Is there a pattern to muscle suffixes? (partial ?? and partial vent)

Does your A&P book not break down how muscles are named?

Pattern of fasciles

size of muscle

shape of muscle

action of muscle

location of muscle

number and locations of origins and insertions

Trying to learn it by suffixes is going to confuse you...its not about making them sinular or plural...its just the root words.

Dorsi is not plural.....think dorsi/flextion....to flex toward the back. Dorsi is just a combining form of the word dorsal, meaning back. Latissimus means widest.....so latissimus dorsi is widest muscle of the back.

"why is it "vastus medialis" but "vastus intermedius"?"

Vastus means huge. Medialis like you said means most median. Intermedius means middle. The quad is 4 muscle. Rectus femoris, and the 3 "vastus" muscles. Medialis, the most medial, lateralis, the most lateral, and intermedius, the middle....it sits in the middle of the Vastus medialis and vastus lateralis, and behind the rectus femoris. (my book has pictures of ALL muscles, lot of cut away pictures of other muscles to show them all)

But then why "rectus femoris" but "caudofemoralis"?

What I noticed (though i dont know if there is exeptions) is "combined words" are when the Origin/insertion is part of the name, where origin would come first, then insertion after.......so caudo/femoralis would be refering to a muscle having insertion on the femor (though this name confused the heck out of me til i looked it up and found it is a muscle only in cats.....the caudo part has to do with the tail.....i hadnt heard it). Rectus femoris is refering to the location of the muscle not Origin/insertion. So both have to do with the femor, but in differnt ways, hence the different words. I'm sure REALLY knowing the latin would help with what is the differece between femor/is and femor/al/is but its really so small a detail (both are pretty much "having to do with the femor") and its not enough of an across the board rule that will make learning these any easier

No real pattern to memorize, just understanding how they are named will help you some. Hope i helped clarify some things.

Thank you very much.

The prof for human anatomy covered these regarding naming:

size of muscle

shape of muscle

action of muscle

location of muscle

number and locations of origins and insertions

but not pattern of fascicles, what does that means regarding naming?

This is the next class: comparative anatomy (cat dissection and comparing cat anatomy to human anatomy).

The book for this class gives the names, origins, insertions and functions. Sometimes it gives a descriptor word ("slender") or phrase. For a very few it also gives a sentence of more information (like what structure the muscle is deep to or that its tendon bends after passing through a groove in the joint or that there is no homolog in humans. There are pictures in the book, and they show at least a portion of most of the muscles but very rarely both origins and insertions (even in different views). It wouldn't matter too much, because we spend all of class time handling the muscles so I can find where a particular muscle goes, but there is only so much time to get them all detailed out. I don't have time to do the fine points like spelling and entymology during class. Outside of class, I take the time but have only the book and a few websites and whatever pictures I take.

The human anatomy prof liked to get into what words and word parts mean, this prof says the reason for non-patterns is to confuse students. I can accept that but it is still easier to remember "medialis" has to do with medial and "medius" has to do with medium than to remember a couple hundred endings by rote.

Again, thanks. :)

Pattern of fascicles in naming has to do with direction of fasicles relative to midline.

Rectus......parallel to mid line

Transverse.......perpendicular to midline

Oblique........oblique

Im fortunate that my book has very detailed tables with every muscle that has a break down of the name, including the roots of the name, the origin, insertion, action, and innervation. We didnt do any studying using a cat. We just used models

I see.

What book do you have? I think that would be helpful.

Thank you.

I think the answer to OP's question--lacking jguy's text--is to look up every muscle name in a medical dictinary which gives etymologies. But there's probably not time for that.

Incidentally, -oid means 'resembling'. One of the best non-medical examples is android--exemplified by Mr. Data on TNG. (This probably cannot be extended to the etymology of 'void', but certainly could to 'ovoid'.)

Thus, the most distal part of the sternum is called the xiphoid process because the ancient Greeks thought it resembled a xiphos (shield) in shape.

Hope this helps, a little.

There is time for that.

Such a dictionary would be a lot faster than my current method of hit or miss with many books, I'll see if the library has one. The test isn't until next week and at this point I'm tracing the word parts (functions, origins, insertions, etc) because it is interesting rather than necessary and because knowing how to find them will undoubtably be valuable later when I might have less time to learn a lot of vocabulary. The etymologies I could find while I was learning them helped.

Thank you. It does help. I still have other sections in this class and other classes to go.

The nursing program I hope to apply to, after prereqs, requires a particular medical dictionary as part of its book list.

(But) I would plan to have/use my own, anyway.