Donate body to Faculty of Medicine, getting closer

Since the Faculty of Medicine of the Balearic Islands started operating in the 2016–2017 academic year, UAM has made three shipments of donor bodies to the islands. In Spain both body donation and transfer of organs from a donor to another university are free by law. The UIB is obliged to bear the costs incurred from transportation. The final delivery (of four coffins) cost approximately 10,000 euros.

FJ Vieira is one of the few Balearic Islands residents Who have donated their body to science. He did it twenty years ago, specifically at the Faculty of Medicine in Valencia. «The destiny one gives to one’s body is linked to personal beliefs. I simply believe in science and its true potential to improve lives, which is why I decided to dedicate my body to this cause,” he explains.

When he donated his body to science, there were no medical schools in the Balearic Islands, which is why he contacted the nearest medical schools in Majorca and completed the procedure in Valencia. Possibility of donating body for that time train future doctors This was unknown to most of the population and such transfers rarely occurred. In the case of organ donors, you sign a contract and receive a card proving your intention to donate your body to the faculty. In practice, family members have the last word at the time of death.

Over the years, the culture of body donation in spain And this creates a new challenge. Before committing to accepting a donor’s request, medical schools must ensure that at the time of their death, they will be able to take the donation.

«Medical school donation systems are specific to each school and involve significant maintenance costs. In Autonomous University of Barcelona We have over 5,000 donors and I receive about 60 cadavers per year. At this time the possibility of making new donations is closed. I am very clear that the university has a responsibility to its donors, and imagine what could have happened during the pandemic. It will be ineffective if 100 bodies come together,” says the doctor. Alfonso Rodriguez Baeza, Professor at UAM and Professor of Anatomy at UIB. Dean Antoni Bennacer warns, “The Balearic Islands are a multicultural community, where many residents come from other countries, where there is a highly conscious culture of body donation and it may be the case that we will have a larger group of donations.”

According to the doctor’s calculations, with the latest shipment of parts from Barcelona to Majorca, the medical faculty in the Balearic Islands is supplied for the next 8 or 10 years. «You can request the appropriate permits to launch Charity in the Balearic Islands, but right now we don’t have the necessary logistics or infrastructure. It requires strong legal advice and should be a project with expert input. “If there is a surge of donations, we have to be prepared, not caught out,” adds Tony Bennacer.

The recent disputes regarding the state of the faculties of Madrid and Valencia preservation of bodies And because of the alleged buying and selling they force the faculty to work even more carefully than before. “It’s very sad to see what’s happening,” says the Rector. “There can never be any financial compensation for body donation, like organ donation,” he says. In all cases, the faculty performs the last rites. and bear transfer costs.

To become a body donor, you must be of legal age or sign parental consent in the case of minors. you can do it too Donate Embryos and Embryos, In any case, even if there is prior consent, the commitment can be broken before death occurs. The entire body should be donatedIt is not possible to become an organ donor and a body donor at the same time. Once the body has finished its useful life for teaching or research, it is considered to be at rest and is cremated.

“In the short term I do not see this possible in the Faculty of Medicine of the Balearic Islands, but we do not rule it out for the future, when we have more infrastructure and logistical capacity, I am in favor of moving in that direction. ,” Bennacer concluded.

In the absence of body donors from the Balearic Islands, how does physical training Your students? In the 2016-2017 academic year (the first in its history) the Faculty was nourished by some donations sent by the Barcelona Clinic. In the second year itself he handed himself over to Professor Alfonso Rodriguez Baeza, considered one of the best 50 doctors in Spain. «Working with real bodies in the anatomy laboratory can better approximate reality. The medical student has his first emotional contact with the human body in the laboratory. This is their first meeting, it’s not morbid. Furthermore, the three-dimensional concept is very important. Apart from the feeling of treating a patient, allows you to see and feel organs Live,” experts say.

For Dr. Rodriguez Baeza, physical model The ones the students use are “very useful supplements,” he says, but “the last batch of dead bodies cannot be replaced.” Four coffins from Barcelona to Palma It includes fragments preserved for the first time through plastination technique. This is a preservation technique performed after dissection is complete. Each piece takes two or three months to complete, but the advantage is that once the process is complete you don’t need to get in front of the camera.

Thus, we have obtained from four coffins more than 300 pieces, who have just arrived. The organs from two of the four coffins have come directly to the Balearic Islands, plastinated, and are going to a warehouse. The other two need to remain in camera for their protection. There are a variety of segments and entire organs, the brain, the heart, the kidneys… some of them with recognizable pathologies. “At this moment we have two cameras for support body composition exercises (We have expanded one) and nothing has been finished yet,” explains Professor Alfonso Rodríguez Baeza.

For practical purposes, when five years have passed since the body was received and once it has completed its teaching or research work, it is considered to be at rest and can be cremated. The oldest faculty still in use in Spain They preserve the organs of the 70s, “I studied in Barcelona between 1975 and 1982 and I still have pieces in the laboratory from when I was a student,” says the anatomy professor. Permanence depends on preservation, but also on fixation, processes that are partly carried out by funeral companies.