Meatus | Weird Word

The term meatus is a weird one. The plural form is not what you might think if you've never heard it before.

meatus
mee-AYT-us
meatus passage or channel

In anatomy, the term meatus refers to a passageway or opening into (or through) a tube.

Meatus is a noun derived from the Latin verb meare, which means "to pass."

For example, the term external acoustic meatus refers to the tubelike opening in the temporal bone that allows passage of the tubelike canal of the external ear bearing the same name.

There are many examples of meatus throughout the body.

What?! Was that a typo? Did I just mean to state, "examples of meatus throughout the body."? Yes. Yes, I did.

Considering the many nouns in science and medicine that end in -us and are pluralized by changing the -us to -i, one would think that the proper plural form of meatus is meati. Nope.

The term meatus is a weird one, remember? It's proper plural form is either meatus or meatuses.

Why the weirdness?

The plural form meatus comes from the fact that it in Latin, it belongs to the fourth declension class of nouns—and as such, meatus is the proper plural form in Latin.

The plural form meatuses adopts the English form of pluralization, which happens frequently when Latin terms are imported into English.

The combining form of meatus is meato-, as in meatoscope (for looking into the urinary meatus).

Bone Names Have Meaning

Using the language of the human skeleton can be intimidating for a number of reasons.  Not the least of which is that the names of the bones and bone features seem to be very odd—sometimes almost unpronounceable.

There's a reason the names are so odd.  They're based on a foreign language!  They're all based on Latin, with a lot of Greek word parts mixed in there. Once you realize that you're using a new language as you master the details of the human skeleton, it will hopefully be a  bit less intimidating.

It turns out that if you actually focus on the fact that these are terms from a foreign language and try to translate them, then using the terminology of skeletal anatomy is far easier—and takes far less time and effort to learn—than if you ignore the meanings of bone names.

To help you get started on this road, I've produced a couple of very brief videos that outline a proven method to quickly and easily learn the bones and bone features of the human skeleton.  Watch them both to get the greatest benefit.

In the videos, I mention a couple of lists of translations (and pronunciations) that will help you engage the method I'm recommending.  Links to those lists are found below.

Bone Names Have Meaning - Part 1 - Get Started

Bone Names Have Meaning - Part 2 - Types of Bone Markings

Want to know more?

List of bone marking types

• Translation of each term
• Pronunciation of each term
• Brief description of each term
• my-ap.us/16PNh3K

List of bones and bone markings of the human skeleton

• Translation of each term
• Pronunciation of each term
• Use with your textbook or Survival Guide for Anatomy & Physiology (below), which has a description of each structure
• my-ap.us/15zZYom

Field Guide to the Human Body:  Bone Names

• Part of the Lion Den Study Tips & Tools series for A&P students
• Includes the videos and lists mentioned above
• my-ap.us/13ihrPs

Survival Guide for Anatomy & Physiology

• Many time-saving, effort-saving, and frustration-saving tips and shortcuts
• my-ap.us/16aa5zg

Adapted from Learning Bones & Skeletal Features

Photo credit: sklmsta