Chapter 1, Lesson 7: The Language of Medicine

Flashcards from Chapter 1, Lesson 7 of McGraw Hill Anatomy and Physiology, Ninth Edition, by Kenneth S. Saladin.

Renaissance naming conventions

Structures were named after people or varied across countries

Worldwide naming conventions

Established in 1895, unique Latin names were used

Modern naming conventions

Established in 1998 in the Terminologia Anatomica, providing Latin and English equivalents

Scientific terms

Root (stem) with a core meaning, with vowels to join roots and prefixes to modify the root meaning

Acronyms

Pronounceable words formed from the first letter or first few letters of a series of words (e.g. PET scan)

Plural forms

Many forms; cortex - cortices, corpus - corpora

Adjectives

Follow the noun it modifies; biceps brachii

Adjectival forms

Different than the noun form, e.g. brachium (n., arm) vs brachii (adj., of the arm)

Spelling

Very important - some are spelled similarly with very different meanings