Anatomical Terminology
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You may hear, many times, during watching TV programs or through your general lives, terminology that's unfamiliar to you. It's often medical or anatomical. So, what we are going to do now, is to go through some of this terminology. The first thing that we need to understand is that the body, in the first place, has to be set up in the anatomical position. The recognized anatomical position is to stand with the palms facing the front. This is classed as the anatomical position. The first thing we need to consider is the midline. The midline is the centre. It cuts us from our nose all the way down to between our feet. Going off from there, anything anterior is to the front of the midline. Anything posterior is to the rear of the midline.
We also have things like proximal and distal. Proximal is the nearest point, whereas distal would be the furthest away point. We also have inferior and superior. Superior is higher up, whereas inferior is lower down. Another terminology you might hear is also medial and lateral. Anything medial would be towards the midline, whereas anything lateral is away from the midline. And the final one that we should consider is the word sub, and sub means below, underneath.