General arthrology

What you will learn

• Define a joint, state its functions, and explain its embryological origin.
• Apply the structural and functional classifications of the articular system.
• Recognize fibrous, cartilaginous, and synovial joints by their organization.
• Identify the six forms of diarthrosis and relate their geometry to degrees of freedom.
• Distinguish labrum, meniscus, and articular disc by their surfaces and attachments.
• Describe simple, special, and complex joint movements in their planes and about their axes.
• Summarize the vascular supply, innervation, and major categories of joint disorders.

Course outline

1. The skeleton as an articulated whole

   A global orientation to skeletal unions and the balance between movement and protection.

   5 min

2. Development and two systems of classification

   The mesenchymal origin of joints and their structural and functional classifications.

   10 min

3. Fibrous and cartilaginous unions

   The features and forms of joints that lack a synovial cavity.

   15 min

4. Architecture of a synovial joint

   The cartilaginous surfaces, cavity, capsule, synovium, and ligamentous reinforcement.

   10 min

5. Six geometries of diarthrosis

   Synovial surface shapes, their degrees of freedom, and their anatomical examples.

   18 min

6. Structures that adapt articular surfaces

   The labrum, meniscus, and disc distinguished by their free surfaces and capsular attachments.

   9 min

7. Fundamental movements, planes, and axes

   Flexion-extension, abduction-adduction, and rotation described in their planes and about their axes.

   14 min

8. Special movements and circumduction

   Anterior, posterior, rotational, and mandibular movements, followed by their combination in circumduction.

   12 min

9. Vessels, nerves, and principal joint disorders

   The neurovascular organization of joints and the major categories of lesions described.

   10 min