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Head and Neck key concepts

7 revision pages for Head and Neck, each with the key facts, a memory aid where one helps, and the exam traps.

  1. Branchial cyst as a lateral neck lump

    A branchial cyst is a congenital fluid-filled sac in the lateral neck, left when the branchial apparatus (the embryo's ridges and grooves) fails to close completely.

  2. Kiesselbach's plexus: the commonest site of nosebleeds

    Kiesselbach's plexus (Little's area) is the artery network on the front of the nasal septum, the wall dividing the nose, where most nosebleeds begin.

  3. Platysma: action and cervical branch of the facial nerve

    Platysma is a thin sheet of muscle under the neck skin that tightens (tenses) it, supplied by the cervical (neck) branch of the facial nerve.

  4. Stylopharyngeus and the glossopharyngeal nerve

    Stylopharyngeus, a throat muscle, comes from the third pharyngeal arch (a bar of embryonic tissue) and is supplied by that arch's nerve, the glossopharyngeal nerve (cranial nerve IX).

  5. Superficial lymph nodes of the head and neck and their drainage areas

    The superficial lymph nodes form a ring where the head meets the neck, and a swollen node usually points to the area that is infected or diseased.

  6. Thyroglossal duct cyst: the midline neck lump that rises when the tongue is stuck out

    A thyroglossal (thyroid-to-tongue) duct cyst is a midline neck lump, usually painless, that is a fluid-filled leftover of the thyroid's path and rises when the tongue is stuck out.

  7. Weber and Rinne tests together: conductive versus sensorineural loss

    Weber's and Rinne's tests, read together, help show whether hearing loss is conductive (outer or middle ear) or sensorineural (inner ear or the nerve carrying hearing to the brain).

Practice Head and Neck questions