Class Review
- Got prepared for lab.
- Started lab for dissection of the heart.
Thoughts And Opinions
At first, the heart looked really disgusting!! It was full of fat and not what a heart was supposed to look like, well what I thought. It was really tough to get through, tougher than I thought. The muscles actually work I guess. It amazed me by how different the heart looked from the pictures that we got. It was completely different!! Overall, it was a fun class and I learned a lot from it.
Additional Insight
One of the first surgeons to use these improved techniques to gain access to the heart was Dr. Dwight Harken, a young U.S. Army surgeon. Many of Harken's patients were young soldiers evacuated from the European front with shell fragments and bullets lodged inside their hearts. To leave the shrapnel in was dangerous, but removing it was almost surely fatal. Harken began operating on animals, trying to develop a technique that would allow him to cut into the wall of a still beating heart, insert a finger, locate the shrapnel and remove it. All of his first 14 animals subjects died. Of the second group of 14, half died. Of the third group of 14, only 2 died. Harken felt ready to try the technique on humans. All of his patients survived, proving that the human heart could be operated upon.
It was very complicated to find all of the valves and parts of the heart when I did it on a sheep heart. I can't even imagine how hard it would be for a doctor to do an open heart surgery! Especially so long ago with no technology. That is impressive.
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