Welcome to Human Anatomy!

This course has specifically been designed for pre-professional health care students. It is unlike other course materials offered in the anatomical sciences at the undergraduate level because this is a “concepts” driven course. Yes, anatomical concepts - we are not just memorizing facts and numbers.  You will be learning, and using!, basic vocabulary throughout this course – and while we will be identifying structures we will examine them in light of their name, form (cell and tissue components), and their relationship to the entire organism. That is to say, there is an emphasis on understanding the relationships between cell type, organ function, and the health of the organism. We will continually reflect on what was previously learned to ensure good retention of necessary information that will aid you in advanced studies - and we will work to develop relevant connections between concepts and critical reasoning skills.

This is a systems based course. It is presented in four units: Intro and skeletal, muscular system, nervous system, and organ systems. We will begin our study with descriptive terms and learn some basics about the tissues of the body. This has largely been done to get people thinking about how we can better repair, and indeed engineer, the human body. Throughout the course we will continuously consider what tissues could be harvested from one organ for use in another organ– or indeed from another animal, or person, with little risk of rejection.

Our study of the skeletal system is intensive and requires good memorization or language skills. If you possess neither you will learn from a variety of techniques how to master this type (visual - verbal) and volume of information. We will then focus on the muscular system.  Because muscles attach to the skeletal system the muscular and skeletal systems have many terms that overlap and reinforce one another – having strong foundation knowledge of the skeletal system will facilitate the learning of muscle names and indeed actions.

Our third unit will be that of the nervous system. Once again we will reflect, and review, the musculoskeletal system in the light of nervous innervation (supply). Although it might seem frightening to consider now – by the end of this course you will be able to state what nerve innervates what region or tissue within the body and what loss of function (action) would occur if a nerve were severed and a muscle no longer had innervation. This is easily done because nerves supplying a structure or region have a name similar to that of a bone or bone feature – and this in turn has a relationship to muscle names. I hope that readers can now appreciate that this course provides constant repetition of foundation material relevant to medical studies.

The final unit is comprised of organ systems.  While we will be reviewing some features of organs that you already know it is envisaged that you will learn more information related to form and function - and gain a new appreciation for the cells and tissues that create our organ systems. We will reflect back on the musculoskeletal and nervous systems by considering what skeletal elements protect, or could cause damage to, underlying organs – and what nerves have could be impaired or damaged during surgical procedures.

Students who have completed advanced anatomical studies at Oakland University have contributed to this e-publication. They have worked to design our pre and post lecture quizzes and have reviewed the course material in order to optimize your learning. We should all appreciate their efforts in keeping the material relevant from the student perspective yet maintaining the rigor necessary for advanced coursework. Specifically we should thank Erika Johnson for her contributions to Unit 1 (skeletal studies), Amaal Haimout for her contributions to Unit 2 (muscle studies), Emily Fitgerald for her contributions to Unit 3 (neurological studies), and Kirsten Mowry for her contributions to Unit 4 (organ systems studies). Further, Kirsten Mowry and Chris Copper have created the muscle charts for student use.

It is our hope that you came upon these studies excited about the prospects of a career in medicine – or just plainly excited about studying anatomy. It is our greater hope that you come away from this course with an increased fascination and marvel regarding the human body.