Overview
Fundamental Anatomy presents essential human anatomy and embryology in a readable and well-illustrated concise text. Written in narrative form, this reader-friendly textbook provides the conceptual framework that will help students master the structure and function of human anatomy.
Using a systems-based approach, Fundamental Anatomy emphasizes organizational and development and insightfully integrates embryology for a more thorough understanding of adult gross anatomy.
A companion Website offers the book's fully searchable online text.
In response to shrinking contact hours in basic science courses, this new anatomy textbook provides a concise, easy-to-read alternative to the classic anatomy texts that are currently the gold standard in medical education. Rather than take an exhaustive, encyclopedic approach, it is written in narrative form and provides a conceptual framework, helping students master the structure and function of human anatomy. Fundamental Anatomy uses a systems-based approach, emphasizing organization and development and integrating the insights of embryology into a model for understanding adult gross anatomy. This paradigmatic approach is suitable for allied health, pre-med, and medical students in systems-based curricula.
Synopsis
Fundamental Anatomy presents essential human anatomy and embryology in a readable and well-illustrated concise text. Written in narrative form, this reader-friendly textbook provides the conceptual framework that will help students master the structure and function of human anatomy.
Using a systems-based approach, Fundamental Anatomy emphasizes organizational and development and insightfully integrates embryology for a more thorough understanding of adult gross anatomy.
A companion Website offers the book's fully searchable online text.
Doody Review Services
Reviewer:George C. Enders, Ph.D.(University of Kansas Medical Center)
Description:This is a new approach to the subject of embryology and anatomy that is designed around systems, ideal for a systems-based curriculum. In just eight chapters and about 400 pages, the book introduces embryology then discusses the highlights of the anatomy of the system, with occasional clinical cases added to drive home the relevance of the topic to future healthcare professionals.
Purpose:The purpose is to provide an embryonic approach to each organ system and key points of its adult anatomy in an abbreviated summary book.
Audience:The audience for this book is allied health students, premedical students, and medical students in a systems-based curriculum, a curriculum currently in favor in many medical schools. The author teaches at an osteopathic medical school.
Features:The book contains well done, well chosen illustrations. Some of the early chapters (Essentials of Early Embryology and Cardiovascular System) contain newly drawn illustrations for this book and generally are excellent. This book is unusual in that it also contains key illustrations from other books. Many chapters use key line drawings from Sadler's Langman's Medical Embryology,10th edition (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2006), and many of the illustrations of adult anatomy are from Moore and Dalley's Clinically Oriented Anatomy, 5th edition (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2006), or Moore and Agur's Essential Clinical Anatomy, 3rd edition (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2007). The text, by nature often brief, is made more readable by its informal, conversational style.
Assessment:Many students will find that this book can replace two books on their shelf (Medical Embryology and Essential Clinical Anatomy). While most medical students will find Fundamental Anatomy may substitute for an embryology text, many will certainly still need an atlas and perhaps textbook to learn anatomy. Most of the newly drawn embryology illustrations are excellent, but some chapters have few original illustrations. While some chapters cover the bulk of the embryology first, others seem to dive into a regional approach (such as the digestive system) before giving the big picture of most of the embryology and are missing key basic embryological concepts, such as foregut, midgut, and hindgut derived organs that often then explain vasculature, and even innervation and lymphatic drainage of this system. During the development of the reproductive systems, the key concept of indifferent structures that have bipotential for differentiation (gonads and external genitalia for example) appears underemphasized. For some systems, the embryology prior to adult anatomy has been well executed (such as the cardiovascular system), but others jump into detail prior to giving the big "top down" picture this book claims to provide. Many students will find this a very valuable substitute for the typical embryology textbook as many of the clinically relevant illustrations relate back to embryonic defects. However, while this approach is logical and well executed in some chapters, other chapters appear forced (such as the nervous system chapter which also describes head and neck anatomy, where portions of both the digestive and respiratory systems are also located).
Editorials
From The Critics
Reviewer: George C. Enders, Ph.D.(University of Kansas Medical Center)Description: This is a new approach to the subject of embryology and anatomy that is designed around systems, ideal for a systems-based curriculum. In just eight chapters and about 400 pages, the book introduces embryology then discusses the highlights of the anatomy of the system, with occasional clinical cases added to drive home the relevance of the topic to future healthcare professionals.
Purpose: The purpose is to provide an embryonic approach to each organ system and key points of its adult anatomy in an abbreviated summary book.
Audience: The audience for this book is allied health students, premedical students, and medical students in a systems-based curriculum, a curriculum currently in favor in many medical schools. The author teaches at an osteopathic medical school.
Features: The book contains well done, well chosen illustrations. Some of the early chapters (Essentials of Early Embryology and Cardiovascular System) contain newly drawn illustrations for this book and generally are excellent. This book is unusual in that it also contains key illustrations from other books. Many chapters use key line drawings from Sadler's Langman's Medical Embryology,10th edition (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2006), and many of the illustrations of adult anatomy are from Moore and Dalley's Clinically Oriented Anatomy, 5th edition (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2006), or Moore and Agur's Essential Clinical Anatomy, 3rd edition (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2007). The text, by nature often brief, is made more readable by its informal, conversational style.
Assessment: "Many students will find that this book can replace two books on their shelf (Medical Embryology and Essential Clinical Anatomy). While most medical students will find Fundamental Anatomy may substitute for an embryology text, many will certainly still need an atlas and perhaps textbook to learn anatomy. Most of the newly drawn embryology illustrations are excellent, but some chapters have few original illustrations. While some chapters cover the bulk of the embryology first, others seem to dive into a regional approach (such as the digestive system) before giving the big picture of most of the embryology and are missing key basic embryological concepts, such as foregut, midgut, and hindgut derived organs that often then explain vasculature, and even innervation and lymphatic drainage of this system. During the development of the reproductive systems, the key concept of indifferent structures that have bipotential for differentiation (gonads and external genitalia for example) appears underemphasized. For some systems, the embryology prior to adult anatomy has been well executed (such as the cardiovascular system), but others jump into detail prior to giving the big "top down" picture this book claims to provide. Many students will find this a very valuable substitute for the typical embryology textbook as many of the clinically relevant illustrations relate back to embryonic defects. However, while this approach is logical and well executed in some chapters, other chapters appear forced (such as the nervous system chapter which also describes head and neck anatomy, where portions of both the digestive and respiratory systems are also located). "