Transcript

Dissection Horror Stories - Halloween Episode

From The BMJ · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 34 min · 5,551 words · 55 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "Dissection Horror Stories - Halloween Episode", an episode of The BMJ published October 31, 2025 (34 min, about 5,551 words). It mentions 16 people, works and ideas, including Za Khan, Dr. Jennifer Wallace, Burke and Hare, Robert Knox, 1832 Anatomy Act.

What this episode is about

This Halloween special explores dissection horror stories shared by medical students and experts, highlighting both unsettling experiences and the historical context of human dissection in medical education. The discussion also addresses the ethical implications surrounding the treatment of cadavers and the importance of respect within the learning environment.

Key takeaways

  • Dissection horror stories remind us that respect for the deceased is the real anatomy lesson.
  • Not all dissection tales are grim; some schools prioritize ethical treatment, humanizing the experience.
  • Even 19th-century medical students knew mischief, but pranking with body parts is a slippery slope.
  • Jeremy Bentham's wish to be dissected turned macabre when his head became a student joke—a morbid twist on legacy.
  • Medical empathy clashes with desensitization; balancing professionalism and humanity is the true challenge for future doctors.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 5:00: UCL, Dr. Jennifer Wallace, Za Khan, University of St Andrews
  2. – 10:00: Helen McDonald, Robert Knox, Burial Grounds, Gary Patterson
  3. – 15:00: Burke and Hare, 1832 Anatomy Act, Robert Knox, William Burke
  4. – 20:00: Robert Knox, William Burke, 1832 Anatomy Act, Burial Grounds
  5. – 25:00: University of St Andrews
  6. – 30:00: Burial Grounds
  7. – 33:49: BMJ

Notable quotes from "Dissection Horror Stories - Halloween Episode"

  • You and I'm really excited to introduce our expert guest today, Dr. Jennifer Wallace. hello. I'm Jen. I'm a medical humanities senior teaching fellow and a lecturer in the…
    about Dr. Jennifer Wallace · at
  • Or heads from dissection rooms and using them to play pranks on one another. There's a famous story of a student in the 19th century putting a leg down a chimney. There are…
    about Jeremy Bentham · at
  • Well where he thought that people should be useful to society. And this law allowed for the fact that if you died in a public institution like a workhouse or an asylum or a…
    about 1832 Anatomy Act · at
  • It's interesting, isn't it, that we things like the case of Burke and Hair. So, William Burke and William Hair were really famous Edinburgh body snatchers who were supplying…
    about Burke and Hare · at
  • Interestingly, Robert Knox, the anatomist, is never formally punished, although I think people did see him as being complicit in this and he moves away from Edinburgh, he goes to London.
    about Robert Knox · at
  • Andrews primarily because of how strong their dissection department is. I think St. Andrews and Oxbridge are the only institutions now that can provide such comprehensive dissection teaching because kadaavas are so limited. And so.
    about University of St Andrews · at
  • Body snatchers because they knew that they would be I can't think of a better term. They would be fresher bodies to sell to the anatomist. So they were more vulnerable.
    about Burial Grounds · at
  • Social media. We are B&J student on all sites except Tik Tok where we are sharp scratch pod. Until then stay sharp. I've been your host Zakon and I'll catch you next time. Bye.
    about Za Khan · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Za Khan — Person · Host · 1 mention · first at
    Hosts the Sharp Scratch Halloween special, frames the discussion on dissection ethics and history, and moderates the guest and co-host.
  • Dr. Jennifer Wallace — Person · Main guest (expert) · 1 mention · first at
    Provides historical and ethical context on dissection, body-snatching, the Anatomy Act 1832, and exploitation of vulnerable bodies (class and race).
  • Robert Knox — Person · Referenced historical figure (anatomist; case study) · 4 mentions · first at
    Central historical example illustrating unethical anatomy practices: received bodies from Burke and Hare; preserved and eroticized Mary Patterson; avoided formal punishment.
  • William Burke — Person · Referenced historical figure (criminal; case study) · 3 mentions · first at
    One of the Burke-and-Hare murderers who killed vulnerable people to sell bodies for dissection; executed and dissected publicly, influencing debate leading to the Anatomy Act 1832.
    It's interesting, isn't it, that we things like the case of Burke and Hair. So, William Burke and William Hair were really famous Edinburgh body snatchers who were supplying…
  • Jeremy Bentham — Person · Referenced historical figure (philosopher; ethics exemplar) · 2 mentions · first at
    Used to discuss consent, display, and student pranks: Bentham supported dissection and requested public dissection and display; UCL students repeatedly stole his preserved head.
  • Gary Patterson — Person · Referenced victim (historical case) · 1 mention · first at
    An 18-year-old woman whose body was supplied to Robert Knox; her treatment (preservation, eroticized sketch) is used to illustrate exploitation of vulnerable people in dissection history.
    And he receives the body of an 18year-old woman called Mary Patterson in 1828 who was believed to have been a sex worker who was murdered by two men who were murdering people to sell bodies to anatomy schools. we might come on to them.
  • William Hare — Person · Referenced historical figure (criminal; case study) · 1 mention · first at
    Partner to William Burke in murdering people to sell bodies to anatomists; escaped punishment, highlighting uneven accountability compared with Burke.
    It's interesting, isn't it, that we things like the case of Burke and Hair. So, William Burke and William Hair were really famous Edinburgh body snatchers who were supplying…
  • Helen McDonald — Person · Referenced author (recommended reading) · 3 mentions · first at
    Cited as author of a recommended book on dissection history; her work provides the Mary Patterson/Robert Knox case and analysis of vulnerability and exploitation.
    Make really clear how dissection has been most practiced on particularly vulnerable bodies. So there's a brilliant book that I really recommend by Helen McDonald called human…

Books & papers

  • A Tale of Two Cities — Book · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a literary reference to the historical context of body snatching.
    That sounds very densient, but I didn't realize I guess I did a tale of two cities. I chose it for my coursework in like six form and I thought it was a part of the story and…

Companies & orgs

  • University of St Andrews — Company · Case study · 2 mentions · first at
    Highlighted for its comprehensive and ethical approach to dissection teaching.
  • UCL — Company · Referenced institution · 2 mentions · first at
    Mentioned in the context of historical medical practices and the display of Jeremy Bentham's body.
    And apparently UCL had to eventually lock this away and replace it with a wax head because students kept stealing it to play jokes on one another. And I guess something like…
  • Imperial — Company · Affiliation · 1 mention · first at
    Affiliation of the expert guest, Dr. Jennifer Wallace, providing historical context on dissection.
    You and I'm really excited to introduce our expert guest today, Dr. Jennifer Wallace. hello. I'm Jen. I'm a medical humanities senior teaching fellow and a lecturer in the…

Concepts & topics

  • 1832 Anatomy Act — Concept · Key argument · 2 mentions · first at
    Discussed as a pivotal law that changed the supply of bodies for dissection, targeting the poor.
  • Burial Grounds — Concept · Key argument · 3 mentions · first at
    Discussed in the context of body snatching and the vulnerability of certain burial sites.

Places & events

  • Burke and Hare — Event · Core topic · 1 mention · first at
    Infamous case of body snatching and murder in 19th century Edinburgh, illustrating ethical failures in medical history.

Sponsors

  • BMJ — Company · Sponsor · 2 mentions · first at
    The publisher of the podcast, providing a platform for medical education discussions.
    Hello and welcome to or welcome back to Sharp Scratch. This is a podcast brought to you by the BMJ where medical students, resident doctors, and expert guests come together to talk about the things that we need to know to.

Full transcript with timestamps

Hello and welcome to or welcome back to Sharp Scratch. This is a podcast brought to you by the BMJ where medical students, resident doctors, and expert guests come together to talk about the things that we need to know to be good doctors but might not get taught at medical school. I'm your host Za Khan, a medical student in London and this year the editorial scholar running BMJ Student. Today's episode is our Halloween special looking at dissection horror stories and I'm excited to introduce to you the people who we have on today. Hi, I'm Anna and I'm also a medical student from London.

Thank you. We're really excited to have you and I'm really excited to introduce our expert guest today, uh, Dr. Jennifer Wallace. Uh, hello. I'm Jen. I'm a medical humanities senior teaching fellow and a lecturer in the history of science and medicine at Imperial. Um I'm primarily a historian of psychiatry in the 19th century. Very excited to have you all today if you couldn't tell. Um today is also a special episode cuz this will be coming out on Halloween. So I hope you're feeling spooky. to set the tone. I guess today's episode is on dissection horror stories. So, we're going to take you through some experiences that we've had or heard about dissection today and then take you through the history of it, too. To begin, I was going to share a story um about something that I've heard happen in dissection. So it was actually last year um during one of our sessions on the ethics of human bodies and that kind

of thing, someone else in the class shared that during their first dissection, there was a student who put their hands inside the cadaavver, picked up the lung and threw it across the room. Luckily, they were kicked out of medical school and I think blacklisted from joining any others. Um, but I think things like this are quite important to think about cuz it might have felt like a joke or something silly then, but this kind of idea of dehumanizing this person who was a human just because they're in this state. I was wondering, Anna, whether you had any stories about dissection horror stories or things you've heard go wrong.

Um, so I've actually had a super positive experience doing dissection. I went to the University of St. Andrews. We did dissection every single week for 3 years and the expectations in terms of ethics and treating all of our kadaavas with dignity was made extremely clear throughout every single year. So I haven't really had any horror stories. Well, that makes me really happy to hear. I was going to ask Jen, I know that your background is more in the history behind this rather than dissection today. I was wondering whether positive or negative experiences come to mind historically for you.

Well, I think there's quite a lot of um of stories, anecdotes from the past about students misbehaving with body parts. So, there are stories of students uh borrowing, shall we say, arms or legs or heads from dissection rooms and uh using them to play pranks on one another. There's a famous story of a student in the 19th century putting a leg down a chimney. There are students stealing bodies to to scare their landladies uh and things like this. In a way, I guess maybe it was a a way of coping with something that was quite difficult and quite unusual, but obviously um very problematic. Um, anyone who is uh familiar with UCL as a student or a visitor, when they're going around the corridors there, they may have seen a box with a an an effigy like figure of Jeremy Bentham, who was a utilitarian philosopher in the 19th century. And he was really interesting because he was very pro- dissection. He

thought that more people should be dissected. And so when he died, he had decreed that he would be dissected publicly and he wanted his body to then be displayed. I mean, it's only his his skeleton covered in his clothes and and straw and things. But for a time, his preserved head was with him in this box. And apparently UCL had to eventually uh lock this away and replace it with a wax head because students kept stealing it to to play jokes on one another. And I guess something like this almost feels comical, but at the end of the day, this is a man who like has donated his body.

I guess even though it's on display, is it right to be playing around the with these things? And I guess what you were saying about it being a way of coping is quite interesting because I think it's I don't know if Anna if you found this as well, but I feel like at medical school there's a lot of times where of course we're taught to be empathetic and caring, but there's a lot of like make sure you kind of separate yourself or have that professional distance. and you sort of try your best to desensitize yourself in certain ways so that you're not like emotional and crying during an encounter with a patient which wouldn't be helpful for them. But I guess is this taking it a step too far if you're not like um respecting the rights of these people? Anna, I was interested in you said that your medical school emphasized the importance of looking after and like showing dignity. How did they do that?

Um, so the expectations in how we were expected to behave was always made incredibly clear and where possible we were provided with a document that detailed the person's medical history and their life. So I learned about this person's hobbies, what was important to them. And you could never forget that this person had made a big sacrifice for my education and that was really nice cuz it really humanized um all of our cadaavvers.

That's really nice. I think my experience was slightly similar. We had like a piece of paper on each section and it kind of did have like their like you saying like their hobbies and what they were interested in, what they were like and I think we had like a minute silence or something before our first dissection to kind of think about them as a person and like sort of like thank them internally for doing this. Um I've heard some other interesting ones. I think again last year during our classes I think up north in some medical schools they do like memorial services once a year. So it's like a proper day where they invite like families um or people who are related to the donors um and the medical students and it's kind of like commemorating this donation that they've made and I thought that was really sweet. Um I think also the medical students are expected to like write up a reflection or something based on it.

Yeah. So, I thought that was quite interesting. But here we're talking about people who have chosen to donate their bodies to science. Would you say that that was always the case, Jan?

Uh, definitely not is the easy answer to that. And I think it's really striking listening to to Anna's example about knowing um all those things about the donor that you're dissecting is a huge contrast to the situation in the 19th century for instance where the bodies that were dissected would tend to be people who perhaps were criminals and had been executed and then part of their their sentencing would to be dissected as well. um kind of a a double punishment if you like. And when that stops because there's actually there's so many medical schools, there's so many medical students, there's not enough people being executed to meet that supply.

And so this is where you begin to see body snatching appearing. Um which is essentially people digging up um fairly fresh graves and selling the bodies to medical schools. And many of those would have been um anonymous to the students who were dissecting them. But they would also tend to be uh the more the poorer members of society because they had been buried in

less secure burial grounds for instance. That sounds very densient, but I didn't realize I guess I did um a tale of two cities. I chose it for my coursework in like six form and I thought it was a part of the story and then I was like looking behind the history and I was like oh wait this was actually happening and it's not that long ago if you think about it which is quite crazy. So the kind of examples that we mentioned earlier about students playing pranks with bits of bodies and things um they kind of invite a humorous response and it's really tempting to think about the history of dissection as being this spooky story that doesn't have much relevance today but there are cases that make really clear how dissection has been most practiced on particularly vulnerable bodies. So there's a brilliant book that I really recommend by Helen McDonald called human remains about the history of dissection and I

use this a lot in teaching and in this she talks about one case that's especially troubling that's connected with a 19th century anatomist in Edinburgh called Robert Knox

and he receives uh the body of an 18year-old woman uh called Mary Patterson in 1828 who was believed to have been a sex worker who was murdered murdered by two men who were murdering people to sell bodies to anatomy schools. Um, we might come on to them later. They were very um famous. And Nox uh preserved her body in alcohol for several months. He brought an artist in to the morttery to sketch her because he thought she was so beautiful. And that sketch still exists and Helen McDonald reproduces it in her book. And it's it's incredibly unsettling because it's very eroticized.

um a very eroticized picture of the body of a woman who had only a few hours before that, probably still being alive actually. Um and it's a very weird case that is a perfect illustration of how the most vulnerable people in society at the time tended to be the ones uh very much in contrast to what Anna said about people choosing to donate their bodies where people didn't have that choice.

It's always a man that's the problem. Um I think that's really interesting though because it's almost like what role does your body have and does it belong to you which was something that we thought about a lot even in death or after death it's like does it belong to you should it or whose property does it become

and that's very affected by the social and cultural and political context of the time as well. So in the 19th century you have something called the 1832 anatomy act

which changes the law. It basically tries to increase the supply of bodies legally so that people are not snatching so many bodies out of graveyards. And but what that did was something that Jeremy Bentham had had been behind as well where he thought that people should be useful to society. And this law uh allowed for the fact that if you died in a public institution like a workhouse or an asylum or a public hospital and your family or friends didn't claim your body, then your body could rightfully be sent to the anatomist. That almost reminds me of like the changes that were made to um like the organ donation rules now in terms of like opting out rather than opting in. And I guess this idea of bodies having a use whether it's enough to just be alive and exist or every part of you has to somehow be of service to somebody else in some sense. I don't know if there was like would you say that that act was that what caused that

shift or do you think that's an attitude that was had before? I think some people had that attitude and actually that act is very badly received by many people as well because they see quite clearly that it targets the poorer members of society and it comes around the same time that you had other legislation that was also um kind of trying to to control or make useful the poorer members of society. And so it wasn't necessarily uh wellreceived. It also doesn't have a massive immediate impact because of course you don't actually have the uh facilities to go and check that every med medical medical school is getting their bodies from the proper place and um underhand kind of transactions still went on

but I guess thinking of the present day what impact do you think these stories that we've had has today do have they made changes to how we see people or see people's bodies even after death today or do you think we have quite similar views? Well,

it's interesting, isn't it, that we things like um the case of Burke and Hair. So, William Burke and William Hair were really famous Edinburgh body snatchers who were supplying bodies to Robert Knox, the anatomist,

and they have become almost figures of fun in history. There's a a film about them that's kind of pitched as a comedy, which I find quite troubling. Um, so they are almost these Halloweeny spooky figures that that are a bit of a joke, but really if we break down what they were doing, it's pretty horrendous. And so I think there's a degree to which the passage of time makes us not see things as seriously. Um, at the same time, we often look back at the 19th century and dissection and medical practice and say, "Oh, well that's terrible. We would never do anything like that today. How barbaric. what a terrible attitude they had in the past. They didn't know anything. But we always have to realize that this is historically contingent and things change and there may well be practices that we engage in now that in a hundred years are going to be criticized. Mhm.

So, I guess it's really important for us to keep not questioning ourselves with doubt, but just making sure that we're trying to act in a way with integrity at all times and kind of hold ourselves accountable for things.

Yeah. Jen, so you were mentioning the story of um Burkinhair. Um I'm not actually familiar with the story, so could you share with us?

I can. So, this was a major scandal in Edinburgh in the 19th century. So, um, a bit of context to this is that in the 1820s, there was a lot of discussion about there needing to be more bodies for dissection cuz there's not enough at the time. And so, in 1829, uh, a bill is put forward that would allow anatomists to have the bodies of people who are unclaimed and who have died in places like workhouses. And that was a really important bill and it was much debated. But interestingly, the reason it is then delayed is because of the case of William Burke and William Hair who had begun um serving anatomists in Edinburgh by digging up bodies, but they decided that it might perhaps be easier uh more lucrative to murder people instead, so you didn't actually have to bother with the digging people up. And so they went around the streets of Edinburgh in the 1820s, uh, picking up people in the streets or in pubs,

often people who are homeless perhaps or vulnerable in some way, taking them home, smothering them, and then taking their body to the anatomists. And between 1827 and 1828, it's thought that they killed at least 16 people this way. and Robert Knox, the anatomist, a very eminent anatomist, was actually a key customer, you might say, of theirs. Um, when this is all found out, William Burke is sentenced to death and he has quite a fitting punishment in that he is also dissected and his body is publicly displayed in Edinburgh uh medical school as well and it's still there today.

William Hair manages to escape. Interestingly, Robert Knox, the anatomist, is never formally punished,

although I think people did see him as being complicit in this and he moves away from Edinburgh, he goes to London and sets himself up there instead. Um, so he he doesn't quite get away scot-free. But that bill that I mentioned where in 1829 they were trying to to increase the supply of bodies, the Burke Hair trial just interrupts that. And it's not then until 1832 after the Burkenhair trial has um concluded that that bill finally goes through and becomes the 1832 anatomy act. And this is what massively increases the supply of bodies and is intended to reduce the body snatching.

That's horrible. Um and I think it's more shocking to me that Robert Nox got away with it. Um cuz I mean I I I see obviously why what Burke and Head were doing was immoral, but I feel like Nox should be someone who's morally responsible for things like this. And I feel like there should be ethical clearance, I guess. I don't know if that's something that they did back in the day, but I imagine and I hope that they do. Now,

the ethical side of bodies for dissection in the 19th century is very murky. And so I think although we don't always have evidence that anatomists knew for sure where things were coming from, um it can't be that they were all ignorant of where these bodies were coming from.

We've been talking a lot about kind of the Victorian time and what's been happening over here. But would you say that this is exclusively something that happened in Britain or do you think it's happened elsewhere? Well, there's lots of interesting work about America in the 19th century. And whereas here, um, it's really social class that defines who is most vulnerable to being dissected against their will. As you can imagine, in America, race is a very prominent issue that shapes dissection practices. So in America in the 19th century, the bodies of black populations were much more vulnerable to than the white population to being dissected. Um, in many ways, it's for similar reasons in that um, black populations were buried in less secure graveyards, uh, sometimes in in very kind of shoddy burial grounds that were easy to to take bodies from. But of course, there's also that very open objectification of black bodies in an

era when slavery was still uh rife. And under that logic, if you accepted the idea that black slave bodies were the property of their white masters, it made sense to those people that those bodies also belong to them after death as well. And if you look through periodicals and journals of the time, you you can come across very um disturbing and very blatant requests from medical schools and doctors for slave owners to send their ill or their dying slaves to them with the idea that they will eventually be dissected. Has there been a change in I mean of course there's been a change then but was there a pivotal moment that caused a difference in it cuz I suppose the practices really reflect the kind of social norms and expectations at the time. So was it when slavery was abolished that things changed or was it more of a gradual kind of shift? My sense is that it's more gradual because if you if you look even into the 20th

century at the way that black bodies, both living and dead, have been treated by medicine,

it is still hugely problematic. Um, one of the the most famous cases of um a heart transplant in America um which was really lorded in the press has been this fantastic new boundary being being passed in medicine. the donor, and I use that in heavy inverted commas, was a black man who had had um a fall uh a head injury, uh just an [clears throat] accident in the street, had been brought to the hospital, and even though he had his family's contact details on him, they were not contacted. and he was seen by many of the staff there as an apt candidate

to donate his heart to a white man. And that is another case where yes, it may not be the period of slavery. We may have gone into, you know, the era of civil rights, but many of those attitudes, especially in southern hospitals, still persisted.

Mhm. I guess it's kind of like this idea of autonomy and bodily autonomy. I I'd like to think that we have more respect for people today in terms of you being able to choose what happens to you in life and after death, but um yeah, I don't know. I guess it's really shocking cuz again, this isn't very long ago. I guess it's important to think about I want to say sacrifices but I suppose they didn't make these choices but um these situations that have happened and I guess what we were able to learn from them um from these cases today I suppose they naturally must have shaped how we understand medical practice. I guess it's interesting thinking about whether it is ethical in the way that we learn things um from bodies. But I was wondering Anna if you had any any modernday examples of where this might happen.

Yeah. So I did some of my clinical training in the US and one afternoon a surgical medtech company came in and they were providing limbs for the orthopedic surgeons to try out their surgical equipment and I have quite complicated feelings about this. Seeing bodies used for purely um commercial gain doesn't sit right with me. On the other hand, a lot of my experience with cadaavvers has been incredibly positive. I elected to go to the University of St. Andrews primarily because of how strong their dissection department is. I think St. Andrews and Oxbridge are the only institutions now that can provide such comprehensive dissection teaching because kadaavas are so limited. And so my experience in medical school was really contrasted with the experiences I've had seeing it used commercially.

Um I was wondering, Jen, nowadays is there still quite a large practice for um cadaavvers and bodies being used um for commercial gain in industry?

It's an interesting question. I think a lot of it might not be um advertised very openly because people don't necessarily want the public to know that they are testing or refining things like cosmetic surgery on cadaavvers. It's interesting thinking about autonomy that Zena raised earlier because we we assume if we leave our body to science that it's going to be used in a particular way and I think most of us would assume it's going to be laid out on a table for medical students to learn from. whereas you know there there are cases of people discovering that their relatives bodies have been sent to be involved in cadaavver studies uh for car crashes and so on which is is understandably very upsetting. So how far we're able to to square that um individual wish of what might happen because everybody might also have very different views about what is acceptable to do with their body after death as well. Some people may,

you know, not feel that connection that that some of us do, but squaring that individual desire with the the medical industrial complex, if you like, is always going to be really difficult for somebody that might be interested in donating their body to science. Is this a nationalized process or is it done on a more institutionalized basis? I believe it's more of a I may have to defer to Zena on this. I mean, we have organ donation cards in this country which is slightly different. Um I feel like it's more um institutional. I think often when at least in my experience in like London um medical schools often like the bodies that are donated are from people who probably worked in research at that institution. So they feel like a strong sense of passion towards like furthering scientific research at that place. Um or often like family members who perhaps were saved by medical professionals who may be trained

at that place and they feel like a sense of gratitude. So they want to give back in their own way. Um I don't have statistics to back that up but from my experience that's I think what I see. Something else, Jen, that you brought up though that I found quite interesting was like the cultural aspect of it in terms of how different people might view death or like what happens to their body afterwards. I guess in a lot of cultures, death might be viewed more differently. For example, I'm Muslim and in our religion after we die, we want the person to be buried as soon as possible because there's a belief that the body will still feel pain. I mean, I suppose there wasn't that taken into account back in the day, but do you think that's something that is appreciated more? Perhaps there was some appreciation of these kind of cultural differences. Not to say that they were necessarily always respected, but people

understood that they existed. So, in the 19th century, one of the groups that were also seen as being peculiarly vulnerable was um Jewish people because they also have this requirement of being buried fairly quickly after death. And so that made them very vulnerable to body snatchers because they knew that they would be I can't think of a better term. They would be fresher bodies to sell to the anatomist. So they were more vulnerable.

I think now people have more maybe individualized ideas as well about these kind of things. There's an incredibly interesting article by Brunwin Perry who writes about biological material on slides and she especially talks about the older hair scandal in the 1990s when parents found out that parts of their children who had died at uh a children's hospital in Liverpool had been kept without their knowledge. And when they try to recover those specimens, some of them find that what the specimen amounts to is a box of glass slides with fluid or tissue on the slides.

But she talks really interestingly in her article about how some parents nevertheless saw that as incredibly important like fragments of the body because they were still as much part of their child as maybe an arm or a leg had had been. And so I think it's really difficult to make assumptions now about how we all see our own bodily property, especially in this era of very technologized medicine where

you could have something like a cell line that then becomes kind of incorporated into the industrialized side of medicine and is patented perhaps from somebody's genetic material. And then does that alter how you feel about that genetic material?

I think that's interesting then cuz like for example with the slides or in terms of like cell lines, do we consider something to be a part of someone's body if we it can recognize it as their own? Um or is any material as a part of their body a part of who they are? This is what um Brunwin Perry talks about in the article where she she says why does it make it any less part of your body because it's been processed

in some way. And that was the argument about the slides and that to the parents it didn't matter that this was like a product of a laboratory environment and it had gone through different stages to what was on the slides. At the heart of it many of them still saw that this was part of their childhood. Mhm. I think something that we can take away um me and Anna I mean and like medical students and the listeners who are viewing in today it's that I suppose when we think of clinical practice um or even donor bodies and things like that.

I think it's important to view it as a privilege to have the chance to talk to these people or be able to learn from their bodies. I think sometimes when we talk about these past anatomists or doctors who behaved in this way, it kind of gives me this idea of like a god complex almost like in terms of like a doctor house kind of way where I know how to fix this broken patient. Um, and therefore I have the right to treat them however I want. It doesn't matter if I'm a horrible person because I'm good at my job. Um, but I think something that's really important for us to remember is that these are people whether they're alive or not. They were people. um and that there's honor in what we are doing and we should be able to honor them and the sacrifices or donations or in some cases in the past that weren't willingly taken. Um but I don't know just like taking that time like I love I know what

your medical school did in terms of um thinking about them and their hobbies rather than just like their biological makeup to think about how it influences our clinical practice. Another thing I really liked about my medical school is they really stressed that you needed to show up to every dissection really prepared. You're expected to know exactly what you were meant to do, know all of your anatomy because the resource we were about to use is incredibly precious. And so out of respect to your donor, you expected to get the most you could possibly get out of this experience from an academic standpoint to honor the sacrifice they had made.

You need to get as much as you can out of that dissection. And I really like that outlook.

Yeah, I think I definitely agree with that. And I feel like in terms of training to be doctors, it's kind of like it's important to keep that in mind what you're doing in the bigger picture. um and the respect that you show through along every step to get to the outcome.

Jen, do you think it's important that nowadays medical students are taught about the history behind dissection and types of research?

I do think that's really important. And one thing that strikes me when I do um teach medical students in particular is that many of them when they hear about things like the history of dissection or other famous experiments like those that were done during the Cold War, many of which were very unethical. Is that they say to me, I don't understand why we didn't know this. I don't understand why we've not been taught this. because it is as much as all those lovely success stories and stories about famous surgeons and famous doctors and big discoveries. It's as much part of that history and the history of medicine is a history of failures as well as successes and and that's what has made it what it is now. I think even in terms of further improvement in the future, rosewashing history isn't helpful because like you're saying, understanding these failures are important and that's how we can make changes today.

I think that's all that we have time for today. I hope that you were able to learn something and have some reflection points to take away thinking about how you practice clinically in the future. I'd like to thank Jen for coming on this episode. I've learned a lot and I've enjoyed the time with you. Um, and thank you Anna for such brilliant questions, too. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure you subscribe um, wherever you get your podcast and so that you don't miss an episode. We upload every 2 weeks. Um, follow BMJ Student on all the social media. We are B&J student on all sites except Tik Tok where we are sharp scratch pod. Until then stay sharp. I've been your host Zakon and I'll catch you next time. Bye.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "Dissection Horror Stories - Halloween Episode"?

Za Khan (Host), Anna (Guest), Dr. Jennifer Wallace (Guest).

What is "Dissection Horror Stories - Halloween Episode" about?

This Halloween special explores dissection horror stories shared by medical students and experts, highlighting both unsettling experiences and the historical context of human dissection in medical education. The discussion also addresses the ethical implications surrounding the treatment of cadavers and the importance of respect within the learning environment.

What is mentioned in this The BMJ episode?

16 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Za Khan, Dr. Jennifer Wallace, Burke and Hare, Robert Knox, 1832 Anatomy Act, William Burke. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Dissection Horror Stories - Halloween Episode"?

The episode runs 34 min; the transcript is about 5,551 words in 55 timestamped sections.

More from The BMJ

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated January 24, 2026.