hollow man
so a while back i got to scrub in on a total organ retrieval, which is exactly what it sounds like. organ donation.
an organ donor no longer has a need to keep thier organs and was kindly passing them onto others who might like them.
it was so cool. at least the part i saw. there were WAY too many people in the room. the retrieval team, medical students, residents, attendings, nursing staff.... i got to see alot of back and shoulders and practice my "passing blades and needles around peoples back so they dont get poked" technique. get pretty good at it i might say.
then i got to handle the "leftover organs". they took almost everything - lungs, heart valves, liver, kidneys, pancreas. they left the intestines and most of the spleen. and i got to see the heart beating as they were sectioning off the organs before retrieval. way cool.
lemme tell you, the large intestine feels exactly how you think it would. kinda rubbery and soft. like a hollow kielbasa. and the spleen was dense, like hard rubber, more dense than a liver. but if you've never held a liver then i doubt that you would have a comparison.
when they took all they needed, the donor was very... hollow. probably lost 1/3 of their body weight (it's super-effective) and after the sweing back up had a sunken appearance. very "this sucker is gonna sit up and try to eat my brains i just know it" feel to it.
i wanna do it again. but this time get right in there and hold some beating heart in my hand, just so i can say i did.
an organ donor no longer has a need to keep thier organs and was kindly passing them onto others who might like them.
it was so cool. at least the part i saw. there were WAY too many people in the room. the retrieval team, medical students, residents, attendings, nursing staff.... i got to see alot of back and shoulders and practice my "passing blades and needles around peoples back so they dont get poked" technique. get pretty good at it i might say.
then i got to handle the "leftover organs". they took almost everything - lungs, heart valves, liver, kidneys, pancreas. they left the intestines and most of the spleen. and i got to see the heart beating as they were sectioning off the organs before retrieval. way cool.
lemme tell you, the large intestine feels exactly how you think it would. kinda rubbery and soft. like a hollow kielbasa. and the spleen was dense, like hard rubber, more dense than a liver. but if you've never held a liver then i doubt that you would have a comparison.
when they took all they needed, the donor was very... hollow. probably lost 1/3 of their body weight (it's super-effective) and after the sweing back up had a sunken appearance. very "this sucker is gonna sit up and try to eat my brains i just know it" feel to it.
i wanna do it again. but this time get right in there and hold some beating heart in my hand, just so i can say i did.