Thank you Channel 4 for the best telly programme ever - Anatomy for Beginners. It features a guy who looks like Dr Who with a husky German accent doing real time dissections on human bodies. There is a running commentary from someone in white coat, who looks like he just came out of a washing powder advert. Best of all they have some good looking girl or guy stark naked, who is being used as a model and is being body-painted by an artist showing the organs in their respective positions. Last night's program had a man being slit open from throat to balls. His rib cage was cut open using bolt cutters and then his heart and lungs were removed. It was rivetting. At the end of it, they had shown you how the cardio-vascular system works. Diseases like emphasima and asthma were explained clearly. It was particularly educational when a pair of lungs and a heart were drawn on the breasts of a lovely oriental girl. Unfortunately they did not demonstrate heart massage techniques. Her bush was neatly trimmed. Prior to this learning about arteries and veins and ventricals was boring and difficult to understand. With the lungs and heart opened up in clear view and with the pipes and muscles in place, it was very clear how the whole system worked. One thing that was not explained was what was the guy doing with a huge great diaphragm inside his rib cage just underneath his lungs. Perhaps he was keeping it warm for his wife or maybe his boyfriend was exceptionally well endowed. Tonight was the turn of the food processing system. The cadaver was female and the model was male. The entire system: tongue, aesophagus, stomach, kidneys, liver, small intestine, large intestine and anus was extracted from the body intact. Once it was unravelled the whole tube stretched for seven meters. Burps were explained in detail, as was heartburn. It is amazing that more food does not go down the wrong way, as all food eaten crosses over the air intake to the lungs. This major design fault is fixed by a flap of tissue that covers the wind pipe when you swallow. It was amazing to see how the contents of the system gradually changed from food to shit during its progress towards the anus. While the solid waste system was thoroughly explored, the urinary system barely got a mention once fluid had left the kidneys. Tomorrow is going to be the reproductive system. Get your video recorders ready.

I don't get that channel. I did take anatomy & physiology,,,  in a classroom with a lab,,,  but we opened up frogs and sheep. I can't wait for your description of the reproductive system.  The thing about human cadavers for me is that I always wonder who the person is, what kind of lives they lived, and how they died, and I insist that the body be treated with respect. It kind of sounds like even the live people were not exactly respected.  But leave it to the English style of humor to come up with a programme like this. lol

amanda

-- Edited by amanda2u2 at 08:02, 2005-01-27

Fantastic programme, I saw it too. It's rare to get a decent programme on channel 4.

Only problem is, it's on a bit late for me (23:05, I'm in work at 05:00) so I have to video it and not seen last nights one yet.

Dr Gunther Von Hagens explains very well how all the bits work, it certainly put me off smoking for about 10 minutes!

http://www.channel4.com/science/microsites/A/anatomy/index.html

 

Hope everyone is well.

Bye for now.

Chris.