Employee Q&A: Body Donation Director Joshua Lopez

About 130 bodies are donated to the UA's Willed Body program, overseen by Lopez, each year.

Name
Joshua Lopez

Position
Director, Willed Body Program, Department of Cell Biology and Anatomy

Number of years at the UA
6

Favorite part about working at the UA
"It's hard to put in words. I always feel good when I walk in the building, when I park and walk in. It's the challenge; it keeps me focused on something."

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A first-time visitor to Joshua Lopez's office might find the decor a bit spooky. As two skeletons beam at you from one corner, elaborate Mexican and Central American masks gaze ominously from the wall. Then there are the shelves of skulls and bones and preserved organs.

But when you take into account Lopez's interest in the Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) Mexican holiday, along with his job as director of The University of Arizona's Willed Body Program, it all begins to make sense.

The Willed Body program has existed at the UA for more than 40 years. Enrolled donors request that their bodies, upon their deaths, be donated to the University and used for educational purposes. Stored in the basement of University Medical Center, the bodies serve as important practice tools for University medical students and are occasionally used for research at the UA and other schools throughout the state.

Lopez recently took time to talk with Lo Que Pasa about his work with the program.

What is the Willed Body Program?
The Willed Body Program started back in 1967 as a means to support the medical education of the students, in anatomy. Over the years we've expanded from just our campus to providing material for every school in the state, (the) primary focus being the (University of Arizona's) Tucson campus and Phoenix campus, NAU (Northern Arizona University), ASU (Arizona State University), the community colleges, as well as some of the private schools – like the dental school in Mesa and there's a naturopathic school of medicine that uses anatomical material for their teaching. ... We're the only program like this in the state. 

How are the bodies used?
The biggest use is first-year medical students. They'll go through and do a complete anatomical dissection. They study the body region by region and structure by structure. ... Fourth-year students will come back and do a specialized dissection once they know which field they're going to go into.

Who's eligible to be a donor?
Anybody. The only preclusions we have are (bodies that have undergone) autopsies (or) if there's been organ donation, obesity or any history of infectious disease like hepatitis, MRSA, HIV, anything like that.

How many donations do you typically get?
Typically in a year we receive about 130. We've got a little over 7,000 in our database of enrolled (living) donors.

What's the donation process?
It's a simple process. There are three forms that are filled out – the certificate of donation, a brief medical history and a personal information form, which is used to complete the death certificate, which we take care of at that time (of death). Then the donor receives a donor card with some information about how to contact us in the event of the death. Once the death occurs, we take care of transportation arrangements to get the body to our facility here. If the death occurs in Tucson, it's very simple. If it's up in Phoenix, we use a funeral home up there; we work with them. If it's outside of Pima County, Pinal County or Maricopa County, the family will need to contact a funeral home. But the University does pay for all transportation expenses in Pima County, Pinal County and Maricopa County and cremation expenses for everybody.

The bodies are cremated?
Yes, and during the enrollment process the family has the option to have the cremated remains returned to them. The body can be here for up to about two years. ... Some donors look for what's called "permanent preservation," which allows us to expand into different fields like plastination, which is a different way of preserving tissue so you can handle it without any exposure to toxic chemicals, like formaldehyde.

What's involved in plastination?
What it is is replacing the water and fat in the normal specimen through a process done under deep freeze. You replace the water and fat with acetone, and that allows you to then place the specimen in a vacuum chamber and silicone so you have a fairly firm durable, yet pliable, specimen you can hold. There's no risk of toxic exposure even after this has been done, so you could take it to a community college and they could still cut it or treat it however they wanted to. ... Enhancing preservation – making it more tangible for students not in a medical school environment, say, in a community college where they don't have access to this stuff – that's what I work toward.

How did you get involved with this program? What's your background?
I wanted to work at the medical examiner's office as an investigator when I was in high school. I started studying biology, and as I worked my way through that I got a part-time job in a funeral home and was exposed to that side of the industry. I just found that fascinating so I continued and then added a mortuary science background. I have a degree in mortuary science. ... I worked in funeral homes here in Tucson for about 10 1/2 years or so and then came here.

Do you remember when you saw your first deceased body?
I was actually interviewing for the part-time (funeral home) job and the manager asked me, "Have you ever been to a funeral before?" I wanted to say the right answer, so I lied and said yes, and I hadn't. And part of the interview was he walked you back to the prep room and he very dramatically opened up the prep room and somebody was being embalmed. It was sort of surreal; it wasn't disturbing. Then I got the job. I remember one weekend one of the old retired guys came in to do an embalming and I went in to hang out with him because I liked talking with him, and I was watching what he was doing and I just thought it was amazing. He was basically taking somebody who had been in the worst of shape from their disease process and making them look as close as possible to what the family remembered them being prior to (their death). That was amazing; I knew right then that that's what I needed to do. I was 19.

Why do people want to donate to the Willed Body Program?
It's an interesting question, because there is really no common denominator. Some people think it's financial – yeah, it could be. But there are also former physicians that understand the importance of giving. There are relatives of medical students that hear about what's going on so they donate. A lot of teachers or people with an educational background will donate. But there's also homemakers and just your average people that, rather than have the body simply cremated or buried, want to do something with it.

Are families supportive of the donors' decisions?

Yes. We will not take a body if there are strong objections from the family.

How important are the donated bodies to medical students' educational experience?
It adds immensely. The human body's the greatest textbook that they could ever get, and no two bodies are alike, so when they're in a room with about 30 bodies, they get a lot out of it. Then in their second year they hold a memorial service to thank the donors and their families for what they've been given, and the families come to the service. It's very impressive to watch because students are so appreciative of what they've (the families) given. And for families, it's sort of a thrill to them to see how they've been able to help. ... Then the college and students plant a tree right outside the (Arizona Health Sciences) library. There's a couple trees now with plaques that are dedicated to the donors.

Additional information on the Willed Body Program, including enrollment forms, is available online. 

Do you know someone who has an interesting job at the UA? Send his or her name and contact information to lqp@email.arizona.edu for consideration for a future Employee Q&A.