Terms of position and direction indicating parts of the body

Positional and directional terms are standardized anatomical concepts used to describe the location and orientation of different parts of the body and their structures. They serve as universal reference points to avoid any ambiguity in anatomical description.

They indicate:

• The relative position of one structure in relation to another;

• The direction of anatomical axes and reference planes.

In veterinary anatomy, these terms are adapted to the quadrupedal stance and sometimes differ from those used in human anatomy.