Lesson 1: Anatomical Position & Anatomical Directions

Learning how the human body moves, starts with learning the standard anatomical position and the anatomical directions. These anatomical terms are important for sports medicine professionals because they improve the accuracy of our communications about human anatomy, including the body’s landmarks, positions, cavities, anatomical structures, and motions. The standard anatomical position is a reference model or reference position for describing where a body structure is located, and anatomical directions are directional terms for describing the relative location of a cavity, body part, or structure. That is, standard anatomical position tells us which way our map should face, and anatomical directions tell us how to get to our destination.

Standard anatomical position is the body in a standing position, eyes and head forward, arms at sides with palms forward, and feet together and parallel. All anatomical directions are paired with an opposing direction; superior (toward the head) is paired with inferior (toward the bottom), medial (toward the middle) is paired with lateral (toward the side), anterior (toward the front) is paired with posterior (toward the back), proximal (near the center) is paired with distal (further from center), cranial (toward the head) is paired with caudal (toward the tail), supine (face up) is paired with prone (facedown), dorsal (on the top) is paired with plantar (on the bottom), and sometimes dorsal (on the back) is paired with ventral (on the front).

For example, we could describe the position of the stomach as follows. In anatomical position, the stomach is located proximally, within the abdominal cavity (peritoneum), inferior to the liver, and superior to the transverse colon, deep or posterior to the abdominal wall and rectus abdominis muscle, and superficial or anterior to the pancreas and spine.

Knowledge of the anatomical positions and directions is essential for all sports medicine professionals (personal trainers, fitness instructors, physical therapists, athletic trainers, massage therapists, chiropractors, occupational therapists, etc.) including for the next lesson in these "Introduction to Functional Anatomy Courses" - Lesson 2: Planes of Motion . More advanced courses on anatomical structures, movement analysis, health and wellness, fitness, sports performance, strength and conditioning, physical rehabilitation, etc. will continue with the expectation that these terms are thoroughly understood by the student.

Caption: Anatomical position which acts as a reference point for motion