鈥淟ook how small the esophagus is,鈥� she says, examining her patient鈥檚 neck. 聽鈥淣ow I鈥檓 definitely going to chew my food a bit more knowing that it鈥檚 going down this small pipe into your stomach.鈥�

鈥淚t鈥檚 definitely going to do wonders for me in helping me be a better nurse.鈥� 鈥撀燚esiree dos Anjos, 麻豆原创 nursing student

Her 鈥減atient鈥� was a cadaver, a person who had donated their body to help train medical students, and her 鈥渃linic鈥� was the 麻豆原创 College of Medicine鈥檚 Anatomy Lab. 聽Dos Anjos was one of 10 麻豆原创 College of Nursing students who trained in the lab with thanks to medical students who organized a one-day workshop Nov. 28.

鈥淚t鈥檚 been absolutely phenomenal,鈥� dos Anjos says of her first experience learning from real humans.聽鈥淚鈥檝e learned so much, knowing how the different organs look and how they work inside the body instead of just looking at pictures in a textbook. It鈥檚 definitely going to do wonders for me in helping me be a better nurse, because I鈥檒l have a fuller understanding of how everything actually works when I鈥檓 explaining procedures to my patients.鈥�

The workshop was the brainchild of former critical-care-nurse-turned-麻豆原创-medical student Will Pruitt. After getting trained in the during his first year of medical school, Pruitt realized how valuable such a learning experience would have been during his nursing education.

鈥淪o much of what I learned during the gross anatomy module would have been tremendously helpful in multiple facets of my nursing practice,鈥� says Pruitt, who is now in his second year of medical school. 鈥淪o, I wanted to give 麻豆原创 nursing students, starting with this small group, a unique learning experience that gives them an opportunity to bridge the gap between what they have learned in nursing textbooks and the actual human body.鈥�

Only a handful of nursing schools utilize cadavers for their students鈥� learning. While the College of Nursing employs advanced simulation technologies, such as high-fidelity mannequins, virtual or screen-based patients,聽as well as clinical experience with real patients, cadaver-based learning experiences are not yet part of the curriculum.

鈥淚t鈥檚 clear from listening to the student interactions that there is much to learn and share between disciplines.鈥� 鈥撀燡oyce Burr, 麻豆原创 College of Nursing lecturer

鈥淭he most exciting thing for me as an educator was the absolute total engagement and enthusiasm of both the nursing and medical students during this teaching and learning experience,鈥� says Joyce Burr, associate lecturer at the College of Nursing who helped coordinate the event. 鈥淚t鈥檚 clear from listening to the student interactions that there is much to learn and share between disciplines. The medical students are teaching but they are also learning from the nursing students, and it shows that each partner on the team has something valuable to contribute, and the end product is a healthy patient.鈥�

Pruitt worked with three other medical students and Daniel Topping, the Anatomy Lab鈥檚 director, to design a workshop curriculum that allowed nurses to see and touch core parts of the anatomy and common pathologies and review common clinical scenarios like hernias and lung damage while peering into the human body. The nurses聽also flushed central lines, inserted tracheal tubes and used manual resuscitators to inflate balloons as simulated lungs with medical devices donated by the Osceola Regional Medical Center.

鈥淣urses are at the bedside helping to place and monitor these devices, but they never really get to see what lies beneath the skin,鈥� Pruitt says. 鈥淪o we want them to get a better understanding of where these devices are traveling and how they work once they are in the body, so it will assist them when putting these devices in, and also be able to picture exactly what happens when a device fails or migrates out of place.鈥�

鈥淎natomy is fundamental to any discipline involved in direct care of patients, whether nursing, speech therapy, or pharmacology.鈥� 鈥� Daniel Topping, 麻豆原创’s Anatomy Lab director

Before studying in the lab, nursing students watched a videotape about the experience and the impact of their patient鈥檚 gift to medical education. At 麻豆原创鈥檚 medical school, cadavers are considered the student鈥檚 first patient. Medical students talked to their nursing colleagues about honoring and respecting the person鈥檚 gift to their training. Pruitt will be analyzing the impact of the experience in a research study, and hopes his results will help make the program a staple for 麻豆原创 nursing students.

With the development of 麻豆原创鈥檚 new Academic Health Science Center, which will ultimately bring many 麻豆原创 health programs to Lake Nona and encourage more interprofessional education, research and patient care, Topping says the Anatomy Lab workshop can be a model for future collaborations between healthcare disciplines.

鈥淎natomy is fundamental to any discipline involved in direct care of patients, whether nursing, speech therapy, or pharmacology. And we have such a wonderful facility and resources here, which makes perfect sense for us to collaborate and begin partnerships,鈥� he says.

鈥淚 also feel that our donors would want as many healthcare professionals as possible to benefit from their gift,鈥� he added. 鈥淎nd what better way to do it than through these interprofessional collaborations.鈥�

To view a video version of this story, visit聽

鈥淕rowing up, I saw how that sort of technology changed his life as well our whole family and made it possible for him to live like a normal person,鈥� Sleppy said. 鈥淪o I want to use my engineering skills toward the medical field to be able to impact other people鈥檚 lives the way it impacted my family.鈥�

Sleppy is among 15 麻豆原创 engineering students who are getting to know the inner workings of one of the most intricately designs machines – the human body.

Thanks to a partnership between 麻豆原创鈥檚 College of Engineering and Computer Science and the College of Medicine, the first cohort of students in 麻豆原创鈥檚 new biomedical engineering (BME) master鈥檚 program are receiving a tactile introduction to the human anatomy.

The master鈥檚 program trains young engineers to design medical devices for implant within or on the body, such as heart pumps, pacemakers, and prosthetics. Most of the students have not had any real exposure to anatomy. So the College of Medicine鈥檚 Mechanics of Biostructures class is designed to give them a better understanding of the body鈥檚 structures.

College of Medicine faculty members Drs. Mohtashem Samsam and Robert Steward lecture the students on basic anatomy. Then the students have seven four-hour lab sessions with Dr. Daniel Topping, assistant professor of family medicine and anatomy. In the lab, the future biomedical engineers examine the musculoskeletal structure of cadavers 鈥� persons who have donated their bodies to help train medical students.

鈥淲e take them through various body systems including the lungs and chest cavity, spine and back, and the upper and lower extremities,鈥� explained Topping. 鈥淭he lab runs concurrently with the anatomy class for our first-year medical students and so the students are not required to do dissections as much of the work has already been done by the medical students. But they are able to touch and feel and we pay special attention to cadavers that are found to have medical devices or prosthetics. We鈥檝e had donors with breast implants, hip replacements and a pacemaker.鈥�

鈥淚t really humanizes the experiences when you鈥檙e seeing the body intact and as a whole system rather than just parts,鈥� said student Katherine McGrane. 鈥淲e learn so much from physically seeing and touching these innermost components that we鈥檙e used to seeing only in drawings. This give us a lot more insight on how we will go forward and design better medical implants and treatments.鈥�

Program director and 麻豆原创 engineering professor, Dr. Alain Kassab said the collaboration provides an indispensable experience for the future biomedical engineers.

鈥淔or students that are working on cardiovascular flow, for example, it鈥檚 the first time they have seen what an aorta looks like in terms of the structure, the lumen and the actual geometry of these vessels,鈥� he said. 鈥淪o this will make them better modelers and better at providing solutions for medical problems.鈥�

Kassab said he is motivated by the feedback he has received from faculty and students involved in the joint program. 鈥淭here are a lot of BME programs that don鈥檛 offer such an opportunity and we think that we鈥檝e got something that鈥檚 very unique,鈥� Dr. Kassab said. 鈥淭his collaboration between the College of Medicine and the College of Engineering certainly builds bridges and we are looking forward to expanding this relationship in terms of pedagogical developments and research.鈥�