Conclusion Questions
1. What are the benefits of using universal terms and anatomical
position to refer to locations on the human body? How do they help
identify all humans?
The benefits of using universal terms and anatomical position to refer to
locations on the human body are that they are specific and easy to locate
and all careers that involves the human anatomy will know this. This
creates a common language among doctors and nurses which can be used
for communicating information about a patient to another medical worker.
Even though all humans are different, all humans can be described with
these universal terms and anatomical positions. This is much better than
using confusing terms that relates to a lot of body structures which can
result in miscommunication and cause surgery or a procedure to go wrong.
2. Your friend assured you that “anterior” and “posterior” can always be
used interchangeable with “ventral” and “dorsal”. Politely explain to
him/her that this statement is not always true.
This is wrong because anterior and ventral, for humans, refers to the front
of the body and posterior and dorsal, for humans, refers to the back of the
body. But for four-legged animals, the meaning changes. Anterior, for fourlegged animals, refers to close to the head and away from the tail of the
animal so it would be like superior for humans. Posterior, for four-legged
animals, refers to close to the tail and away from the head of the animal so
it would be like inferior for humans. Ventral, for four-legged animals, refers
to the belly side of the animal. Dorsal, for four-legged animals, refers to the
back side of the animal. This is why “anterior” and “posterior” can’t always
be used interchangeable with “ventral” and “dorsal”.