Ceremony held for those who gave their bodies so that others might live

A gift of life from death
Ceremony held for those who gave their bodies so that others might live

By Lisa Bramen
lbramen@poststar.com
Sunday, September 9, 2007 12:56 AM EDT

MENANDS -- The 247 people memorialized Friday at Albany Rural Cemetery never knew each other. Their lives, and their deaths, were as varied as any group could be.

The single act of donating the last thing they had to give -- their bodies -- united them.

Every year in September, Albany Medical College holds a memorial service for the people who have donated to the anatomical gift program, which allows first year medical students and post-graduate students to gain experience on real human bodies. The service gives closure to family members and allows the students to express their gratitude for the gift.

"They are the true champions of science," said medical student David Hill, who addressed the crowd of more than 200 people on behalf of the class of 2010. He thanked the families of the donors.

"This is the first birthday of our newly acquired knowledge," he continued. "But it is also a farewell to our silent teachers."

Statewide, there is a shortage of donated whole bodies for education, according to Dr. Leon Martino, director of the anatomical gift program.

"The need for bodies is tremendous," he said. "There are places that can't put programs on for their students because of the lack of bodies. A physician needs to learn the anatomy of a human body before they can go out and practice it. They learn the intricate anatomy -- where every vessel is, where every nerve is."

The college maintains two plots -- one at Albany Rural Cemetery and one at adjacent St. Agnes Cemetery. A smaller Catholic service for those who are interred at St. Agnes followed the main memorial service. Families may also elect to have the cremated remains of their loved ones returned to them, usually within a year to a year and a half of death. All families are invited to the service, regardless of what they decide to do with the remains.

Albany Medical College is one of the few colleges that conducts a graveside service for family members, Martino said. The reason is twofold.

"One, we needed to give the families some form of closure, and that's what the memorial service does," he said. "The second major facet of it is the students themselves. We encourage the students to treat these individuals that they are using as their first patients. You learn a certain amount of respect for that individual, you learn to care for that individual in the course of your nine months of study. At some point you want to thank that individual, and you want to thank the families for their sacrifice ... It also gives the families a relationship, to see that their loved one did go for something useful, and not just disappeared. They get to see the future physician that their loved one has trained. It's mutually beneficial."

If donors have a common trait, Martino said, it is a sense of altruism.

"They want to give something back to society or medicine," he said. "A large number of our donors had some kind of medical occurrence in their life and this is their way of giving something back."

Such was the case for Ronald Dinelle, said his sister, Patricia Dinelle Dahoda of Halfmoon, before the service. Dinelle suffered from epilepsy and wanted to help doctors better understand the condition.

"What better experience for a doctor?" she said. "You can't learn that in a book."

The ceremony began with opening remarks by Martino and a homily by the Rev. Rick Behan, followed by student remarks and the reading of the 247 names of the donors being honored. As each name was called, a medical student laid a carnation on the casket holding the urns of those donors' remains to be buried there. Family members were also invited to lay flowers on the casket.

Steve Gomula of Saratoga Springs was at the ceremony for his grandmother, Joan Gomula of Amsterdam.

"She came here from England after World War II," he said. "She helped people all her life. This is just another way to do that."

Joan Gomula's granddaughter, Suzette DuPont of Perth, said that she was the first person her grandmother told about her desire to donate her body.

"She said, 'I don't want you kids wasting money on a funeral,' " DuPont said.

Financial considerations are not uncommon among donors, Martino said.

"A lot of times families don't want to burden children, husbands don't want to burden wives with funeral expenses, which can become quite expensive these days," he said. There is no charge to the donor's family for cremation and interment in the group plot.

The primary, and preferred, method of donation is pre-arranged. Donors must submit a form to the program indicating their wish to have their body donated. However, the state's anatomical gift law also allows select next-of-kin to donate the remains after death.

Remains are occasionally disqualified from being used in the program for several reasons. The main one is if the body contains an infectious disease that could pose a danger to the students or physicians. Bodies that have sustained excessive trauma or are badly decomposed are also unusable. Obesity can also disqualify a donor, because of the difficulty of moving a heavy body.

Becoming a donor does not preclude someone from also donating organs.

"Quite the contrary," Martino said. "As we are a medical center and physicians, we believe the benefit of life is of utmost importance, so that if an individual is an organ donor, we would still go ahead and accept their remains. We would never want to be in a position to discourage an individual from organ donation and having to make a choice between us and organ donation."

Occasionally, he said, a family member is resistant to the idea of donation.

"The biggest resistance is when a family member doesn't understand what the program is about," he said. "We have had family members where a husband will donate and the wife will be all for it, but the children will be hesitant and not sure what's going on. Often at the memorial service I'll have those children come up to me and say, 'I couldn't understand why dad wanted to do this. Now I understand.' "

LEARN MORE: For more information on Albany Medical Center's anatomical gift program, call 262-5379 or e-mail your name and address to AnatGift@mail.amc.edu.

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