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in reply to: Online HTA induction for students #3854
Hi Aine,
We did something similar in Canvas. We embedded a PowerPoint lecture into our VLE – which included some elements of the H&S requirements such as appropriate dress etc. We then asked the students to complete a short quiz in their VLE – including multiple choice answers (for example picking out what was considered appropriate attire for the lab out of a list), and some true/false for the statutory elements.
Canvas Quizzes were pretty easy to put together and allowed us to generate reports on who had attempted the quiz. If there were no answers recorded at all then they weren’t allowed to come into the lab, and there was a clearly communicated deadline that the quiz answers were to be submitted a week before their first session so that there was sufficient time for admin and technical staff to sort out those who had technical difficulties so everyone could come in for their timetabled session (and those who didn’t read the instructions…).
I’m not sure yet what the plan is for this coming Academic year because our institution thinks the pandemic is over.
Natasha
in reply to: Embalming Fluid #3806Hi Samuel,
I’ve used Dodge for soft fixation (Freedom Art) and conventional fixation. I’ve had no complaints – I personally like the colouration that you can get – its not thiel-like, but its pretty nice looking compared to Anatomy’s traditional shades of beige. I’ve not found there to be any mould problems either in the past. We don’t use the Dodge fixatives at Birmingham currently, but I have managed to persuade them to start to use the pre-injection mixes before embalming using our conventional formula. I had plans to do a trial embalming of a full Dodge cadaver so people could evaluate the difference, but then the pandemic happened.
The Freedom Art cadavers smell a bit like Jolly Ranchers (fake fruity in case that reference is showing my age), but were a vast improvement over the odours that fresh frozen produces! The conventional fixation definitely had a different ‘smell’ to them but it wasn’t offensive.
Natasha
By the end of an extended teaching day thanks to covid our specimens look very sad and tired. We keep them in boxes of wetting solution and just make sure we have more solution in the box than we normally would. Overnight they seem to come back to life. If they’re larger they’re kept in a thick sealed plastic bag (the same gauge as our body bags) with plenty of stockinette that is kept wetter than we normally would and again miraculously they come back to life overnight. We just make sure that we change the storage wetting solution more often than we normally would and again this seems to make a difference. We also make sure we timetable slots between the teaching sessions so that we have half an hour to spray the specimens with a pressurised mister – and to clean down the lab between groups of students.
in reply to: Embalming donations in the current climate #3553We’re currently still not accepting at Birmingham, but this is more of a staffing issue than because of covid. We would exclude for any respiratory infection. We were also going to ensure that the donor was masked before we move them from the funeral directors trollies – and increase the PPE for embalming staff.
in reply to: Dissection in the dissecting room after CORVID 19 #3316At Birmingham we only have a small cohort of intercalating students that do full body dissection (usually 16 – but 3 have decided not to undertake the intercalation due to covid). Having measured up our dissecting tables, and the College insisting that PPE can’t be used as mitigation, we will be running the dissection as one person dissecting at any one time per cadaver. We will probably end up with students making prosections rather than undertaking whole body dissection this year unless we can increase the amount of time that they can spend dissecting by making the other elements asynchronous. Still to be confirmed…
We will be teaching in the lab with prosected material as the College are desperate for an excuse to have the students physically on campus, but we are reducing the length of the sessions and the number of courses that will be able to go into the Prosection lab this year simply because there are only so many hours in the day, and a ridiculous number of medical students to accommodate.
in reply to: Specimen printer and labels. #1417Hi,
We’ve started to use the embossed dymo labels as well, but have noticed after switching embalming fluid that these tend to corrode on the whole cadavers, but not on the prosected specimens for some reason. I am going to double check that our supplier has been sending me the stainless steel embossing tape rather than the aluminium, but to be aware this may happen. Just be aware that students love to fiddle with these tags for some reason, and they’re quite easy to snap in half with repeated student fiddling…
Is anyone from Sheffield active on these boards before I go and stalk their contact details offline? They had some really nice cadaver tags and I wanted to get supplier details.
Natashain reply to: Embalming the brain #1401Hi,
We tend to do the same as the method outlined below, but we use a syringe pump which injects 10ml per pump rather than using a narrow trocar on our embalming pump – purely because I prefer the length of the needle on this rather than the length of our narrowest trocar that is compatible with our embalming machine. The technique to start with is a bit hit miss or maybe but once you’ve done it a few times it gets better. Used this method on all brains used for a brain dissection module and no-one passed comment about there being a hole through the brain and I’ve not seen evidence of where the needle passed through in the cross sections I’ve seen.in reply to: Fresh frozen specimens needed #1389Hi Steve,
At Nottingham Uni we cant provide any specimens, but have you considered the national repository operated by Nottingham Hospitals Trust? https://www.nuh.nhs.uk/bodydonation/in reply to: Supervision of students using cadaveric materials #1376Hi Steven,
According to our University’s lab policies, undergraduate students are not allowed into labs unsupervised. Generally we don’t allow anyone in to access specimens without supervision by someone named as a PD even though they in theory could as long as they comply with our lone working policy.
Natashain reply to: Notifiable Disease #1371Hi Bob,
Here we also speak to whoever is signing the death certificate as well as the GP. If the GP is reluctant to give us this information, sending a copy of the donor’s signed consent form means they will then send us a summary of their medical records. Sometimes the relatives notifying us will proffer some medical history. If there is any doubt, we don’t accept.
Natasha
in reply to: Notifiable Disease #1364Hi Bob,
When it comes to conditions which aren’t necessarily infectious but may affect the anatomy, a decision is made at a local level. For issues about controlling the risks from infection, generally I follow the advice provided from the HSE about controlling the risks of infection from human remains – a PDF can be downloaded from here http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/web01.pdf
NatashaAt Nottingham we accept as long as once the body is registered we can start embalming within 1 week of DOD. We have embalmed 3 previously frozen cadavers using Dodge’s freedom Art kit and they seemed to work out well – have yet to trial long term storage of these cadavers though, just for use on multi-day surgical simulation courses.
in reply to: Fresh Frozen #1297Hi andy – shouldn’t be a problem at all – my contact details are here if you need them: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/life-sciences/people/natasha.russell
in reply to: Fresh Frozen #1295Hi Andy,
We do it at Nottingham – very happy to come to you or for you to come down once our new freezers are installed – should be completed next week?
Natasha -
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