Psychological impact of cadavers and prosections on physiotherapy and occupational therapy students

The short and long term impact of exposure to cadavers and prosections was examined with 114 occupational therapy and physiotherapy students attending the Auckland Institute of Technology. Pre-exposure measures included a shortened version of the Hopkins Symptom Checklist to assess general distress, and an event-specific apprehension questionnaire. Thirty per cent of students exhibited a post-traumatic stress reaction as measured by the Impact of Event Scale. Eighteen months later, 7 per cent still exhibited symptoms of stress. Multivariate regression analysis revealed that high general distress, high event-specific apprehension and being a member of the physiotherapy student group were associated with high scores on the Impact of Event Scale. These findings indicate that the cadaver experience had a significant impact on these students, although the effect diminished over time.