Log in

View Full Version : Disease


inngyn
Jan 14, 2014, 01:38 PM
Hi I'm a medical student and today I watched PM examination .time since death was about 40 hours and body was kept in mortuary before examination. I was close to body and noticed some tissue or fluid were coming out of body to nearby me. I'm afraid they entered my eye because I felt as if there was something in my eye. As HIV can survive whe and frozen' Can I acquire diseases by that event. What can happen to me?

CravenMorhead
Jan 14, 2014, 01:47 PM
If you're asking this question, maybe medicine isn't your calling. The tissue and fluids you saw were probably benign. While corpses are a known vector for all sorts of diseases, I can assure you that these probably weren't infectious and they were just dead. Anything you saw or experienced was just natural decay or your own body. It is more likely that you got an eyelash or hair or some such particle in your eye than anything from the cadaver.

You're fine.

smearcase
Jan 14, 2014, 06:26 PM
I am hard pressed to believe that medical students are placed in situations with no protocol for safety glasses and other protection appropriate to the situation.
You have the access to the experts. You won't like what the alleged expert in the below link has to say.
If there is any doubt in your mind, either get tested or worry about it for x number of years.


This is one opinion and I am sure there are many others:
From How long HIV virus survive in a Dead Human body - Forum on Safe Sex and HIV Prevention -- TheBody.com (http://www.thebody.com/Forums/AIDS/SafeSex/Q8660.html)
"When a person dies, HIV will not "die" immediately after death. This is because there is a large quantity of blood in the body, and it takes time for the conditions inside the body to change to an unlivable environment for the virus. Death is more of a process than an instantaneous event. The conditions in a dead body change slowly and gradually.

There have been several studies that have looked at how long HIV survives in a dead body. In unrefrigerated bodies, HIV generally survives up to 24-36 hours after death. However in refrigerated bodies, the survival time of HIV is significantly increased. In one study, in bodies that were stored at 6 degrees Celsius (42.8 degrees Fahrenheit), HIV was still viable for up to 6 days. In another study, bodies refrigerated at 2 degrees Celsius (35.6 degrees Fahrenheit) were found to have infectious HIV for up to 16.5 days. "

Alty
Jan 14, 2014, 06:31 PM
Hi I'm a medical student and today I watched PM examination .time since death was about 40 hours and body was kept in mortuary before examination. I was close to body and noticed some tissue or fluid were coming out of body to nearby me. I'm afraid they entered my eye because I felt as if there was something in my eye. As HIV can survive whe and frozen' Can I acquire diseases by that event. What can happen to me?

Wow, that's a lot of typos for a medical student. If you're in medical school, that's scary.

Look in your text books, ask your professors, talk to other students that can actually form a sentence. You're learning to be a doctor, and the question you asked, most people, everyday people, people with no medical knowledge or education at all, can answer.

This question begs another. Are you really cut out to be a doctor? I'm thinking you should cut your losses and find another profession.

Yikes.

Fr_Chuck
Jan 14, 2014, 11:28 PM
It appears you were not wearing proper protective wear that one would when doing such an exam.

Yes body fluids can have all types of issues. And leaking ( how, where, since a body does not "leak") and of course none of those are medical terms a medical student would use.

Anyway, leaking is not "splashing" and is no where near eye. Was fluid on face, on clothes. I will assume most of this is more mental fear than actual happening. I agree eye lash, sweat, tear.