Just To Scare You A Bit....and State The Facts!
Again given to reminiscence on my student days:
I recall walking in on auxiliary staff of the anatomy department one hot afternoon as they were performing a most bizarre but essential duty.....stripping flesh from the bones of "spent" cadavers!
Believe me, the scene was no different from any regular butcher's shop!
You see, year one medical students must of necessity, surround themselves with human bones....shining....devoid of flesh....polished.....in their bags.....in their wardrobes, table tops, lying side by side with books and groceries!
Or else, they may not pass Gross Anatomy!
And as I joked with the workers....
"Oga, na wa for you and this ya butcher work o!"
.....came the reply...."my brother, na so we see am o!".
When students finish dissecting the bodies, the remains are surrendered to these men to "produce" the bones. Such bones are then tabled before the academic staff who mark them....sorry, paint them! Using two colours.....red and blue. Red for "origins"....and blue for "insertions"!
Students also note the grooves and indentations on each bone signifying the "structures" that lie in contact with them. Even otherwise soft and pliant organs that harden up on embalment have their indentations and grooves painted for similar reasons....liver, spleen, lungs.....
Now, I need to get into some technicalities here:
Embryologically, muscles and other connective tissues are believed to derive from mesoderm, one of the three main primitive templates or precursors from which future tissues develop. (Your skin and brain share the same origin called ectoderm. First to sprout is the primitive brain which grows a tail, the spinal cord. Both brain and spinal cord then throw ever-lengthening whips in many directions to form cranial and peripheral nerves. The endoderm eventually ends up as "organs").
Thus with a solid understanding of embryology of any part of the human body, the smart doctor can work around providing solutions to abnormalities deriving from such parts. So the student learnt of Frontonasal, Maxillary and Mandibular "processes" in the formation of the face. He knows that as problems arise from the Maxillary process, the eventual baby may be born with varying degrees of cleft lip and/or cleft palate!
A thorough understanding of histology especially epithellial types and forms would equally serve the doctor well in proferring solutions to bodily disorders....
We would leave that for another day so we stay in focus:
As muscles develop in utero, they grow or elongate from their "origins" on one bone (usually across a joint) towards their "insertions" on another bone!
So, finally I knew.... All those bones "lying around" in the hostel were "produced" by these men!
I also remember visiting General Hospital Isolo Mortuary about a decade an half ago to inspect the corpse of a sister to a Pastor friend. The full bodies laid on the floor were visible enough....as tubes ran from receptacles into their nakedness....bearing formaldehyde (formalin).....the popular chemical substance used to embalm them....lest they smell and pollute the air....and endanger the health of you and I!
An ingenious method crafted by mortuary technicians....to bypass the idle refrigerators of the mortuary chambers. No electricity. So?
But wait a minute.... What are those dried-out, flattened darkened "things" stacked against the wall like "Kilishi" near the window? Dead human beings? Three columns! Each the height of the window base! And up to twenty bodies per column fitting "comfortably" into that height? Ah! How dried out they were!
I set out to scare you a bit......
Hope I succeeded!
Next time you chase the things of the world, just remember you cannot possibly take any along with you when you die.....
Dr Tosin Akindele is a medical practitioner and public affairs analyst.