Gross anatomy is largely clinically oriented and in a sense can be termed clinical anatomy. A true understanding of gross anatomy depends upon the basic science of human structure; it depends upon knowing how apparently complex gross anatomy results from the very simple anatomy of the early embryo; how that apparently complex anatomy is related to function, e.g. biomechanical function; and how complex anatomy is related to evolution. Gross anatomy forms the foundation for procedures in diagnosis and treatment, in radiology, surgery, obstetrics and other medical fields. Every practitioner who sees a patient makes a physical examination of the patient’s anatomy. Since the examiner’s sensory nervous system works by analogue methods, physical examination consists of comparing the possibly abnormal with a mental image of the normal. Though gross anatomy is concerned with practical work in the dissecting laboratory, it also includes imaging anatomy and living or surface anatomy. It is a science of the living, not of the dead, and though our knowledge is, perforce, acquired from the cadaver it is in terms of the living that you must think. It also teaches something about human and constitutional variations no two bodies are ever alike and about the plasticity of the human form and biological variation of living populations. The intent of this guide is not to teach clinical practice but to guide you in learning and appreciating the anatomy of the human body, the anatomical language and principles that will be needed in your medical career. The guide helps to make anatomy rational, interesting and directly applicable to the clinical problems encountered in the health professions. If anatomy is simply memorised and not understood, it will soon be forgotten. The practice of good medicine requires a significant knowledge of anatomy. Dissecting material is both scarce and immensely valuable; therefore you must always scrupulously follow the instructions given by the department, tutor and dissecting manual concerning the care of the dissection and the procedure to be followed, otherwise much time and effort may be wasted. At any time, only two to four members of a dissecting table group are able to dissect and two will be reading out aloud from the instruction manual.

Those who are not dissecting should follow both the text and dissection, making appropriate reference to atlases and textbooks, and see to it that the dissectors are carrying out their work properly. It is essential that each one takes his/her proper turn in dissection. The practice of medicine demands both knowledge and manual dexterity, and it is during the anatomy course that this good habit is acquired. Before you follow a particular dissection schedule, you should always study the relevant Overview in the guide and the relevant section in the textbook in order to become familiar with the major features that you will encounter. A good dissection should display clearly and cleanly the main features of the region. You should be as neat and accurate as you can, for a slovenly dissector will be a slovenly doctor. There must be no blind dissection, you must always have a preliminary session with the manual to find out what main structures are to be looked for, and where to expect to find them. During dissection, in addition to reading the dissecting instructions and dissecting, you should all the time be discussing and questioning with your fellow students and with your tutors matters such as the relation of the anatomy that is being dealt with to development, function, and the related practical importance. The manual gives clear and explicit instruction on how to get the best view of each part. It is quite astonishing how many find themselves in trouble because they have either failed to read the dissecting instructions or failed to understand them. There is no excuse for this. A failure to take in and understand written or verbal instructions can be immensely dangerous in medical practice, and now is the time for the student to train himself/herself to be meticulous. Dissection is something more than merely following instructions, nor is it a purely mechanical task. It is a kind of original visuotactile method of investigation; nobody has ever investigated the particular body you are working on, and it is individual and unique. What you find out for yourself sticks in your mind much better than what is shown to you by somebody else. Dissection provides plenty of mental problems on which you ought to sharpen your wits. Many make the mistake of believing that gross anatomy can be satisfactorily studied for examination purposes from the textbook alone. These people are readily recognisable at the practical and oral examinations.

Gross anatomy is a practical and functional subject, not a theoretical subject, and when you are qualified your patients will not be satisfied with your ability to recite little lists of relationships; the patient will demand someone who knows how and where to find these relationships, and how they function within their own bodies. In the dissection tutorial you learn to understand the structural relationships and the structure function interrelationship, and you learn to cultivate the visual memory. It is upon these that you will constantly depend in your clinical work. You have to consider how the anatomy of soft parts in the region you dissected must change when the part is moved in the living body. How would you attempt to locate the main arteries and nerves from the surface of the living body? What results would follow if the main nerve of a region were cut? If the main artery were tied? Questions such as these help to fix the important features of the region firmly in the mind. In every dissection it is helpful to build your knowledge of the region as a whole, around a framework provided by certain key structures. These may be muscles, nerves, ligaments or arteries. It is preferable to select those key structures that are of intrinsic functional or professional significance. In addition, thinking should be systematised. There are three points of view that should be applied to every region of the body: the functional, the clinical and the conceptual.

(a)The functional aspect: You should mentally stand back from the details of the dissection and try to take a broad view of the functions of the part upon which you are working. Thus if you are studying the foot, which takes a leading part in walking, running and jumping, it ought to occur to you immediately that one of the most important things about it must be the bony, muscular and ligamentous mechanisms by which the weight of the body is supported and transferred.

(b) The clinical aspect: You should adopt a more specifically professional point of view and consider the anatomy of common injuries, infections and other diseases that may occur in the region under consideration. Thus the relationships of the middle ear are of little functional significance, but they are of great practical importance because an infection within the middle ear may endanger hearing or even life.

(c) The conceptual aspect: You will find it valuable to remember that the key to a dissection may lie not in an individual structure, but in an idea. Thus one of the most important aids to the understanding of the disposition of the abdominal viscera is the knowledge of the local embryology. Also the understanding of the evolutionary development of humans as primates is important when studying humans structurally and functionally. In the dissection tutorial facts, principles and their relation to function are discussed. These are the keys to solving problems of an anatomicalclinical nature. The dissection tutorial plays the role that bedside teaching plays in the clinical years. With regard to the value of dissection versus a study of prepared (prosected) parts, there is no doubt as to which is the more rewarding. From experience, it is clear that the knowledge gained from dissecting a cadaver is retained longer and more vividly than that gained from examining prepared specimens. Dissection of the body is an essential basis for the understanding of human structure, organisation and function. It is a visuotactile method of learning and is of value as a discipline and as a training in observation and investigation. It often comes as a salutary shock to discover during dissection that the body does not agree with the textbook. Dissection is itself a basic research method in application for the student which is carried out nowhere else in the preclinical course you do your own investigation and confirm or contradict the description in the literature, i.e. actual research in the proper sense, and you use a technique that is analytical in nature. One cannot teach locomotion or the limits of joint movement until the student has dissected the relevant parts. He/she cannot otherwise understand what is happening.