Abstract Manager

Oral

OA1-3-3

yes

General Call (Workshop, Oral Presentation, Poster Presentation)

Oral

Education Research

Graduate Student

no

The invisible work of Cadaver Based Simulation: An ethnography

Cadaver Based Simulation (CBS) is on the rise in Canada, due to recent advances in cadaveric preservation. However, the CBS literature tends to focus on perceptions of CBS and procedural performance. The complex work involved in CBS, particularly the invisible work of clinical cadaver staff, is little understood. This presentation therefore examines how cadavers, learners, workers, tools and spaces come together in a clinical cadaver program and offers implications for wider processes and discourses of simulation learning.

Our ethnographic methods (observation [n=30 hours], interview [n=30], document analysis [n=22]) allowed us to follow the cadaver before educational use (cadaver preparation), during (learning sessions with physicians, residents), and after (memorial service) over a two-year period (2018-2020) at Dalhousie University.

Our analysis identified a complex work and educational "life cycle" of the cadaver, from its entrance into the body donation program through to burial and interment. This cycle is characterized by a series of transitions as cadavers pass through the hands of multiple actors. Some of these shifts were obvious (e.g., passing the threshold between home/hospital and morgue) and others were subtle, rapid, and constantly changing (e.g., moving between person and tool).

Cadavers require a complex system of invisible work processes within and beyond the classroom. CBS requires workers and learners to navigate the tension between treating the body as an anonymous educational tool and as a specific, whole person. Better understanding this nuanced process may inform how we use cadavers in medical education.

Simulation

cadavers

ethnography

Post Graduate

Postgraduate

Continuing Medical Education

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes