Would you donate your body to science?

[Balloondog]

Just pondering this as I update my will. I've been on the organ donor list since I was 18 and I understand you can only donate your body to science as a cadaver if you have not had any organs used for donation (or if you've had a post-mortem) so chances are it won't happen anyway but I'd like it to be an option.

DH thinks I'm out of my mind and can't think of anything worse (though he won't even consider cremation over burial as he thinks it's unnatural so I probably could have seen that coming!).

So would you donate your body to science or do you find the idea too strange?

I’ve signed up to this at my local medical school. I have no religious beliefs and and if my remains can further medical science in any way, meaning a benefit for somebody else, then I am all for it.

When I began to look into it, you can also donate your brain to Parkinson’s disease research after death (but cannot do both together).

I’d like them to use my organs if they can, but if not I am more than happy for my body to be used for research. It’s not like I’m going to need it.

I've completed the paper work to do this. There are a lot of caveats. For instance if I die over a bank holiday, have to have an autopsy, died of a communicable disease, or they have too many bodies anyway, it's not on.

I'm on the donor register, but I'm getting on a bit !! No one would want my eyes, my lungs are shot to pieces, my skin is shocking and I fully intend to destroy my liver and kidneys with an excess of good wine before I go. So I'm happy for this vessel of a body to go to aspiring surgeons to practice on.

They have to start somewhere don't they?

My DF is leaving his brain for Alzheimers research. Apparently they will only take his brain but not the rest of him. Not sure how I'm going to sort that out when the time comes.

Maybe if I could be sure I wouldn't get dissected by medical students. I knew a few of them at university and they were pretty indiscreet and uncomplimentary about their anatomy class cadavers! For some reason I always felt offended on their behalf, even though they're dead and don't care.

I didn't know you could leave your brain to places... I have the gene for HD (non-symptomatic) and am fairly linked up to the local hosp/uni as I do quite a bit of research for them already. I may well have a word with them...

Nope, and I say this as someone who obviously benefited from it at medical school. Cadavers were always treated with the utmost respect, you never forgot that they were once living people that were someone’ mum/son/brother etc but there were a few things that would sway me towards not doing it.

I just came on to MN after googling this!!

Dh mentioned it the other day and I just remembered to google it, as I said I had heard they were quite fussy about who they would take!

for Scotland

and those all important FAQs :o

I might do this too...if they will have me.

I was just thinking about this the other day, I would like to donate my body to research into fibromyalgia, I have this and would love to help find out what it is and a cure.

I watched a very interesting programme about this a couple or so years back, two people in very different circumstances both left their bodies to medical science.

One was a nurse who had cancer and was sadly terminal. Her body was used for trainee surgeons to practise on, the other persons body was used for medical students studying anatomy.

It was all handled very respectfully, the families held a memorial service and then later their bodies will be given back for a funeral. The university also held a service which the families were invited too, that mentioned the names of the people donated etc.

I'm planning to if it's needed. I think it's a great idea and it's nice to think you can still be of use even afer you've shuffled off this mortal coil!

I know you are treated very respectfully and there are instances where the students write letters to the donor or the donors family. Such a lovely gesture.

Just FYI, my DH died recently, and as he was a passionate scientist, I tried to donate his body to science. We are in Oz and sadly they would not take it as we had lived in the UK in the 1980s. - potential issues with Creutzfeldt Jacob disease, the same reason that prevents me giving blood here. The same rules apply in several other countries apparently, just not in the UK, as that would massively deplete the the potential population of blood and body donors. It's a good thing to do though, so would definitely encourage those interested to sign up for it.

Yes, we've both signed up and have mentioned it in recent hospital stays, in the same breath as "do not resuscitate". One medical student said "thank you very much, and look at it this way, you'll get 2 funerals"!

My DM has completed the papers for this. IIRC it works a bit like this:

If she has to go into hospital (near end of life) then I must inform the hospital of her wish to leave her body. Then when she dies (I think) the hospital contact the body place and sort the handover. If she dies at home I need to contact them myself.
We, the family, can choose whether to have remains given back, says it might be 2 - 3 years, or whether the body place can just dispose of the remains and let us know where they are scattered.
Again, they will only take her if they have availability.

BUT, might be something to think about...

I read a book a while ago (American) about body donations to 'science' and some of these bodies were used for practicing cosmetic surgery, for using in car accident tests etc, it was definitely not all used for the medical reasons you might imagine.

Whilst I think it’s a lovely thing to do- I couldn’t. Nor would I want any of my loved ones to do it. Death has to be final and the funeral the time I let go, no matter how hard. I would need to have the loved one cremated as I couldn’t bear them still being in the world but not in my world. So the same with bells on would apply to their body. I could t walk around my everyday life knowing my loved ones body was still around. How could I? It might be incredibly selfish but no. Definitely not.

I would be happy to bring some amusement to the class. ....

A member of my family has done this within the past month. A few thoughts.

1. We have a medic in the family so we are 'aware' of what happens. The thought seems fine to me in theory but I was horrified and upset by the thought of someone I loved going through this process.
2. They died midweek and were accepted. We had not realised that they might not be accepted so having got used to the idea that we did not have to arrange much, we had a sleepless 24 hours suddenly thinking we would have to arrange things. Then they accepted the body and we were relieved again.
3. Everyone was lovely about my relative's decision except for one person who said "oh so they're going to be chopped up." That was hard to bear.
4. We will have a memorial service not a funeral, which is ok.
5. Apparently there will be a cremation of the remains so we may still have something to scatter.

So basically if you're going to do this, let your relatives know well in advance. It's a brilliant thing for science but as the relative I needed a lot of time to get my head around their decision and the knowledge of what would happen to their body which, though I know they no longer have a use for, I still felt an animalistic urge to protect.

I would. But it’s actually very difficult. You’ll only be accepted if you die on a week day. They want anatomically normal bodies so if you have a serious illness they don’t want you.

My mum had an extremely rare type of cancer - you’d think her body would be useful for research but no, nobody wanted her remains. Couldn’t even donate her corneas as she’d had laser eye surgery in the past. It made me incredibly sad as it was so important to her.

Organ donation is only viable if you happen to have become brain dead and are kept on life support I think? So fairly unlikely for most people.

@HoppingPavlova Could you elaborate on what are the things that would sway you not to donate your body based on your experience?

My grandmother did and my mother has also arranged to, if possible. The university my grandmother donated to holds a memorial service at the end of each year as thanks to those who donated that year

I wouldn't, but hey, if you chose to, why not?

I'd prefer to be an organ donor but if I couldn't do that then yes I'd leave it to science. I don't even want a funeral when I die, I hate them. I couldn't care less what they do with my body so it may as well do something useful.

balloondog, it’s a little hard to explain honestly. The experience with entire cadavers was positive on the whole. You had a person who you worked on as a group (we had 5 people) and week by week you progressed. A whole human lying there is easy to see as a human. However, one of our anatomy pracs was after lunch on a Friday. This prac often became a chore to ‘get through’ and to be honest was always rushed so we could start the weekend at the pub asap, I can’t think of one time we would have used the entire time for the prac on a Friday. I always imagine someone thinking they will have people carefully concentrating on what should be a valuable learning experience and while that was the case in the main, the Friday afternoon session was definitely let’s just get this over with as quickly as possible. I imagine that’s not what people were aiming for when they donated.

The other thing was body parts. At times we also used body parts rather than whole cadavers for certain things. Even though you were grateful someone donated to provide the opportunity for what you were doing there was sometimes a disconnect in regards to them being a person you didn’t have with whole cadavers. The poor lab technicians always had a time of it making sure parts were kept identified after dissection so remains could be reconciled etc. Also we often had body parts in exams so a part of some person sitting there with a few flags sticking out of them for a stressed student to identify in their 2minute station rotation or whatever it was, all a bit impersonal and I honestly can’t say in each station stop as you rotated around that you gave thought to anyone associated with the part, too stressed and rushed. Again, not sure that’s what some people imagined when they donated? All this was several decades ago, not at all recent so things may or may not have changed.