October 31, 2025 • 30 mins
Skeleton
In this episode The Real Anatomist, Dr David Robson, introduces the human skeleton in his inimitable way.
Discussing the development of our bones, the fascinating history of us, the developing human form, the Romans, the Greeks, referring back to the 1st Century when some of the parts of the skeleton were named.
And absolutely fascinating facts...eg did you know 96k miles of arteries in the human body?
There is some comparative anatomy.
General conversation about the topic, including when a child is growing should they be protected against damaging these developing bones.
If you have any questions or comments, do can get in touch with Dr David and we can answer personally or answer on next months podcast which will be released on 1st December. The
Thanks for listening.
Dr David Robson and Alison Craig
Dr David Robson is a practicing Anatomist who lives and works in Edinburgh.
Click here to contact Dr David Robson directly
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_02 (00:00):
You're listening to the Real Anatomist podcast with
myself Alison Craig and Dr.
David Robson M D M A who is TheReal Anatomist.
If you like the podcast, pleasesubscribe and share.
Thanks.
Well welcome along to The RealAnatomist with myself Alison
(00:21):
Craig in conversation with Dr.
David Robson, MDMA, and uh apracticing anatomist living in
Edinburgh, Scotland.
Thank you to everybody that'sbeen listening to the podcast
and the feedback we've beenhaving's been great, hasn't it?
SPEAKER_00 (00:35):
It has.
Yeah, so it has.
It surely days.
SPEAKER_02 (00:38):
Yeah, very early days.
Last month we finished by givinga little taster of which I know
is a massive part of this wholetopic, which is of course the
human skeleton.
And so we are going to becovering that today.
Not all of it, obviously, butmaking a start.
And uh also I think I'd like toask you about your mentor as
(00:59):
well this month, Dr.
Barlow.
So um yeah, let's crack on.
Too many questions, and I'm suresome more astounding facts.
So thanks for listening to TheReal Anatomist with myself,
Alison Craig, and David.
Okay, let's start with theskeleton.
Let's start with the skeleton.
SPEAKER_00 (01:17):
As you mentioned, the last time the human skull
consists of 206 independentbones, 308 in a newborn baby.
The human skeleton in itself isan inert frame.
It's a series of independentlevers of which the muscles can
act on to put the body intodifferent positions.
(01:38):
It also acts as a protectionmechanism for essential organs
like the brain, which is encasedwithin the skull, the spinal
cord, which is encased withinthe neural canal of the
vertebral column.
The heart and lungs areprotected within inside the
thoracic cage, composed of thethoracic vertebrae, the ribs,
(01:59):
laterally and the sternumanterior.
Because it's an inner frame, itactually the long bones have a
central canal which contains themouth, which is where you get
red blood cells.
And the skeleton also acts as areservoir for certain minerals,
(02:19):
particularly calcium.
To go through all of theskeleton itself is a big topic.
So I'll do it in a way thathopefully you will understand.
The skeleton itself is actuallydivided up into two parts an
axial skeleton and anappendicular part.
(02:41):
The axial skeleton consists ofthe skull, vertical column,
ribs, sternum.
The appendicular part of theskeleton consists of the bones
of the limbs, the upper limb andthe lower limb and the pelvis.
So if we take the axial skeletonfirst and we look at the bones
of the head in particular, thereare 29 bones altogether on the
(03:04):
head.
SPEAKER_02 (03:05):
Does that include the neck or is this just the No,
this is just the skull, this isjust the head.
SPEAKER_00 (03:11):
So that the and the skull itself consists of eight
skulls which form the cranium orthe calvarum, which is the top
of the skull.
Eight bones.
Fourteen bones form the bones ofthe face.
Then you have six ossicles.
These are the very small bonesfound in the ear.
And you have the mandible andthe hyoid bone.
(03:34):
The smallest bone in the humanbody is the stapes.
It's two millimeters long.
SPEAKER_02 (03:42):
Where's that?
In the ear.
SPEAKER_00 (03:44):
It's one of the three ossicles in the ear.
And the three ossicles in theear are the malleus, the incus,
and the stepes.
Hammer, anvil, and stirrup.
To give them the name.
And stirp, because when you lookat them, the stepes represents
that of a stirrup.
The malleus is the hammer.
And the incus is the anvil.
SPEAKER_02 (04:06):
So it's a nice way for people to remember the.
SPEAKER_00 (04:08):
A nice way to remember the three small bones
within the ear.
SPEAKER_02 (04:12):
Because last week, last month, we touched on the
clavicle.
And you said that was called theclavicle because turned on its
side.
SPEAKER_00 (04:22):
It presents a woman key.
It's derived from the Latinclavis, which means key.
SPEAKER_02 (04:37):
Who developed the names?
SPEAKER_00 (04:39):
The names of the of the human skeleton is debatable.
We don't really fully understandwho give the names to the bones.
We know that a physician calledRufus of Ephesus.
SPEAKER_02 (04:54):
Easy for you to see.
SPEAKER_00 (04:55):
Yeah.
In the first century, he gavethe names to certain bones.
SPEAKER_02 (04:59):
Did you say the first century?
SPEAKER_00 (05:00):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (05:01):
Yeah.
I like to just clarify thatbecause sometimes I think that I
must have been.
SPEAKER_00 (05:04):
And a chap that we've already mentioned in the
previous podcast called ClaudiusGalen.
He described and named thesacrum and the coccycks.
SPEAKER_02 (05:14):
When was he around?
SPEAKER_00 (05:16):
First century.
SPEAKER_02 (05:16):
He was the first century.
Remarkable.
SPEAKER_00 (05:22):
So But a lot of names for the bones of the
skeleton are derived from Latin.
SPEAKER_01 (05:27):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (05:28):
Ancient Greek.
And the names really haven'tchanged at all.
If you go to the next part ofthe axis column, which is the
vertebral.
The vertebral columns consistsof 33 bones.
24 are movable.
That's nine are fused.
SPEAKER_02 (05:49):
And Suleman like myself, is that your back, your
spine?
SPEAKER_00 (05:53):
Yeah, it's just spine, vertebral column.
So you have seven cervical,twelfth thoracic, five lumbar,
five circular, which is fused toform one triangular-shaped bone,
and four coccyle, which formsthe rudimentary tail bone.
The true vertebral column arethe movable ones.
Okay.
Alright?
(06:14):
And that's 24.
The uppermost one is called theatlas.
And the atlas is unusual.
It's actually named after themythological Titan, an atlas,
who held the world above hisshoulders.
And that's where it gets itsname from.
SPEAKER_01 (06:33):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (06:34):
The other thing that makes it unusual is that the
atlas has no body.
It's just doing a bone.
SPEAKER_01 (06:42):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (06:42):
But it has no body.
The body for the atlas is theupper projection of the second
cervical vertebrae called theaxis.
And the upper projection iscalled the odonti process.
That is the body for the atlas.
SPEAKER_02 (06:59):
So when they're talking about the atlas being
the thing that's supporting thehead being the support, it's
actually so in the skeleton andanatomy, the atlas is supporting
the skull.
SPEAKER_00 (07:12):
And the only movement permitted between the
atlas and the the occipacondylesof the skull is nodding.
You can only nod.
It's the only movement thattakes place.
The movement between the atlasand the axis is rotation.
The atlas rotates around yourdontite process.
SPEAKER_02 (07:32):
It's really interesting how these words ping
up in your brain.
When you say atlas, you realizethat's been called that for
centuries and centuries.
SPEAKER_00 (07:40):
But then when they find out way back to Greek
mythological times.
SPEAKER_02 (07:44):
And then when they find out that the world wasn't
flat, it was round.
And that becomes the ball, itbecomes the sphere.
SPEAKER_00 (07:54):
Now you can understand why it's called the
atlas, because it's actuallysupporting the skull.
Seven true ribs attached to thesternum.
(08:18):
Three false and two floaters.
SPEAKER_02 (08:22):
Yeah, what's that?
I mean that is that a designfault or what's the point?
SPEAKER_00 (08:25):
No, no, it's it's just how the body is designed.
The seven true ribs attached tothe sternum.
The three false ones attached tothe cartilage directly above
each one.
And the f the floaters attachedto the muscles of the abdominal
wall.
SPEAKER_02 (08:43):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (08:43):
And they're called the floaters.
SPEAKER_02 (08:45):
But they are attached.
Are they attached to the bones?
SPEAKER_00 (08:47):
Yeah, but they're not attached to the bone,
they're called floaters.
So they don't they don't have auh an attachment to cartilage.
SPEAKER_02 (08:57):
Last week last month, we talked about these
bones in the back of the neck,and you said that the human
skeleton has seven cervicalvertebrae.
And I told several people, Iasked them the question, I said,
you know, a giraffe's neck.
(09:19):
I said, you know, I explained.
Do you know just a couple offriends because I found I found
it absolutely astounding.
Said to a few friends, right,we've got seven cervical
vertebrates.
I probably didn't call themthat, I was trying to, but and I
said, How many do you think agiraffe's got?
And everybody said 120 or 82 oryou know, a ludicrously high
number because but just remindus of the seven seven, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (09:43):
There were seven cervicular vertebrates in a
giraffe.
SPEAKER_02 (09:45):
So is that the same in all animals?
I mean no.
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (09:50):
No.
Some animals have more, somehave less.
SPEAKER_02 (09:52):
Because the comparative anatomy is a
fascinating part of the subjectas well.
SPEAKER_00 (09:56):
Yeah, because you bring it in to help to
understand human anatomy,particularly where the organs
are not concerned or the musclesare concerned.
But yeah, and in the giraffe,there's definitely only seven.
But they're much bigger thanours.
But only seven.
SPEAKER_02 (10:11):
And uh you started off by saying that we have two
hundred and six bones.
SPEAKER_00 (10:16):
Um that's what we end up with.
Yeah.
That's the normal arrangement.
But I'll just finish off doingthe appendicular skeleton first,
and that means we've done theaxial skeleton and then I'll
talk about.
The appendicular skeletonconsists of the pelvic girdle.
Oh, going back to the axialskeleton, you also have the
(10:38):
shoulder girdle, and thatcomprises the clavicle.
Latin clavus, meaning turn it upand a key or the scapula, or the
shoulder blade.
(11:01):
And then you have the femur inthe thigh, the lower leg
consists of the tibia and thefibula, and then you end up with
the foot.
The number of bones in the footis 26, the number of bones in
the hand, which we didn'tmention for the appendicular
scan, is 27.
There's one more in the handthan there is in the foot.
(11:24):
Put all of those numberstogether, you'll get 206 bones.
SPEAKER_02 (11:27):
And if our this is again potentially a dark
question, but if our twos werelonger.
SPEAKER_00 (11:33):
Some people do have long tools.
SPEAKER_02 (11:34):
Could we use them the way that we use our hands or
fingers?
No.
unknown (11:38):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (11:38):
But if you watch it an orangutan, they have long
digits.
And the anatomy of the hand isthe same as the foot, or the
foot is the same as the hand.
The only difference is we canoppose with a thumb and little
finger, but we can't oppose thegreat toe and a little toe.
But you can in an anthropoidape.
(11:59):
And the old world monkeys youcan.
And an orangutan can, but wecan't.
The number of bones that a childhas or a baby has is 308, which
These are separate bones, theseare called epiphyses because the
head of the femur is separate,the gratitude can't have the
femur is separate.
So during development, theystart to migrate together in the
(12:21):
fuse.
And that's how the number isreduced from 308 to 206.
SPEAKER_02 (12:27):
And at what age do these bones are they set the way
as an adult?
SPEAKER_00 (12:33):
As an adult, by the time you're 25, all the bones
are fully set.
SPEAKER_02 (12:36):
What struck me about that was the amount of physical
exercise that kids havenaturally, they're all running
around, you know, and certainlyclimbing trees and leaping
around.
Um and of course they get brokenbones and and whatnot.
But some of the more extremetraining, for instance, a child
might go through if it's perhapsgoing to be identified as a
(12:58):
potential you know, rugby playeror a football player or a
gymnast, are are they notdamaging their development and
the the the coming together ofthese bones by training and
playing away?
SPEAKER_00 (13:13):
And yes, but if you had to take a long bone, you
have the shaft which is thediaphysis.
And at each end you have thegrown ends of the bone, and
that's the epiphyses, and it'sthe grown ends that are
responsible for the length ofthe bone by telling the bone is
fully developed.
And that's the epiphyses.
And they're separate duringdevelopment, and then they fuse
with the shaft.
(13:35):
So yeah, if you're doing anintense sport training, there's
always the possibility that youcan damage the bones by
fractures and that.
SPEAKER_01 (13:43):
Oh yes.
SPEAKER_00 (13:45):
And the strongest bone in the human body is the
femur.
SPEAKER_02 (13:49):
Which is the thigh bone.
SPEAKER_00 (13:51):
And its other name is the os femoris.
That's its other name.
The interesting thing about thetibia and the fibula and the
lower leg is the tibia is knownas the flute because it
represents the wind instrument.
And if you look at the fibula,that is derived from the Latin
(14:13):
word for brooch because itrepresents a Roman brooch.
Because of its shape.
Because it's this the fibula isnot just a straight bone, it
actually slightly spiralsaround.
So yeah, you get different namesfor different bones if you go
back to it in history.
SPEAKER_02 (14:31):
Yeah, so these names were given, it just shows you
how incredibly sophisticated theRomans were.
Oh the Romans were, so were theGreeks.
SPEAKER_00 (14:37):
Flutes and brooches.
But they were, you see, becauseit the tibia represents this
flute, this musical instrument,because it's hollow.
And it's and the shaft of thelong bone is just hollow, and in
there you have the bone marrow.
And in the bone marrow, that'swhere your red blood cells are
being produced.
SPEAKER_02 (14:56):
So if you were a father of a 14-year-old boy,
let's just this is a random,probably using this as an
example because my son played alot of rugby when he was that
kind of age.
Um that crashing they do intoeach other and you know,
tackling and all that, andfootballs, you know, it's all
quite rough and tumble,obviously.
(15:18):
It's been discouraging uh, youknow, your child's it's
difficult.
SPEAKER_00 (15:22):
Yeah.
It's very difficult to stopchildren from playing a sport.
But it's it's changing becausefootball, they're now trying to
restrict the heading of the ballbecause there's a direct link
now between that and dementia.
Yeah.
The same with the same the samewith sport.
Contact.
Contact sport, particularly inrugby, especially the scrum
(15:45):
because the heads are gettingbanged together.
SPEAKER_01 (15:46):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:47):
So you have to be careful.
SPEAKER_01 (15:48):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:49):
And then of course you have the more serious side
of it all, particularly inrugby, where some players
unfortunately end up with abroken neck.
unknown (15:56):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (15:58):
You can become paralyzed from the neck down.
SPEAKER_00 (16:00):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And like in some, there's aninstance last week where Fram,
the cyclist, he was in ahorrendous accident and had to
have emergency surgery becausehe fractured one of his lumbar
vertebrae.
That requires surgery.
If if you're young and you'redoing your sport and you're very
careful, you're okay.
(16:21):
It's the amount of sport thatyou do during your life.
Unfortunately, you think, oh,it's all great, but
unfortunately it comes back tohaunt you when you get older.
I was gonna ask.
Because people tend to developarthritis because of the damage
to the joints.
SPEAKER_02 (16:33):
Okay, and so that's what arthritis is, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00 (16:35):
Well it's arthritis is considered as wear and tear.
Yeah.
If you take, and again it's acontroversial subject because of
arthritis, but if you take thebones of the human skeleton, you
just take one, take one bone,just take the feminine.
The bones are covered in aprotective membrane, covered by
(16:56):
perosterum.
And the best way to describethis is to think of getting a
piece of cling filament andwrapping your salmage or your
cucumber up in cling filament,it's protecting the food.
It's the same principle for theperostum, protecting the bone.
So if you get a compoundfraction and the bone shoots
(17:17):
through the skin, it's acompound fracture, it'll tear
the peroster.
And that perosterum is importantbecause it's helping to protect
the bones.
And all bones in the skeletonare called in periosterum.
So what happens is when I saywear and test it's because we're
overshooting my hands or myknees, whatever arteries that
we're doing, over a long periodof time it's going to rub away.
SPEAKER_02 (17:38):
Anyway, no matter what you do.
SPEAKER_00 (17:39):
Yeah, it doesn't matter basically.
What happens then is thatbecause that periostum has been
rubbed away, the surface ofbones will come into contact.
And it's that friction, thatrubbing, that starts for
osteoarthritis.
And you can see that if you lookat skeletons that have been dug
up in archaeological sites.
(18:07):
Of osteoarthritis, particularly.
(18:27):
And the swelling, but not thebones.
SPEAKER_02 (18:30):
And is there anything people can do to help
that or to prevent it to try todo that?
SPEAKER_00 (18:34):
You can't, not really like you know the
overseer will just have a goodsense of diet, have your your
greens, your vegetables, youknow, drink your water and that.
But it depends on the type ofjob that you're doing.
SPEAKER_02 (18:45):
Yeah, of course, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (18:46):
It's like it's like it's like writers, artists that
are constantly writing all thetime.
The hands are in a particularposition like that for writing.
See the way I've got thefingers?
Yeah, turning like that.
But what can happen is theperson slowly over a long period
(19:07):
of time, the little finger inthe ring finger will start to
curl in.
And that's called a Dupatron'scontraction.
It's where the fibre sheathcurving the tendons tightens up
and the tendons become involved,and you get a Dupatron's
contraction.
It's a simple operation, youmake an incision and you release
(19:28):
it.
Named after a French surgeoncalled Baron Georges Dropatron.
First amongst surgeons, lastamongst men.
He had a terrible reputation.
But when he died, he left hismoney to endow a chair of
pathological anatomy andpathology.
SPEAKER_02 (19:47):
So he came good in the end.
He came good in the end.
Literally in the end when hedied.
SPEAKER_00 (19:52):
So yeah, so the skeleton is fascinating.
SPEAKER_02 (19:55):
It is, I mean, it's a lot to sort of take in.
So what I'm going to do, ifyou're not going to be able to
do that.
SPEAKER_00 (19:58):
But it is because if if if if we mentioned the hands,
the 27 bones of the hand,divided up into three parts, you
have the wrist.
And the wrist consists of twobracelets of bones, of which
there are eight.
Then you have the fivemetacarpal bones, and then you
have the digits made up of thephalanges.
(20:19):
Fourteen in total, two for thethumb and three for each finger.
Five metacarpals, eight carpisbones.
In the foot, it's seven tarsusbones.
Five metatarsals, but fourteenphalanges.
It's a lot to take in.
It's a lot to take in, and thenthe bones of the carpets have
(20:41):
all got the owner and betiscularnames.
They're collectively known ascar carpus.
And then you've got differentshapes of bones.
You have the long bones, whichare particularly relevant for
the limbs, like the humus in theupper arm.
Latin name for that is humerus.
Just later on they stuck an Hon, that's why it's called the
(21:03):
humus.
SPEAKER_02 (21:04):
Somebody was having a joke.
SPEAKER_00 (21:06):
And then you have the radius and the ulna, the two
for one bones.
And then you come down to thewrist and you have the eight
carpet bones.
And the eight the names of theeight carpet bones are you have
the trapezium, the trapezoid,the capitate, the hamate, the
pysiform, the scaphoid, and theloneid, and the tricretal.
(21:28):
They're the eight bones thatmake up the carpal bones of the
wrist.
SPEAKER_02 (21:32):
That's just the wrist, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (21:33):
That's just the wrist.
And then the foot, the seventosser bones is the tailus, the
calcaneum, and the navicular,the major lateral cuneiforms,
and the cuboid.
And that's the seven.
SPEAKER_02 (21:47):
There's a lot to learn.
And I always like to reiteratethis every podcast that you
never refer to notes.
Everything you talk about is inthe mind.
Yeah, it's in the mindsomewhere.
Makes it sound like you'remaking it up, but it's off the
top of your head.
It's all off the top of yourhead.
Yeah, which is which isremarkable.
SPEAKER_00 (22:07):
And then so and then you show that long bones, the
bones of the wrist, or shortbones.
Right.
Because in a confined space.
So they're there for strength.
Flap bones consist of thescapula for muscular touchings,
flat bones for the skull,particularly for the calvaum of
the cranium.
(22:27):
You have irregular shape bones.
These are bones pertaining tothe vertebral column, because
they are regular shaped.
And the second, because it's atriangular red shape bone.
Then you have funny littlebones, other names for bones,
called pneumatic bones.
(22:48):
In the skull, and they'reactually the two tables of the
skull bones.
And the substance in between isthe diploe.
And one of through them isveins, which we'll discuss later
on in the podcast.
But as the bones are developingin that that actually changes.
(23:09):
And you end up with sinuses inthe bones.
Like the Maxov sinus on theface, or the frontal sinus of
the brow.
And the mastoid sinus.
Yeah, these are air sinuses.
They contain air.
SPEAKER_02 (23:27):
And are we born with them?
SPEAKER_00 (23:28):
Oh yeah, yeah.
But they're there, they justdevelop.
And the bones that are relatedto them are known as pneumatic
bones.
And then you have other bones,extra little bones, called
Wormion bones.
W-O-M-I-A-N, named after OlafWormian, the anatomist who first
described them in the 1600s.
(23:50):
And these are tiny little bonesin relationship to the sutures.
If you look at the skull, it hassutures, particularly the
lamboid suture at the backbetween the parietal bones and
the occipital bone.
You'll have these little bones,and they're called warmion
bones.
Wormion bones, and then you haveanother little set of bones,
(24:12):
which aren't really in theseries of the main skeleton.
And these these ones are calledepiteric bones.
These are like scale-leg bones,tiny little scale-leg bones,
which are always associated withthe anterolateral sinus.
(24:33):
Of the skull.
It's not sinus fontanelle.
And on the school you have theanterior frontanelle between the
two frontal bones and the front.
It's very soft, yeah, it'striangular shape, and the last
one to close is the anteriorfrontanelle, closes by the age
of two.
And they're important,particularly the anterior
fontanelle.
(24:54):
Because if you needed to get itan antibiotic in fast into a
newborn baby, you could actuallyput it in through the anti
frontanelle straight into thesuperior venous satural sinus.
Yeah, yeah, you can get inquick.
SPEAKER_02 (25:10):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:11):
So they're different classes of bones as opposed to
the main bones that we've justdescribed.
SPEAKER_02 (25:16):
But they're all categorized as bones.
Oh yes, okay from the top to thetube, literally.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:22):
The way they say that the scale-like bones is
because the vision we developedfrom the fish.
SPEAKER_02 (25:27):
Yes.
So what is the resemblancebetween a scale-like bone and a
fish?
SPEAKER_00 (25:32):
Well, if you look at the fish, fish all have scales.
Yes.
They're very fine, differentshapes.
It's the same principle forthese epiteric bones on this on
the human skull.
So they're tiny.
They're not always there,they're they're rare, but
occasionally you will you'llcome across them.
SPEAKER_02 (25:45):
They're not always there.
No.
SPEAKER_00 (25:48):
No, because the the anterior lateral fontanelle at
the front isn't always present.
The anterior one is and theposterior one is.
But again, with the posteriorfontanelle, sometimes that can
be missing as well.
SPEAKER_02 (26:00):
So at the at this point in our evolution, these
little bones are they don't havea purpose then, or they're just
fading out from our development.
SPEAKER_00 (26:12):
But if if you have them at the anterior lateral
fontanelle, instead of thatbeing soft, you have this little
scale like bone filling in thegap.
SPEAKER_02 (26:19):
Which must be, as an anatomist, a fascinating thing
to see.
SPEAKER_00 (26:22):
It is.
SPEAKER_02 (26:24):
So I mean, if you say something a bit further back
down the food chain, which Ithink I've used that expression
about some of the boyfriends Ihad when I was younger, that
could actually be the case.
SPEAKER_00 (26:33):
Well, that's a different story.
SPEAKER_01 (26:38):
Wow.
SPEAKER_00 (26:39):
So that's giving an introduction to the human
skeleton.
SPEAKER_02 (26:45):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (26:45):
The normative arrangement is in the adult
skeleton of 206 bonds.
But nature decides sometimes toput a span on the works.
SPEAKER_01 (26:57):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (26:58):
And maybe it.
Or two may be fused.
Or nature may give you an extrarib in the neck, called a
cervical rib.
SPEAKER_02 (27:09):
In the neck.
SPEAKER_00 (27:10):
In the neck, yeah.
Yeah, but it takes a torsionfrom the transverse process of
the seventh cervical vertebra,which has the longest spine of
the cervical vertebra and isknown as the vertebrae
prominence.
And that can be a cervical rib,and it can be unilateral or
bilateral, meaning it can be onone side or on both sides.
SPEAKER_02 (27:28):
So as a you know work person walking around that
knows nothing about the anatomy,let's just say me, because that
would be the case.
But if I have a sore back or asore neck, you know, and I go to
you know the doctor and say I'vegot a sore back or a sore neck,
they're not going to take intoaccount any of these potential
anomalies.
SPEAKER_00 (27:46):
No, no, you're only sure when if an x-ray is taken.
unknown (27:49):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (27:50):
You know, if you've got if a person goes to
vegetables rib, then they cancause a nerve of vascular
problem with the upper arm.
Right.
Because it depends on thedevelopment of it.
And then nature throws anotherspan in the works and we will
have about twelve ribs.
From time to time, nature willchuck another rib in and it'll
be known as a lumbar rib.
SPEAKER_02 (28:11):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (28:12):
And that arises from the first lumbar vertebrae.
SPEAKER_02 (28:16):
Gosh.
And could you tell that if youput your hands on a patient that
they've got that extra rib?
SPEAKER_00 (28:20):
Yeah, but it's very rare that one.
SPEAKER_02 (28:22):
Very rare.
SPEAKER_00 (28:22):
That one's very rare.
SPEAKER_02 (28:24):
Have you come across it?
SPEAKER_00 (28:25):
Once.
SPEAKER_02 (28:26):
Once.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:27):
Yeah, so a long time ago, and it was much smaller.
But it was a lumbar rib.
It came from the transverseprocessor value one.
So you see, you just never know.
The plan is everything there.
We should have 206 bones, 650muscles, 96,000 miles of
(28:47):
arteries in the in the humanbody.
How many?
96,000 miles.
That'll go around the worldthree times.
Yeah, stress.
Okay, that'll just just littleexamples.
But then from time to timenature will just change the
plant slightly.
(29:11):
Nice shaft, nice and smooth, andthen from time to time it'll
produce a spur.
A suprachondylar spur.
Always on the inside.
And attached to that, that'd bea tiny little ligament going
down to the medial epicondyle.
(29:32):
The suprachondyle ligament ofStruthers.
Struthers was a famous surgeonand anatomist who first
described it.
And sometimes if that's burned,I'll reinforce this in later
podcasts.
But if this happened, thensometimes the median nerve can
come down with a bicular andactually pass through the little
space between the ligament andthe shaft of the humus, which is
(29:55):
unusual.
But can be common in animals.
SPEAKER_02 (30:00):
Particularly the monkeys.
Monkeys.
SPEAKER_00 (30:02):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (30:03):
We're not that far away, are we?
SPEAKER_00 (30:08):
And as I've said before, this is what makes the
whole subject interest.
SPEAKER_02 (30:13):
You're listening to the Real Anatomist Podcast with
myself, Alison Craig, and Dr.
David Robson, M D MA, who is theReal Anatomist.
If you like the podcast, pleasesubscribe and share.
Thanks.
You're listening to the Real Anatomist podcast with
myself Alison Craig and Dr.
David Robson M D M A who is TheReal Anatomist.
If you like the podcast, pleasesubscribe and share.
Thanks.
Well welcome along to The RealAnatomist with myself Alison
(00:21):
Craig in conversation with Dr.
David Robson, MDMA, and uh apracticing anatomist living in
Edinburgh, Scotland.
Thank you to everybody that'sbeen listening to the podcast
and the feedback we've beenhaving's been great, hasn't it?
SPEAKER_00 (00:35):
It has.
Yeah, so it has.
It surely days.
SPEAKER_02 (00:38):
Yeah, very early days.
Last month we finished by givinga little taster of which I know
is a massive part of this wholetopic, which is of course the
human skeleton.
And so we are going to becovering that today.
Not all of it, obviously, butmaking a start.
And uh also I think I'd like toask you about your mentor as
(00:59):
well this month, Dr.
Barlow.
So um yeah, let's crack on.
Too many questions, and I'm suresome more astounding facts.
So thanks for listening to TheReal Anatomist with myself,
Alison Craig, and David.
Okay, let's start with theskeleton.
Let's start with the skeleton.
SPEAKER_00 (01:17):
As you mentioned, the last time the human skull
consists of 206 independentbones, 308 in a newborn baby.
The human skeleton in itself isan inert frame.
It's a series of independentlevers of which the muscles can
act on to put the body intodifferent positions.
(01:38):
It also acts as a protectionmechanism for essential organs
like the brain, which is encasedwithin the skull, the spinal
cord, which is encased withinthe neural canal of the
vertebral column.
The heart and lungs areprotected within inside the
thoracic cage, composed of thethoracic vertebrae, the ribs,
(01:59):
laterally and the sternumanterior.
Because it's an inner frame, itactually the long bones have a
central canal which contains themouth, which is where you get
red blood cells.
And the skeleton also acts as areservoir for certain minerals,
(02:19):
particularly calcium.
To go through all of theskeleton itself is a big topic.
So I'll do it in a way thathopefully you will understand.
The skeleton itself is actuallydivided up into two parts an
axial skeleton and anappendicular part.
(02:41):
The axial skeleton consists ofthe skull, vertical column,
ribs, sternum.
The appendicular part of theskeleton consists of the bones
of the limbs, the upper limb andthe lower limb and the pelvis.
So if we take the axial skeletonfirst and we look at the bones
of the head in particular, thereare 29 bones altogether on the
(03:04):
head.
SPEAKER_02 (03:05):
Does that include the neck or is this just the No,
this is just the skull, this isjust the head.
SPEAKER_00 (03:11):
So that the and the skull itself consists of eight
skulls which form the cranium orthe calvarum, which is the top
of the skull.
Eight bones.
Fourteen bones form the bones ofthe face.
Then you have six ossicles.
These are the very small bonesfound in the ear.
And you have the mandible andthe hyoid bone.
(03:34):
The smallest bone in the humanbody is the stapes.
It's two millimeters long.
SPEAKER_02 (03:42):
Where's that?
In the ear.
SPEAKER_00 (03:44):
It's one of the three ossicles in the ear.
And the three ossicles in theear are the malleus, the incus,
and the stepes.
Hammer, anvil, and stirrup.
To give them the name.
And stirp, because when you lookat them, the stepes represents
that of a stirrup.
The malleus is the hammer.
And the incus is the anvil.
SPEAKER_02 (04:06):
So it's a nice way for people to remember the.
SPEAKER_00 (04:08):
A nice way to remember the three small bones
within the ear.
SPEAKER_02 (04:12):
Because last week, last month, we touched on the
clavicle.
And you said that was called theclavicle because turned on its
side.
SPEAKER_00 (04:22):
It presents a woman key.
It's derived from the Latinclavis, which means key.
SPEAKER_02 (04:37):
Who developed the names?
SPEAKER_00 (04:39):
The names of the of the human skeleton is debatable.
We don't really fully understandwho give the names to the bones.
We know that a physician calledRufus of Ephesus.
SPEAKER_02 (04:54):
Easy for you to see.
SPEAKER_00 (04:55):
Yeah.
In the first century, he gavethe names to certain bones.
SPEAKER_02 (04:59):
Did you say the first century?
SPEAKER_00 (05:00):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (05:01):
Yeah.
I like to just clarify thatbecause sometimes I think that I
must have been.
SPEAKER_00 (05:04):
And a chap that we've already mentioned in the
previous podcast called ClaudiusGalen.
He described and named thesacrum and the coccycks.
SPEAKER_02 (05:14):
When was he around?
SPEAKER_00 (05:16):
First century.
SPEAKER_02 (05:16):
He was the first century.
Remarkable.
SPEAKER_00 (05:22):
So But a lot of names for the bones of the
skeleton are derived from Latin.
SPEAKER_01 (05:27):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (05:28):
Ancient Greek.
And the names really haven'tchanged at all.
If you go to the next part ofthe axis column, which is the
vertebral.
The vertebral columns consistsof 33 bones.
24 are movable.
That's nine are fused.
SPEAKER_02 (05:49):
And Suleman like myself, is that your back, your
spine?
SPEAKER_00 (05:53):
Yeah, it's just spine, vertebral column.
So you have seven cervical,twelfth thoracic, five lumbar,
five circular, which is fused toform one triangular-shaped bone,
and four coccyle, which formsthe rudimentary tail bone.
The true vertebral column arethe movable ones.
Okay.
Alright?
(06:14):
And that's 24.
The uppermost one is called theatlas.
And the atlas is unusual.
It's actually named after themythological Titan, an atlas,
who held the world above hisshoulders.
And that's where it gets itsname from.
SPEAKER_01 (06:33):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (06:34):
The other thing that makes it unusual is that the
atlas has no body.
It's just doing a bone.
SPEAKER_01 (06:42):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (06:42):
But it has no body.
The body for the atlas is theupper projection of the second
cervical vertebrae called theaxis.
And the upper projection iscalled the odonti process.
That is the body for the atlas.
SPEAKER_02 (06:59):
So when they're talking about the atlas being
the thing that's supporting thehead being the support, it's
actually so in the skeleton andanatomy, the atlas is supporting
the skull.
SPEAKER_00 (07:12):
And the only movement permitted between the
atlas and the the occipacondylesof the skull is nodding.
You can only nod.
It's the only movement thattakes place.
The movement between the atlasand the axis is rotation.
The atlas rotates around yourdontite process.
SPEAKER_02 (07:32):
It's really interesting how these words ping
up in your brain.
When you say atlas, you realizethat's been called that for
centuries and centuries.
SPEAKER_00 (07:40):
But then when they find out way back to Greek
mythological times.
SPEAKER_02 (07:44):
And then when they find out that the world wasn't
flat, it was round.
And that becomes the ball, itbecomes the sphere.
SPEAKER_00 (07:54):
Now you can understand why it's called the
atlas, because it's actuallysupporting the skull.
Seven true ribs attached to thesternum.
(08:18):
Three false and two floaters.
SPEAKER_02 (08:22):
Yeah, what's that?
I mean that is that a designfault or what's the point?
SPEAKER_00 (08:25):
No, no, it's it's just how the body is designed.
The seven true ribs attached tothe sternum.
The three false ones attached tothe cartilage directly above
each one.
And the f the floaters attachedto the muscles of the abdominal
wall.
SPEAKER_02 (08:43):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (08:43):
And they're called the floaters.
SPEAKER_02 (08:45):
But they are attached.
Are they attached to the bones?
SPEAKER_00 (08:47):
Yeah, but they're not attached to the bone,
they're called floaters.
So they don't they don't have auh an attachment to cartilage.
SPEAKER_02 (08:57):
Last week last month, we talked about these
bones in the back of the neck,and you said that the human
skeleton has seven cervicalvertebrae.
And I told several people, Iasked them the question, I said,
you know, a giraffe's neck.
(09:19):
I said, you know, I explained.
Do you know just a couple offriends because I found I found
it absolutely astounding.
Said to a few friends, right,we've got seven cervical
vertebrates.
I probably didn't call themthat, I was trying to, but and I
said, How many do you think agiraffe's got?
And everybody said 120 or 82 oryou know, a ludicrously high
number because but just remindus of the seven seven, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (09:43):
There were seven cervicular vertebrates in a
giraffe.
SPEAKER_02 (09:45):
So is that the same in all animals?
I mean no.
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (09:50):
No.
Some animals have more, somehave less.
SPEAKER_02 (09:52):
Because the comparative anatomy is a
fascinating part of the subjectas well.
SPEAKER_00 (09:56):
Yeah, because you bring it in to help to
understand human anatomy,particularly where the organs
are not concerned or the musclesare concerned.
But yeah, and in the giraffe,there's definitely only seven.
But they're much bigger thanours.
But only seven.
SPEAKER_02 (10:11):
And uh you started off by saying that we have two
hundred and six bones.
SPEAKER_00 (10:16):
Um that's what we end up with.
Yeah.
That's the normal arrangement.
But I'll just finish off doingthe appendicular skeleton first,
and that means we've done theaxial skeleton and then I'll
talk about.
The appendicular skeletonconsists of the pelvic girdle.
Oh, going back to the axialskeleton, you also have the
(10:38):
shoulder girdle, and thatcomprises the clavicle.
Latin clavus, meaning turn it upand a key or the scapula, or the
shoulder blade.
(11:01):
And then you have the femur inthe thigh, the lower leg
consists of the tibia and thefibula, and then you end up with
the foot.
The number of bones in the footis 26, the number of bones in
the hand, which we didn'tmention for the appendicular
scan, is 27.
There's one more in the handthan there is in the foot.
(11:24):
Put all of those numberstogether, you'll get 206 bones.
SPEAKER_02 (11:27):
And if our this is again potentially a dark
question, but if our twos werelonger.
SPEAKER_00 (11:33):
Some people do have long tools.
SPEAKER_02 (11:34):
Could we use them the way that we use our hands or
fingers?
No.
unknown (11:38):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (11:38):
But if you watch it an orangutan, they have long
digits.
And the anatomy of the hand isthe same as the foot, or the
foot is the same as the hand.
The only difference is we canoppose with a thumb and little
finger, but we can't oppose thegreat toe and a little toe.
But you can in an anthropoidape.
(11:59):
And the old world monkeys youcan.
And an orangutan can, but wecan't.
The number of bones that a childhas or a baby has is 308, which
These are separate bones, theseare called epiphyses because the
head of the femur is separate,the gratitude can't have the
femur is separate.
So during development, theystart to migrate together in the
(12:21):
fuse.
And that's how the number isreduced from 308 to 206.
SPEAKER_02 (12:27):
And at what age do these bones are they set the way
as an adult?
SPEAKER_00 (12:33):
As an adult, by the time you're 25, all the bones
are fully set.
SPEAKER_02 (12:36):
What struck me about that was the amount of physical
exercise that kids havenaturally, they're all running
around, you know, and certainlyclimbing trees and leaping
around.
Um and of course they get brokenbones and and whatnot.
But some of the more extremetraining, for instance, a child
might go through if it's perhapsgoing to be identified as a
(12:58):
potential you know, rugby playeror a football player or a
gymnast, are are they notdamaging their development and
the the the coming together ofthese bones by training and
playing away?
SPEAKER_00 (13:13):
And yes, but if you had to take a long bone, you
have the shaft which is thediaphysis.
And at each end you have thegrown ends of the bone, and
that's the epiphyses, and it'sthe grown ends that are
responsible for the length ofthe bone by telling the bone is
fully developed.
And that's the epiphyses.
And they're separate duringdevelopment, and then they fuse
with the shaft.
(13:35):
So yeah, if you're doing anintense sport training, there's
always the possibility that youcan damage the bones by
fractures and that.
SPEAKER_01 (13:43):
Oh yes.
SPEAKER_00 (13:45):
And the strongest bone in the human body is the
femur.
SPEAKER_02 (13:49):
Which is the thigh bone.
SPEAKER_00 (13:51):
And its other name is the os femoris.
That's its other name.
The interesting thing about thetibia and the fibula and the
lower leg is the tibia is knownas the flute because it
represents the wind instrument.
And if you look at the fibula,that is derived from the Latin
(14:13):
word for brooch because itrepresents a Roman brooch.
Because of its shape.
Because it's this the fibula isnot just a straight bone, it
actually slightly spiralsaround.
So yeah, you get different namesfor different bones if you go
back to it in history.
SPEAKER_02 (14:31):
Yeah, so these names were given, it just shows you
how incredibly sophisticated theRomans were.
Oh the Romans were, so were theGreeks.
SPEAKER_00 (14:37):
Flutes and brooches.
But they were, you see, becauseit the tibia represents this
flute, this musical instrument,because it's hollow.
And it's and the shaft of thelong bone is just hollow, and in
there you have the bone marrow.
And in the bone marrow, that'swhere your red blood cells are
being produced.
SPEAKER_02 (14:56):
So if you were a father of a 14-year-old boy,
let's just this is a random,probably using this as an
example because my son played alot of rugby when he was that
kind of age.
Um that crashing they do intoeach other and you know,
tackling and all that, andfootballs, you know, it's all
quite rough and tumble,obviously.
(15:18):
It's been discouraging uh, youknow, your child's it's
difficult.
SPEAKER_00 (15:22):
Yeah.
It's very difficult to stopchildren from playing a sport.
But it's it's changing becausefootball, they're now trying to
restrict the heading of the ballbecause there's a direct link
now between that and dementia.
Yeah.
The same with the same the samewith sport.
Contact.
Contact sport, particularly inrugby, especially the scrum
(15:45):
because the heads are gettingbanged together.
SPEAKER_01 (15:46):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:47):
So you have to be careful.
SPEAKER_01 (15:48):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:49):
And then of course you have the more serious side
of it all, particularly inrugby, where some players
unfortunately end up with abroken neck.
unknown (15:56):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (15:58):
You can become paralyzed from the neck down.
SPEAKER_00 (16:00):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And like in some, there's aninstance last week where Fram,
the cyclist, he was in ahorrendous accident and had to
have emergency surgery becausehe fractured one of his lumbar
vertebrae.
That requires surgery.
If if you're young and you'redoing your sport and you're very
careful, you're okay.
(16:21):
It's the amount of sport thatyou do during your life.
Unfortunately, you think, oh,it's all great, but
unfortunately it comes back tohaunt you when you get older.
I was gonna ask.
Because people tend to developarthritis because of the damage
to the joints.
SPEAKER_02 (16:33):
Okay, and so that's what arthritis is, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00 (16:35):
Well it's arthritis is considered as wear and tear.
Yeah.
If you take, and again it's acontroversial subject because of
arthritis, but if you take thebones of the human skeleton, you
just take one, take one bone,just take the feminine.
The bones are covered in aprotective membrane, covered by
(16:56):
perosterum.
And the best way to describethis is to think of getting a
piece of cling filament andwrapping your salmage or your
cucumber up in cling filament,it's protecting the food.
It's the same principle for theperostum, protecting the bone.
So if you get a compoundfraction and the bone shoots
(17:17):
through the skin, it's acompound fracture, it'll tear
the peroster.
And that perosterum is importantbecause it's helping to protect
the bones.
And all bones in the skeletonare called in periosterum.
So what happens is when I saywear and test it's because we're
overshooting my hands or myknees, whatever arteries that
we're doing, over a long periodof time it's going to rub away.
SPEAKER_02 (17:38):
Anyway, no matter what you do.
SPEAKER_00 (17:39):
Yeah, it doesn't matter basically.
What happens then is thatbecause that periostum has been
rubbed away, the surface ofbones will come into contact.
And it's that friction, thatrubbing, that starts for
osteoarthritis.
And you can see that if you lookat skeletons that have been dug
up in archaeological sites.
(18:07):
Of osteoarthritis, particularly.
(18:27):
And the swelling, but not thebones.
SPEAKER_02 (18:30):
And is there anything people can do to help
that or to prevent it to try todo that?
SPEAKER_00 (18:34):
You can't, not really like you know the
overseer will just have a goodsense of diet, have your your
greens, your vegetables, youknow, drink your water and that.
But it depends on the type ofjob that you're doing.
SPEAKER_02 (18:45):
Yeah, of course, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (18:46):
It's like it's like it's like writers, artists that
are constantly writing all thetime.
The hands are in a particularposition like that for writing.
See the way I've got thefingers?
Yeah, turning like that.
But what can happen is theperson slowly over a long period
(19:07):
of time, the little finger inthe ring finger will start to
curl in.
And that's called a Dupatron'scontraction.
It's where the fibre sheathcurving the tendons tightens up
and the tendons become involved,and you get a Dupatron's
contraction.
It's a simple operation, youmake an incision and you release
(19:28):
it.
Named after a French surgeoncalled Baron Georges Dropatron.
First amongst surgeons, lastamongst men.
He had a terrible reputation.
But when he died, he left hismoney to endow a chair of
pathological anatomy andpathology.
SPEAKER_02 (19:47):
So he came good in the end.
He came good in the end.
Literally in the end when hedied.
SPEAKER_00 (19:52):
So yeah, so the skeleton is fascinating.
SPEAKER_02 (19:55):
It is, I mean, it's a lot to sort of take in.
So what I'm going to do, ifyou're not going to be able to
do that.
SPEAKER_00 (19:58):
But it is because if if if if we mentioned the hands,
the 27 bones of the hand,divided up into three parts, you
have the wrist.
And the wrist consists of twobracelets of bones, of which
there are eight.
Then you have the fivemetacarpal bones, and then you
have the digits made up of thephalanges.
(20:19):
Fourteen in total, two for thethumb and three for each finger.
Five metacarpals, eight carpisbones.
In the foot, it's seven tarsusbones.
Five metatarsals, but fourteenphalanges.
It's a lot to take in.
It's a lot to take in, and thenthe bones of the carpets have
(20:41):
all got the owner and betiscularnames.
They're collectively known ascar carpus.
And then you've got differentshapes of bones.
You have the long bones, whichare particularly relevant for
the limbs, like the humus in theupper arm.
Latin name for that is humerus.
Just later on they stuck an Hon, that's why it's called the
(21:03):
humus.
SPEAKER_02 (21:04):
Somebody was having a joke.
SPEAKER_00 (21:06):
And then you have the radius and the ulna, the two
for one bones.
And then you come down to thewrist and you have the eight
carpet bones.
And the eight the names of theeight carpet bones are you have
the trapezium, the trapezoid,the capitate, the hamate, the
pysiform, the scaphoid, and theloneid, and the tricretal.
(21:28):
They're the eight bones thatmake up the carpal bones of the
wrist.
SPEAKER_02 (21:32):
That's just the wrist, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (21:33):
That's just the wrist.
And then the foot, the seventosser bones is the tailus, the
calcaneum, and the navicular,the major lateral cuneiforms,
and the cuboid.
And that's the seven.
SPEAKER_02 (21:47):
There's a lot to learn.
And I always like to reiteratethis every podcast that you
never refer to notes.
Everything you talk about is inthe mind.
Yeah, it's in the mindsomewhere.
Makes it sound like you'remaking it up, but it's off the
top of your head.
It's all off the top of yourhead.
Yeah, which is which isremarkable.
SPEAKER_00 (22:07):
And then so and then you show that long bones, the
bones of the wrist, or shortbones.
Right.
Because in a confined space.
So they're there for strength.
Flap bones consist of thescapula for muscular touchings,
flat bones for the skull,particularly for the calvaum of
the cranium.
(22:27):
You have irregular shape bones.
These are bones pertaining tothe vertebral column, because
they are regular shaped.
And the second, because it's atriangular red shape bone.
Then you have funny littlebones, other names for bones,
called pneumatic bones.
(22:48):
In the skull, and they'reactually the two tables of the
skull bones.
And the substance in between isthe diploe.
And one of through them isveins, which we'll discuss later
on in the podcast.
But as the bones are developingin that that actually changes.
(23:09):
And you end up with sinuses inthe bones.
Like the Maxov sinus on theface, or the frontal sinus of
the brow.
And the mastoid sinus.
Yeah, these are air sinuses.
They contain air.
SPEAKER_02 (23:27):
And are we born with them?
SPEAKER_00 (23:28):
Oh yeah, yeah.
But they're there, they justdevelop.
And the bones that are relatedto them are known as pneumatic
bones.
And then you have other bones,extra little bones, called
Wormion bones.
W-O-M-I-A-N, named after OlafWormian, the anatomist who first
described them in the 1600s.
(23:50):
And these are tiny little bonesin relationship to the sutures.
If you look at the skull, it hassutures, particularly the
lamboid suture at the backbetween the parietal bones and
the occipital bone.
You'll have these little bones,and they're called warmion
bones.
Wormion bones, and then you haveanother little set of bones,
(24:12):
which aren't really in theseries of the main skeleton.
And these these ones are calledepiteric bones.
These are like scale-leg bones,tiny little scale-leg bones,
which are always associated withthe anterolateral sinus.
(24:33):
Of the skull.
It's not sinus fontanelle.
And on the school you have theanterior frontanelle between the
two frontal bones and the front.
It's very soft, yeah, it'striangular shape, and the last
one to close is the anteriorfrontanelle, closes by the age
of two.
And they're important,particularly the anterior
fontanelle.
(24:54):
Because if you needed to get itan antibiotic in fast into a
newborn baby, you could actuallyput it in through the anti
frontanelle straight into thesuperior venous satural sinus.
Yeah, yeah, you can get inquick.
SPEAKER_02 (25:10):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:11):
So they're different classes of bones as opposed to
the main bones that we've justdescribed.
SPEAKER_02 (25:16):
But they're all categorized as bones.
Oh yes, okay from the top to thetube, literally.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:22):
The way they say that the scale-like bones is
because the vision we developedfrom the fish.
SPEAKER_02 (25:27):
Yes.
So what is the resemblancebetween a scale-like bone and a
fish?
SPEAKER_00 (25:32):
Well, if you look at the fish, fish all have scales.
Yes.
They're very fine, differentshapes.
It's the same principle forthese epiteric bones on this on
the human skull.
So they're tiny.
They're not always there,they're they're rare, but
occasionally you will you'llcome across them.
SPEAKER_02 (25:45):
They're not always there.
No.
SPEAKER_00 (25:48):
No, because the the anterior lateral fontanelle at
the front isn't always present.
The anterior one is and theposterior one is.
But again, with the posteriorfontanelle, sometimes that can
be missing as well.
SPEAKER_02 (26:00):
So at the at this point in our evolution, these
little bones are they don't havea purpose then, or they're just
fading out from our development.
SPEAKER_00 (26:12):
But if if you have them at the anterior lateral
fontanelle, instead of thatbeing soft, you have this little
scale like bone filling in thegap.
SPEAKER_02 (26:19):
Which must be, as an anatomist, a fascinating thing
to see.
SPEAKER_00 (26:22):
It is.
SPEAKER_02 (26:24):
So I mean, if you say something a bit further back
down the food chain, which Ithink I've used that expression
about some of the boyfriends Ihad when I was younger, that
could actually be the case.
SPEAKER_00 (26:33):
Well, that's a different story.
SPEAKER_01 (26:38):
Wow.
SPEAKER_00 (26:39):
So that's giving an introduction to the human
skeleton.
SPEAKER_02 (26:45):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (26:45):
The normative arrangement is in the adult
skeleton of 206 bonds.
But nature decides sometimes toput a span on the works.
SPEAKER_01 (26:57):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (26:58):
And maybe it.
Or two may be fused.
Or nature may give you an extrarib in the neck, called a
cervical rib.
SPEAKER_02 (27:09):
In the neck.
SPEAKER_00 (27:10):
In the neck, yeah.
Yeah, but it takes a torsionfrom the transverse process of
the seventh cervical vertebra,which has the longest spine of
the cervical vertebra and isknown as the vertebrae
prominence.
And that can be a cervical rib,and it can be unilateral or
bilateral, meaning it can be onone side or on both sides.
SPEAKER_02 (27:28):
So as a you know work person walking around that
knows nothing about the anatomy,let's just say me, because that
would be the case.
But if I have a sore back or asore neck, you know, and I go to
you know the doctor and say I'vegot a sore back or a sore neck,
they're not going to take intoaccount any of these potential
anomalies.
SPEAKER_00 (27:46):
No, no, you're only sure when if an x-ray is taken.
unknown (27:49):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (27:50):
You know, if you've got if a person goes to
vegetables rib, then they cancause a nerve of vascular
problem with the upper arm.
Right.
Because it depends on thedevelopment of it.
And then nature throws anotherspan in the works and we will
have about twelve ribs.
From time to time, nature willchuck another rib in and it'll
be known as a lumbar rib.
SPEAKER_02 (28:11):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (28:12):
And that arises from the first lumbar vertebrae.
SPEAKER_02 (28:16):
Gosh.
And could you tell that if youput your hands on a patient that
they've got that extra rib?
SPEAKER_00 (28:20):
Yeah, but it's very rare that one.
SPEAKER_02 (28:22):
Very rare.
SPEAKER_00 (28:22):
That one's very rare.
SPEAKER_02 (28:24):
Have you come across it?
SPEAKER_00 (28:25):
Once.
SPEAKER_02 (28:26):
Once.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:27):
Yeah, so a long time ago, and it was much smaller.
But it was a lumbar rib.
It came from the transverseprocessor value one.
So you see, you just never know.
The plan is everything there.
We should have 206 bones, 650muscles, 96,000 miles of
(28:47):
arteries in the in the humanbody.
How many?
96,000 miles.
That'll go around the worldthree times.
Yeah, stress.
Okay, that'll just just littleexamples.
But then from time to timenature will just change the
plant slightly.
(29:11):
Nice shaft, nice and smooth, andthen from time to time it'll
produce a spur.
A suprachondylar spur.
Always on the inside.
And attached to that, that'd bea tiny little ligament going
down to the medial epicondyle.
(29:32):
The suprachondyle ligament ofStruthers.
Struthers was a famous surgeonand anatomist who first
described it.
And sometimes if that's burned,I'll reinforce this in later
podcasts.
But if this happened, thensometimes the median nerve can
come down with a bicular andactually pass through the little
space between the ligament andthe shaft of the humus, which is
(29:55):
unusual.
But can be common in animals.
SPEAKER_02 (30:00):
Particularly the monkeys.
Monkeys.
SPEAKER_00 (30:02):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (30:03):
We're not that far away, are we?
SPEAKER_00 (30:08):
And as I've said before, this is what makes the
whole subject interest.
SPEAKER_02 (30:13):
You're listening to the Real Anatomist Podcast with
myself, Alison Craig, and Dr.
David Robson, M D MA, who is theReal Anatomist.
If you like the podcast, pleasesubscribe and share.
Thanks.
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