Sterling students' human anatomy training is a cut above thanks to virtual dissection table

STERLING — Sterling High School students are using a tool of technology to peel back the layers of the human body for an up close and intimate view of human anatomy.

An anatomage table is an interactive virtual dissection tool that lets students explore the human body in 3D. The table uses advanced imaging technology to provide high-resolution images of human anatomy that students can use to dissect digital cadavers and peel back layers to view organs, muscles and other bodily systems in action.

Amy Downs, SHS director of curriculum and instruction, said the school received the $75,000 anatomage table in 2022 through a donation from the school’s ABC Boosters Club.

Virtual images are made using thousands of 2D photographs of organs and systems from real cadavers. The photos then are layered over each other to create 3D models. SHS teacher Nicole Schlemmer said the table also features hundreds of medical case files that students can pull up and explore with just a touch.

“The table allows students to get super specific and pull up things like only the muscular or skeletal system,” Schlemmer said. “They can rotate those models, and there’s also animations where you can see the different muscles and how they move. They can animate the heart and they can even pick a body part and look at it on a cellular level like you would under a microscope.”

Kate Austin is a senior at SHS with plans to major in nursing at Illinois State University. She said the table helps reinforce what she learns in the classroom.

“There’s real people programmed into the table, and we’re learning about how they died, what they had going on in their bodies, and we can see everything going on in there,” Austin said. “Being able to manipulate each portion of the body that we’re learning about is probably the best feature.”

Schlemmer said she uses the anatomage table to enhance her anatomy and physiology curriculum and has seen a noticeable improvement in her students' comprehension of the material.

“I teach the content with notes in the classroom and then we go use the table to see it in action,” Schlemmer said. “I have lots of recordings and images from the table screenshot into my notes so that everything aligns with the table. The students are memorizing the body parts, bones and systems better because they can see them in action; they can rotate them and look inside.”