In anatomy blessing ceremony, first-year medical students honor silent donors
October 18, 2024
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On a Tuesday morning in late September, approximately 170 first-year students at the Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine filed down to the lower level of the Cuneo Center and into the anatomy laboratory on the Health Sciences Campus (HSC). Twelve silver dissection tables lined three walls of the brightly lit room; along the fourth wall, a simple sanctuary had been set.
Just eight weeks into medical school, the students were there to begin a 12-week course called Structure of the Human Body, more commonly known as gross anatomy. That’s where they, “learn the entire human body,” says Eva Murdoch (PhD ’09), associate professor and assistant director of the anatomy course. “The goal is to become as familiar as possible with the human body and to be able to form relationships between the systems and how the systems work together to keep a body alive.”
The students learn by dissecting donated human bodies, a first for most of them. “When they first look at a deceased human body, it’s unnerving for a lot of people,” says Professor and Course Director Robert Frysztak (PhD ’90) who has been teaching at Stritch for 11 years. He also sits on the board of the Anatomical Gift Association of Illinois, an organization of medical schools that gathers donations for medical and scientific study.
“Going into the anatomy lab for the first time was very difficult, actually,” says second-year medical student Kiana King, who took the anatomy course last year.
To support students, Dr. F, as Professor Frysztak is called, says HSC Ministry is invited to the lab on the first couple of days, “just to help get through the uneasiness that’s associated with doing this.”
For at least 25 years, the HSC Ministry team has partnered with faculty and students for an official blessing ceremony at the beginning and end of the course. Other medical schools around the Chicago area and across the country have similar programs.
“We call it the Anatomy Course Blessing,” says Ann Hillman, director of HSC Ministry. “We bless the donor bodies as part of it and talk in general about blessing the course and lifting up the students’ calls to medicine, to being people for others.”
“The blessing was started to humanize what we’re doing and to give students perspective on the beautiful and wonderful sacrifice made to allow us to explore and discover everything that’s inside the human body,” Dr. F says. “The blessing ceremonies help keep that in mind, and that a donor is technically a student’s first patient, a person, and not just a tool. Students need to respect that and respect that in their patients as well.”
Second-year student Angeles Almaraz Villanueva understands. “It’s something that can easily get lost in exams and everything we have to do, but the donors are giving us so much. We are learning because of them,” she says. “I came into medicine like a lot of people, because we want to heal, we want to address address issues impacting health. I think one of the things I’ve learned over this last year is that death is also part of it.”
The blessing ceremonies are led by the HSC ministry staff, including Father David DeMarco, S.J., MD, assistant professor in the Department of Medicine, who has been part of the program for nine years. The rituals involve Ministry staff and student reflections, scripture from various faith traditions, prayer, and music.
“I usually begin the opening blessing with introductory remarks that situate the experience of learning anatomy in the history of medicine,” Father DeMarco says. “Then I’ll conclude with how important it is for us to acknowledge, not only that this is an iconic course, but that it wouldn’t be possible without the generosity of the women and men who decided to leave their earthly remains with us.”
I think along scientific lines, but there are just certain things that are not an accident. There had to be some type of structured plan. It gives me a sense of awe, a sense that there’s definitely something a lot higher than we are.
— Robert Frysztak (PhD ’90), associate professor and Structure of the Human Body course director in the Stritch School of Medicine
Father DeMarco then blesses water and an evergreen branch, which students move around the room, water on the tables and blessing each donor. The branch is then hung over the lab door, so students walk underneath it every day as they go in and out of the lab.
“It’s kind of a neat thing,” Dr. F says, “I’m a scientist, so for me, the most interesting part of anatomy is being able to peel back the skin and see what’s really underneath, see how everything works together synergistically—one muscle can’t do anything by itself. It’s the idea that everybody’s got to work together. I think along scientific lines, but there are just certain things that are not an accident. There had to be some type of structured plan. It gives me a sense of awe, a sense that there’s definitely something a lot higher than we are.”
“It was a spiritual experience for me,” says King. “The ceremony itself was spiritual in the sense of people coming together to respect and appreciate other human life. I think anatomy lab, the whole experience, and then the blessing itself reignited some of my spiritual curiosities.”
Students are asked to collect their thoughts in a written reflection after the course. “The closing blessing is often more palpable,” Father DeMarco says. “White roses are placed on the donors’ remains, and we incorporate student reflections. Having gone through the course now, they’re in a position to describe what it was like, what they learned—not about anatomy —but what they learned about themselves in the anatomy course.”
“We talk about the donors being silent teachers,” says Hillman. “We ask students, ‘What did you learn from your silent teachers? Did you feel fear? Did you feel wonder? What did these donors teach you?’”
The reflections not only help the students, “take a second to reflect on how did this shape you,” Villanueva says, “but ask how does this affect you? Because it does and it’s going to affect your next patient. I think it’s just such a core component of our training.”
King agrees. “The fact that Loyola offers this and expects this from us just adds to the kind of doctor I’m going to be because I’m practicing this now,” she says.
Professors Frysztak and Murdoch provide the reflections to families who inquire, and she is working with HSC Ministry on a ceremony for relatives of the donors. This spring the team hopes to offer a small, interfaith memorial service on campus with families, faculty, and students. Father DeMarco says a tree will be dedicated along with a memorial plaque for all the women and men who have been part of the anatomy course over the years.
“We want to invite relatives to come and understand how much we appreciate what their family member has contributed to so many people,” says Murdoch. “A donor passes a body on to many students. Not one, not 20 really. It’s hundreds, because we use those bodies for several years. We even invite high schools to come here so future doctors that want to apply to medical school can see our anatomy lab. We wouldn’t be able to do this without our donors, our silent teachers—they teach us so much, and they never say a word.”
For first-year medical student Nicholas D’Ambrose, who just matriculated at Stritch over the summer, the ceremony “was beautiful. It had a blanket of gratitude within it,” he says. “As doctors, we help individuals go on to be better people to their family members, and that will extend to the community. So it’s kind of like igniting a domino reaction of positive good. That’s what brought me into medicine. And I think that idea is at the core of all classes, at the center of the curriculum at Loyola.”
