Sheri Amsel - The Everything KIDS Human Body Book: All You Need to Know About Your Body Systems--From Head to Toe!

KIDS
Human Body
Book

All you need to know about your body systemsfrom head to toe!

Sheri Amsel

T his book is about the most interesting thing on EarthYOU!

Did you ever wonder how your muscles work or why your heart beats? How many hairs do you have? What are freckles? Why do you get hiccups or sneeze? What are goose bumps? Why do you have a belly button? How do you hear, see, smell, and taste? Why do you shiver when its cold and sweat when its hot? These are just a few of the many amazing mysteries about your body that will be explained in this book.

Your body is a machine with a lot of moving parts. It is a very complicated system. There is so much to know that people who work with the human body often specialize in just 1 part of it. A doctor may be a cardiologist and specialize in caring for the heart. A neurologist specializes in the nervous system, including the brain. A dermatologist treats the skin. A podiatrist is a foot expert.

Doctors, nurses, dentists, emergency medical technicians, and biology researchers are just a few of the people who study the human body. An anatomist studies the big parts of the body like the organs, muscles, and bones. A microbiologist studies the tiny, microscopic parts of the body, like the blood, cells, and other tissues. A geneticist studies your DNA. They may help repair injured people or treat sick people or find new ways to prevent illnesses in the first place. They may fix birth defects and extend lives. All these scientists are putting together a pretty complete picture of what is going on inside the human body to help people know the best way to stay healthy and strong for a good, long life. Not everything is known yet, but every day we know more about the amazing human body.

If you are interested in what you read here, maybe you would like to become a doctor, nurse, or other health professional when you grow up!

THE AMAZING HUMAN BODY

The human body is made up of many different systems that work together to form a healthy, functioning person. Without you even knowing it, your body is busily working every second of the day and night to keep you running smoothly. Here are some of the things your body needs to take care of every day.

• You need protection from the outside world against changes in temperature and moisture, bangs and scrapes, and germs and dirt.
• You need a way to make your body move from place to place.
• You need a way to sense what is going on around you so you can respond to it.
• You need to take in food and break it down to fuel your body.
• You need a way to get rid of wastes that your body doesnt need.
• You need to be able to repair yourself when you get injured, grow, and reproduce.

Your body juggles thousands of processes and functions to do these things every day while keeping things stable inside you so you can go about your day. When you think about how complicated the human machine is and how little goes wrong, it is really an amazing feat.

The body can be broken down into parts and regions, each with its own name. This helps doctors and other medical caregivers know where you might be injured so they can care for you. It helps for you to know what the body regions are called, too.

If you stand at attention with the palms of your hands facing forward and your thumbs pointing out, this is called the anatomical position. In this position the terms right and left refer to how you see them, not the doctor looking at you. So your right side is always the side with your right hand. That way, if you complain of pain on the right side of your belly, the doctor knows which side the pain is actually on! Here are some important terms to remember.

anatomical

Something that relates to the anatomy or body structure is called anatomical.

• Your head is superior to your shoulders, while your shoulders are inferior to your head.
• Your belly button is anterior to your backbone, while your backbone is posterior to your belly button.
• Your ears are lateral to your nose, while your nose is medial to your ears.
• Your elbow is proximal to your fingertips, while your fingertips are distal to your elbow.
• Your skin is superficial to your muscles, while your muscles are deep to your skin.

You can see how knowing this language could be useful if you are describing where an injury is on someones body. Suppose someone got a deep cut on his face and needed stitches. Would the doctor know from that description where the cut is? How about if you could describe the cut by saying that it was inferior to the right eye, just lateral to the nose? Can the doctor picture where it is now? Knowing the parts and regions of the body can be a useful healthcare tool.

Health Tip

PROTECT YOUR GUTS!

The body cavity (and its organs) that is most likely to be injured in an accident is the abdominal cavity. That is because, unlike the thoracic cavity that is protected by the ribcage and the pelvic cavity that is protected by the boney pelvis, the abdominal cavity is only surrounded and protected by muscles. This is another good reason to always wear your seatbelt while riding in the car. Protect your guts!

Your trunk is the main part of your body, not including your arms, legs, and head. It is divided into 3 main body cavities, each containing important body organs. They are the