Pretty Interesting

Today I learned something pretty interesting. We are one week away from being done with anatomy. But that's not the pretty interesting something I learned about. We are studying cranial nerves one more time. Today I learned many things about cranial nerves, but the most interesting thing I learned is that the olfactory nerve, or CN I, rests on your cribiform plate. Your cribiform plate is a really interesting bone, because it looks like a thin cheese grater and just lays within your ethmoid bone. All these things, by the way, are in your skull, which is actually a ridiculous thing to look at when it's not covered in skin and hair. I'm still shocked that we have styloid processes, which look like sharp little toothpicks sticking straight down from around your ears.

Regardless, the reason why your cribiform plate is all holey is because the sensory fibers of your olfactory nerve pass between those holes to gain access to the outside world right next to your superior nasal conchae. Only cranial nerves I (olfactory) and II (optic) are directly in contact with your brain (all the others communicate with your brain stem) but only your olfactory nerve is also in direct contact with the outside world. That's right, if you really, and I mean really pick your nose, you can touch your brain.

But that's not even the coolest thing I learned today. THE COOLEST THING I LEARNED TODAY WAS.... from my mom, who teaches an essentials of clinical reasoning course. The fact that your olfactory nerve is the closest your brain gets to the outside world means that it can occasionally screw you up (and by screw you up, I mean kill you). So over the summer, a few people from Louisiana died when amoebas began eating away at their brains. The cause? They had been using Neti pots--a wonderful invention that lets you irrigate your nasal canal--filled with regular tap water... regular in that it had amoebas in it. Usually, drinking such water would just give you an upset stomach. But because the water was getting into their noses, and I mean really up into their noses, they ended up getting the equivalent of an upset stomach in their brains.

BAM! My mind... figuratively BLOWN! Not slowly eaten away by protozoans.... No. BLOWN! And that's why anatomy is interesting by itself, but it isn't fascinating until you make it clinical.