[HAPS-L] Hip bone

["Ken Saladin" <ksaladin@xxxxxxxxxx>]

At 02:08 PM 11/19/2006, you wrote:


I remember back when I broke my hip in 1980.  It was an intertrochanteric break.  (Femur) The doc called it a hip break and I asked why since it was the femur.  He told me that all bones in that area (os coxae, proximal femur, sacrum, etc.) are all a part of the hip and thus breaking the proximal femur was a hip break.  Saying that, isn't using "hip bone" rather confusing?  It could mean any of those bones.  I would not let my students use it.
 
Charlene



That's true, it is a little ambiguous, but no more so than "os coxae," which simply means "bone of the hip." Besides the Latin, what's the difference between calling something "hip bone" and "bone of the hip"? Translating a term between Latin and English doesn't make it any more specific in meaning.

Moreover, if you would not let any of your student use the term, that means you are telling them that Gray's Anatomy is wrong, the anatomy atlases of Netter, Clemente, Rohen & Yokochi, Grant (Agur), Kopf-Maier, and McMinn and Hutchings are all wrong, the Terminologia Anatomica is wrong, Moore & Dalley's Clinically Oriented Anatomy is wrong, and Hollinshead's Textbook of Anatomy is wrong. Like it or not, that's what they call this bone; several of these don't even offer any alternatives or synonyms to "hip bone."

Wouldn't it be rather arrogant to tell our students, when they agree (even if unknowingly) with all these authorities, that their answer is wrong?

I'm not crazy about such a prosaic sounding name as "hip bone" (what's next, renaming the humerus "arm bone"?), but I figure it's my job to teach my students what things are called in the world of professional anatomists, not what I would rather call them. Like it or not, I will get used to using the accepted term and discarding my old bias.  (If you really want to, though, you can justifiably call it "coxal bone," accepted by the TA and used as a synonym by some of those other sources. "Hip bone," though, seems to be the more widely used term.)

Ken

>From - Mon Jan 1 00:00:00 1965
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