248 HUMAN DISSECTION. ITS DRAMA AND STRUGGLE 



strated ability in applied teaching and research and that there 

 should ideally be one teacher for every fifteen to twenty students. 

 The time should be decreased from an average of 800-900 to 680 

 hours where the course of study had a total of 4,100 hours. They 

 also proposed that histology, embryology and neuroanatomy be 

 given consideration as major subjects. 



Flexner, in his well-known 1910 report, stated that anatomy, 

 the oldest of the laboratory sciences, logically comes first in the 

 curriculum because it is so fundamental. He believed that his- 

 tology, embryology, physiology and pathology had given it back 

 its youth making it once more a green and flourishing science. 

 According to him, the anatomist was carrying a steadily increas- 

 ing load; the surgeons were embarking on hitherto unknown ven- 

 tures, the physical indications involving most delicate structures 

 and discriminations were important to the clinicians and the 

 preclinical teachers leaned on him. The student, he felt, must 

 gain a picture of the body as a whole, of its parts taken severally 

 in their relations. He stated that the teacher had two choices: 

 stick to teaching what he thought was useful and practical or ap- 

 proach the subject from the broad scientific viewpoint. There 

 was no doubt in Flexner's mind that the latter road was the better 

 to follow; he reported rather deplorable conditions existing in 

 the anatomical departments of the medical schools functioning 

 in 1909. 



The Commission on Medical Education ('32) reported that 

 anatomy was overcrowded; that it is closely related to biology 

 on the one hand and clinical medicine on the other; that students 

 studying it should visualize structures in the living, healthy in- 

 dividual; that minute details should not be taught in the under- 

 graduate courses but rather in the specialties so that the amount 

 of time devoted to it in the first year could be reduced; and fi- 

 nally, provisions should be made at intervals throughout the four 

 year medical course for review and extension of anatomical know I 

 edge. This group felt that the instruction could be improved by 

 using such instruments as the ophthalmoscope, otoscope, x-ray 

 and others as well as clinical illustrations. In the opinion of its 

 members, it was not necessary for anatomy to have profound ( liiii 

 cal and practical application in the imdergraduate course. 



