Anatomical Orientations

Anatomical orientation terms are crucial for describing precise parts of the body in medical texts, lectures, or discussions about injuries. For beginners, these terms can be difficult to remember because they describe relative positions (such as "your nose is superior to your mouth"), they come in pairs that can be easily confused (like "sagittal" vs. "coronal"), and to make things even more complicated, they often have two or three different ways of saying the same thing (for example, the transverse plane is also called the horizontal or axial plane), while some terms refer to planes and others are purely directional. Our 3D visual aid offers a clear guide for students and teachers. The following are the definitions and tips for remembering each term.

Terminology and tips to remember

Superior: Refers to something above or toward the top of the body (closer to the head).

  • Remember: "Superior" means higher in everyday life, just like it means higher in the body.

  • Cranial: Refers to something positioned toward the head or related to the skull.

    • Remember: "Cranial" comes from cranium, meaning skull, so it refers to the head region.

  • Cephalic: Refers to something related to the head.

    • Remember: "Cephalic" comes from Greek kephalē, meaning head—anything cephalic points toward the head.

  • Inferior: Refers to something below or toward the bottom of the body.

    • Remember: "Inferior" means lower in rank, and in anatomy, it refers to being lower in the body.

  • Caudal: Refers to something toward the tail or lower part of the body.

    • Remember: "Caudal" comes from the Latin word cauda, meaning tail, so it refers to the lower part of the body.

  • Anterior: Refers to the front of the body.

    • Remember: "A" is at the front of the alphabet, just like anterior refers to the front of the body.

  • Ventral: Refers to the front of the body, often used in animals or specific medical contexts.

    • Remember: "Ventral" refers to the belly or underside, so it helps to remember it’s toward the front.

  • Posterior: Refers to the back of the body.

    • Remember: Think of a sign post—the pole holding up the sign is always behind the sign, just like the posterior side of your body is behind you.

  • Dorsal: Refers to the back of the body, often used in animals or specific medical contexts.

    • Remember: "Dorsal" refers to the back or spine, just like a dorsal fin on a fish is on its back.

  • Medial: Refers to something closer to the midline (center) of the body.

    • Remember: "Medial" sounds like middle, so it refers to things closer to the center of the body.

  • Lateral: Refers to something farther from the midline of the body (toward the side).

    • Remember: "Lateral" sounds like ladder—imagine climbing a ladder away from the center of the body, toward the sides.

  • Proximal: Refers to something closer to the point of attachment or the trunk of the body.

    • Remember: "Proximal" sounds like proximity—things that are proximal are closer in proximity to the body’s center.

  • Distal: Refers to something farther from the point of attachment or the trunk of the body.

    • Remember: "Distal" sounds like distant—things that are distal are farther from the body.

  • Superficial: Refers to something closer to the surface of the body.

    • Remember: "Superficial" is often used to describe things that are shallow or on the surface in real life, and it means the same in anatomy—closer to the body’s surface.

  • Deep: Refers to something farther from the surface of the body (more internal).

    • Remember: Just like in real life, deep means farther in, so anything deep is farther from the surface.

Anatomical Planes:

  • Sagittal Plane: Divides the body into left and right halves.

    • Remember: Picture the bow of a bow and arrow pulled vertically along your body. The string of the bow aligns in a vertical line, splitting your body into left and right halves, just like the sagittal plane.

  • Coronal Plane (Frontal Plane): Divides the body into front and back halves.

    • Remember: Think of how you slice bread. The direction of the cut is perpendicular to the long side of a loaf of bread, separating the front from the back. This is how the coronal plane divides the body.

  • Transverse Plane (Horizontal Plane): Divides the body into upper and lower halves.

    • Remember: Think of a book lying flat on a table. When you flip through the pages, you are turning across the horizontal surface of the book, just like how the transverse plane turns across your body, dividing it into top and bottom halves.

  • Axial Plane: Another term for the horizontal plane, dividing the body into upper and lower halves.

    • Remember: Imagine a conveyor belt moving horizontally. The belt cuts across the body at the waist, dividing the upper and lower halves. The axial plane works similarly, separating the body horizontally, like the belt moves objects across.