Most health profession schools, such as medical,
physician assistant, and dental schools, require that students complete a practical (dissection) course in gross human anatomy. Such courses aim to educate students in advanced fundamental human anatomy and seek to establish anatomical landmarks used to aid
medical diagnosis. Most schools provide students with
cadavers for investigation by dissection, aided by dissection manuals, as well as cadaveric atlases (e.g.
Netter's,
Rohen's). Working intimately with a cadaver during a gross anatomy course has been shown to capture the essence of the patient-provider relationship. However, the expense of maintaining cadaveric dissection facilities has limited the time and resources available for gross anatomy teaching in medical schools that are less funded, with some adopting alternative prosection-based or simulated teaching. This, coupled with decreasing time dedicated to gross anatomical courses within the growing greater medical school curriculum, has caused controversy surrounding the sufficiency of anatomical teaching with nearly half of newly qualified doctors believing they received insufficient anatomy teaching due to the course often being condensed into one semester. Medical schools have implemented on-screen anatomical lessons and tutorials to teach students surgical procedures. The use of technological visual aids accompanied with gross dissection have been shown to be more effective than learning via one modality alone. Online and physically made flashcards and quizzes have been long used. ==See also==