CADAVERS

helping people,” said Julia Skalyo, his sister. “It was his way to pay back (the medical staff’s) kindness to him.”

Bodies donated to science are used to help medical students and surgical residents practice surgical procedures. Surgeons and physicians also use the cadavers when developing new surgical procedures.

Spurred in part by high funeral costs, greater social awareness and dwindling observance of religious customs, body donation is on the rise across much of the United States.

Medcure, one of three national body donation organizations, reports a 36% increase in the past five years. Ohio State’s College of Medicine also has seen an uptick in fullbody donations, going from 192 in 2014 to 276 in 2018, university spokeswoman Serena

Smith said.

“Dissecting a human body is a superior way to learn anatomy,” said Joy Balta, director of Ohio State’s anatomical services and body donation program. “This is not something you can get from looking at a book. It’s not something you can get from a plastic model.”

Medical schools aren’t the only ones who use donated cadavers. On a recent Friday afternoon at Ohiohealth Doctors

Hospital, a group of first-year surgical residents from Ohiohealth, Mount Carmel Health System and OSU’S Wexner Medical Center practiced below-theknee amputations on cadavers.

Ohiohealth receives full-body donations from Science Care, a Phoenix-based whole body donation company and nontransplant tissue bank. Ohiohealth’s surgical residents complete more than 150 different procedures on the cadavers each year, spokesman Marcus Thorpe said.

“You don’t want anyone’s first time to be on a real patient, so that’s where the cadavers come in handy here,” said Dr. Charles Pugar, a vascular surgeon at Ohiohealth who led the cadaver session.

Dr. Matthew Glazier and Dr. Braden Passias, both first-year orthopedic surgical residents at Ohiohealth, carefully mapped out their incisions before cutting through skin, muscle, nerves, tendons and, eventually, bone.

The residents said they were grateful for the opportunity.

“You treat everything with respect and just realize that it’s a special opportunity we have to be able to work in this situation instead of just reading out of a textbook,” Glazier said. “It’s a huge blessing to have the opportunity.”

Working with cadavers not only teaches medical students and surgical residents about anatomy, but also how to treat bodies with professionalism.

“This is a real person, and they had a full life and they had a family, they had friends, people who love them and care about them,” said Kyleigh Depetro, a second-year medical student at Ohio State. “Being able to see their body in the way that we do gives us a lot of context for what it means to work with real patients.”

The 25-year-old Los Angeles native hopes to go into the neurological field and remembers how excited she was to work with a cadaver for the first time.

“I just remember feeling so thankful these individuals trust us and care enough about our education to be able to use the intimate part of what made them human to become the best professionals we can be,” she said.

People who are interested in donating their bodies to science to OSU’S College of Medicine can fill out a legally binding form. After their death, their family can call the university’s Body Donation Program to make arrangements.

However, not everyone can donate their body to science, and final acceptance isn’t determined until a donor’s time of death. Restrictions include if someone had a contagious disease such as HIV or severe trauma such as a recent surgery.

OSU usually keeps donated cadavers for about two years. After use, cadavers are cremated at no cost to the family. The cremated remains are either returned to the donor’s family or placed in a crypt in the mausoleum at the Silent Home Cemetery in Reynoldsburg.

The remains of Skalyo’s brother are at Silent Home. Skalyo, 82, of Long Island, New York, said she and her family had the opportunity to ask Ohio State about how Long’s body was used in the classroom but didn’t have any questions.

She said her brother’s donation to science helped give her closure. OSU’S College of Medicine puts on a yearly memorial service for those who donated their bodies to science, and Skalyo fondly remembers attending the service for her brother and others in August 2018.

“It was an absolutely beautiful, uplifting and meaningful ceremony,” Skalyo said. “It was a beautiful way to say goodbye.”