, ``God's Comic.''

Associated Press