One Breath Apart

Sandra Bertman is the author of Facing Death: Images, Insights, and Interventions (1991), editor of Grief and the Healing Arts: Creativity as Therapy (1999), and creator of the DVD and book project Art, Spirit, and Soul (forthcoming). At the University of Massachusetts, her teaching career in the departments of psychology (Boston campus) and psychiatry and medicine (Worcester) dates back to 1977. In 1995, for her pioneering work in Humanities and Medicine, and Psychology of Death and Dying, she was one of the recipients of the University of Massachusetts Award commemorating the University’s 125 years of service to the Commonwealth for Distinguished Professional Public Service.

• Foreword, Jack Coulehan, MD Prologue: Sharing a UMASS Medical School Tradition Dissection and Reflection: Variations of the Module—Anticipating Dissection: Template—Inaugural Session: Facing Dissection—History of Dissection—Relevance to Patient Care—Anatomical Gift Program—Meeting the Cadaver— Coping Styles (Illustrated Lecture Presentations)—Anatomy Lesson in Art and Dance—The Art and Science of Medicine—Michelangelo’s Morgue Experiences— Student Service of Thanksgiving for Body Donors— A Graduation TraditionMedical Students Meet Cadavers—The room was both a morgue and a classroom—I’m more uncomfortable having to draw than having to dissect—Words cannot describe what it is like—Our bodies are our cheat sheets—I like the Buddhist notion of death and the body—I wonder what her life was like—Cut me I will not bleed—The power of habit —I’ll never forget Doc, as we called himEpilogue: Reflections and Connections—The UMass Community cares for its dead—Memorial Service —Student Eulogies and Family Members’ Responses—Coda: The Web of LifeReferencesAcknowledgments