Gross! Anatomy

Students view

diseased, healthy body

organs in lessons about drug abuse

By RON LARSEN

Journal Staff Writer

NEW ULM -- It was enough to make a 12-year-old want to pass on lunch, feel a little shaky and, hopefully, never want to touch alcohol or drugs.

It was the second part of a three-session Adolescent Substance Abuse Program presentation to sixth-graders in Janelle Kopacek's science classes at Holy Trinity Middle School. The presenters were New Ulm Rural Health School students at New Ulm Medical Center who are fulfilling their community service requirements.

Greg Parranto, a rural physician associate program medical student at the University of Minnesota; Kristin Hatton, a physician assistant student at Augsburg; and Jen Reigel, a pharmacy student at the university; with the assistance of Chris Koeckeritz, New Ulm Rural Health School's site coordinator, showed the students actual, preserved livers, lungs, heart and brain from humans. To stimulate interest, the session was called "Gross! Anatomy."

It lived up to its billing for a number of the 46 students who sat through the demonstration.

Parranto showed them how a healthy liver looks, compared with one with cirrhosis scarring from alcohol. They learned that the diseased liver looked "yukky" in color, more green and white than dark pink because the cirrhosis had crippled the liver's ability to flush materials and bile.

Meanwhile, Hatton was showing students the difference among a healthy lung, one that was pitted with concentrations of tar, and another that contained a cancerous tumor.

Reigel demonstrated the heart's operation and how drugs like cocaine can cause a heart to enlarge, inviting a heart attack.

Koeckeritz demonstrated how the brain is put together by crumpling up a cloth and the areas of the brain affected by different substances.

"I'm not eating lunch," Dave Hooper, 12, said afterwards. "I lost my appetite with that liver."

While ASAP may gross kids out, it does capture their attention. There was nary a yawn, snicker or joking comment from any of the 46 students as the ASAP team went through the demonstrations.

ASAP was developed by the University of Chicago. It is now being implemented around the country by the American Medical Student Association and is designed as a community service prevention project aimed at teaching upper elementary students the importance of maintaining a healthy body and making informed choices about drug use.

The first session focuses on normal internal organ function and the harmful effect on these organs by commonly abused substances, including cocaine, tobacco, marijuana and alcohol.

During the second session, the children get to see -- but not touch ­ actual organs and what substance abuse can do to those organs.

In the last session, the children are challenged to use the information to develop resistance skills, through role playing focusing on peer pressure and life skills training.

"The students are very interested and very eager," Kopacek said. "They want to know the information, you can see them processing it, they want to know. They were introduced to DARE in the fifth grade so this is a good followup to DARE."

Melissa Schisel, 11, found the discussion about an actual brain "very interesting," and she learned that "you can't learn too much about the body."

The session taught Nick Portner, 12, that "I don't really want to drink alcohol."

"It made me feel that I should not take any drugs," Hooper said. "It's too scary."