Gray’s Anatomy for Students: With Student Consult Online Access, 3e

Book Preface

The 3 rd edition of Gray’s Anatomy for Students builds on the past and looks toward the future. It maintains the goals and objectives of the 1 st and 2 nd editions while at the same time continuing to incorporate input from our readers and adjusting the content to align with the evolving educational environment.

One of the maj or focuses of our attention as we prepared the 3 rd edition was clinical content. The reason for this is that learning in context has become an important theme not only in medical education but in anatomical sciences education generally. We dealt with the clinical content in two ways. First, we reevaluated and updated the “In the clinic” boxes, clinical material in the body of the text, clinical cases at the end of the chapters and in the online resources, and in the surface anatomy section. Second, we added new clinical material so that the reader would have up-to-date examples relating anatomical information to clinical situations.

In addition to updating and revising the clinical content, the section on cranial nerves has been significantly expanded. Understanding these important components of the nervous system is critical for students at every level. To facilitate student learning a new figure summarizing the location, function, and distribution of each cranial nerve has been added, as has a new figure summarizing how maj or structures , including cranial nerves, enter and leave the cranial cavity. We also have included a new figure illustrating the clinical importance of vascular structures in and around the cranial cavity.

Another new feature in this edition relates to review materials. While these useful study aids have always been available on Student Consult as an online resource, in this edition the appropriate review materials for each chapter are listed at the beginning of that chapter. This information includes an online anatomy and embryology self-study course, medical clinical cases , physical therapy clinical cases, self-assessment questions , and more.

We believe that with these changes the 3 rd edition of Gray’s Anatomy for Students is a much improved version of the 2nd edition and hope that the book will continue to be a valuable learning resource for students .

Richard L. Drake
A. Wayne Vogl
Adam W. M. Mitchell
December 2 0 1 3