Out of the dissection room. An experience of outdoor practical sessions for animal anatomy education

Practical exercises are an essential component of anatomy education, so anatomy sessions including dissection are essential for animal anatomy courses. In Spain there are not difficulties in obtaining farm animal corpses for educational purposes (although some sanitary laws restrict it in certain cases) neither in general ethical constraints. From 2009 we have been doing outdoor animal dissection for 1st level students of the “Animal Health and Science” degree course of the University of Lleida in Catalunya (Spain) in an industrial corpse destruction plant near the university. There, students practice cow dissection in order to observe simple anatomical structures, such as superficial muscles and bony points, under “field” conditions. We think that these kinds of practical lessons are a cheap and realistic educational model and clearly superior to the classical dissection performed with fixed corpses, even to those done with fresh corpses but under laboratory conditions. In this practice we found educational and technical advantages are more numerous than disadvantages, which are listed in this article.