Hello, I exist.

I popped my head in for just a second, following a link. Next thing you know, I'd joined up.

(Sigh) Another password to invent; another username to invent.

What's anatomical pathology? Got some time? Go to www.rcpa.edu.au and find out. For a broader view, Dr Ed Friedlander can be found at www.pathguy.com.

Basically, what I am in training to do (having already spent four years slaving over the sick bodies of the living) is to take the excised parts sent to me by surgeons and gynaecologists, pick the diseased areas, and take samples to be made into microscope slides. Then to work the meaning of it all out.

"What is it? Did they get it all out? Will they have to go back for more?" All of these questions and more are the reason for my existence.

When not slaving over the pieces of the living, I slave over the bodies of the dead. Yes, we are the doctors who do post-mortems. Autopsies. Call them what you will; it's all the same. The knife goes in. The organs come out (all of them). Weighing and (in some cases) measuring occurs.

By virtue of long experience, we come to realise as trainee pathologists what the appearances mean. Why did this person die? That's the question. Knowing the answer is our job.

Pathology is not a sexy discipline, and anatomical pathologists are probably the least sexy. Our only claim to fame is that Forensic Pathology is our close-cousin discipline - and Forensic Pathology is VERY SEXY. Forensic Pathologists can be very sexy (and a good source of income - just ask Patricia Cornwall!). Forensic pathologists spend a lot of time dealing with people who have died very violent deaths (at least on TV they do; sometimes the excitement is mirrored in real life). But it isn't all crime and murder. Much of the time it's dead grandmothers who haven't seen their doctor in years - the law says it can't be sure how they died, so we get to find out.

If you smoke and eat too many greasy, fatty things, you too will die like most of my forensic customers do.

Alas, many of us are not much like Kay Scarpetta - Scarpetta is based on the US Medical Examiners, who are lawyer and pathologist sort of rolled into one. Here we have coroners to handle the interface between law and medicine. Which leaves us free to do more surgical work. And autopsies.

And sit for exams. Yawn. Which of my weekend days shall I sacrifice to study this time around? Hmmm....Okay, enough! See you later...