Loyola University Medical Education Network Step 1 -
Dissection of the Forearm

  1. Separate the muscles of the anterior forearm, which include the:

    Here is a good way to remember the muscles originating from the common flexor tendon.

  2. Clean the radial and ulnar arteries and follow the ulnar and median nerves. Notice how the bicipital aponeurosis protects the median nerve during venupuncture of the median cubital vein.

  3. Find the radial nerve between the brachialis and brachioradialis muscles before it divides into superficial and deep branches. Demonstrate where the deep radial nerve passes deep to the supinator muscle.

  4. Clean and separate the pronator teres muscle to visualize the common interosseus artery (video) branching from the ulnar artery and giving rise to the anterior and posterior interosseus arteries, which travel with the corresponding nerve. You can best identify the anterior interosseus a. and n. where they enter deep to the pronator quadratus muscle on the anterior surface of the interosseus membrane. This is another dissection of this area. Find as many of the collateral branches (e.g., and the anterior ulnar recurrent a.) as you can.

    NOTE: You may wish to dissect the deeper structures (flexor digitorum profundus m., flexor pollicis longus m.) after you have opened the flexor retinaculum which will allow bow-stringing the tendons of the forearm muscles.

John A. McNulty, Ph.D.
Updated: Sep 29, 2008
Created: Dec 22, 1996