Recommend introductory anatomy text?

coolaboola

Hullo! Can anyone recommend a decent, accessible introductory text on anatomy? I'm not a medical professional (I'm an engineer) but would like to learn more about the subject.

I've done a bit of rooting around and have figured out the following:

Gray's Anatomy (38th Edition) is apparently the bee's knees and cat's pj's of anatomy texts... but costs an arm and a leg (geddit? sorry!)

Netter's Altas of Human Anatomy is the definitive accompaniment to Gray's Anatomy but is similarly expensive.

What I'm looking for is an easy-to-read but informative - that goes into more depth than Leaving Cert biology anyway! - text on the subject that won't break the bank. Any suggestions?

DrIndy

Whatever you do, don't go for Grays anatomy - that book is for serious/postgrad study only and has phenomenal but useless information.

Get a book like Netters atlas and couple that with a textbook is a good idea (such as Moore's). You should also get a photographic atlas which shows dissections.

all these books are expensive and huge. If you want to learn about this though its needed - whereas for dabbling, simply get an atlas.

Vorsprung

the book everyone in my classed used for anatomy was "clinically orientated anatomy" by moore, i think it's widely used by physio, med and nursing students in all the colleges. it's a big book, about €50 in clarendon medical or hoggis figgis. aside from the anatomy there's descriptions of clinical situations and other general interest stuff. might be a bit above your needs though. there is a smaller version by the same guy, not sure of the name (we called it baby moore) that has all of the anatomy, that might be just what your looking for. both are worth checking out.

snorlax

you should try looking up the books on amazon or ebay and get them cheap secound hand. it's handy to have a comprensive book even if it is expensive to buy in the first place.
i used Netter's book too and there is alot of detail in it.

its 20 dollars on ebay now try http://search.ebay.co.uk/search/search.dll?sofocus=bs&sbrftog=1&catref=C6&from=R10&fstype=1&satitle=anatomy+atlas+netter&sacat=-1%26catref%3DC6&bs=Search&floc=1&sargn=-1%26saslc%3D2&sadis=200&fpos=Postcode&ga10244=10425&ftrt=1&ftrv=1&saprclo=&saprchi=&fsop=1&fsoo=1

Capt'n Midnight

DrIndy wrote:

Whatever you do, don't go for Grays anatomy - that book is for serious/postgrad study only and has phenomenal but useless information.

For the thread lurkers - The copyright has expired on older copies.

http://www.bartleby.com/107/

The Bartleby.com edition of Gray’s Anatomy of the Human Body features 1,247 vibrant engravings—many in color—from the classic 1918 publication, as well as a subject index with 13,000 entries ranging from the Antrum of Highmore to the Zonule of Zinn

DrIndy

Unfortunately thats the older version that recommends including tying off the lingual artery to treat tongue cancer.

To be frank, there has not been a whole lot of change in gross anatomy for the last 100 years so its not a bad book, but in regard any clinical information is wholely useless.

Get Baby Moores clinical anatomy and couple that with an atlas such as netters or a gorier one if you prefer.

Of note, under the anatomy act, it is illegal to enter the environs of a dissection room with cadavers present unless you are a doctor or medical student (by law - leeway is given to other health professionals).

John

Netter seems to be really good but I've only used the brain pages in it.

panda100

Baby moore book is definatley the best.Also there are a lot of easy to read USMLE revision books to which give you a great overview of the body and arent that expansive either

angeldelight

DrIndy wrote:

Of note, under the anatomy act, it is illegal to enter the environs of a dissection room with cadavers present unless you are a doctor or medical student (by law - leeway is given to other health professionals).

That's interesting - our pharmacy class did anatomy and were brought in to look at cadavers. What about someone doing an anatomy degree?

John

angeldelight wrote:

That's interesting - our pharmacy class did anatomy and were brought in to look at cadavers. What about someone doing an anatomy degree?

Pharmacy's a health profession. All the act really means is that you have to be doing a course or profession that involves needing to study a human body to legally enter a dissection theatre. I'm doing neuroscience and whilst most of us will never do anything clinical we need to study a real brain so we know what we're looking at in MRI studies and understand where everything is so we know how they interact.

snorlax

im doing Occupational therapy and we look at all the muscles/ nerves/ brain etc of the kadavras.

nursing students in TCD don't use the Kadavras though. we are expected to have a better understanding of upper arm muscles/ nerves then the meds that's why we spend a whole term studying it in depth as we do a lot of treatment around upper arm, including applied anatomy (movements etc).

DrIndy

I always enjoyed studying anatomy - there was always great craic around the dissecting tables and the staff were really down to earth. I also got used to the smell as well to such an extent that when I get a whiff of formaldehyde, it brings back memories!

Baby Moores is a topnotch book......

snorlax

we all used mint flavour vicks to block the smell of the formaldehyde, now i can never use vicks again because it reminds me of kadavras.

for some reason the formaldehyde also affected our appetite...

DrIndy

Never mine! We always used to go to the Pav afterwards for post dissection Guinness!

John

I'm always starving by the end of a dissection, animal or human.

snorlax

probably from the toaster that always seemed to be on in the staff room....

DrIndy

The technicians sure love their toast!

snorlax

ugh remmeber the museam?! yuck, never again..:(!

John

I thought the museum was fascinating, I kept darting in there after lectures.

coolaboola

Loads of suggestions! Looks like 'Baby Moore' and Netter's it is. Thanks a million folks.

BTW, re cadavars and disecting rooms, I believe a colleauge of mine who studied biomedical and mechanical engineering got to visit the disecting room to see some cadavars. The only thing I ever got to disect was a Ford gear box

Also on the subject of cadavars, I've just finished 'Stiff: The Curious Life of Human Cadavars' by Mary Roach - a great if gory read!

And finally, thanks for the recommendations of amazon and ebay for buying the books. Anyone looking for difficult to find books or older editions may find www.abebooks.com useful also.

Much appreciated!

c

John

I got a nice little history of TCD's school of medicine on abebooks coincidentally.

btkm8unsl0w5r4

Netter has really great pictures and Moor is a good general text. I used them both both at an undergraduate and postgraduate level and they were more than adaquate for my needs. I have a grays anatomy and several other texts most of hich I never use. The trinity anatomy and disection manuls are fantastic if you can ge your hands on them.