Author: Dr Peter de Souza
Last modified: 14 December 2021

Transcription

Okay so this is a tutorial on the bones of the foot.  In the foot you've got tarsals, metatarsals, and phalanges.  I'll just remove the tibia and the fibula, so we can take a look at the tarsal bones first.

Tarsal Bones

You’ve got seven tarsal bones, so these are the bones that come before the metatarsals and the phalanges, and you can separate the tarsal bones into a proximal and distal group.

 

Proximal Tarsals

In the proximal group you've got two bones, you've just got this bone here, which articulates with the tibia and the fibula, so it's this bone here - it's called the talus. And you've got the calcaneus.  Those are the two bones in the proximal row.

 

Distal Tarsals

The distal row, you've got four bones.  The distal row is the bones of the foot which articulate with the metatarsals.  You’ve got the cuneiform bones, which are these three bones here; you’ve got a medial, an intermediate and a lateral cuneiform bone, which articulate with the first to third metatarsals. And then you've got this bone here, which is the cuboid bone, sitting laterally, and this articulates with the lateral two metatarsals. And then you've got an intermediate bone, so this is a bone which sits between the proximal and the distal rows.  this bone is called the navicular.

 

I always use to get confused when I was learning about this, because I thought by looking at this lateral view you can see that the cuboid bone is kind of in line with the navicular bone, yet the cuboid bone is in the distal group.  The distal group of tarsal bones are just those bones which articulate with the metatarsals.  The intermediate bone, this navicular bone, sits between the proximal row and the distal row of tarsal bones.

 

Just looking back at the proximal bones, you've got the calcaneus which articulates above with the talus, and anteriorly it articulates with the cuboid bone. And the talus bone articulates below with the calcaneus, and anteriorly it articulates with the navicular - the intermediate bone.  Looking at the navicular, you can see anteriorly it articulates with the cuneiform bone, so the medial, intermediate and lateral cuneiform bones.

 

And the cuboid bone in the distal row of tarsal bones articulates anteriorly with the lateral two metatarsals, and the cuneiform bones articulate anteriorly with the medial three metatarsal bones.  Those are the seven tarsal bones.

 

Recap

You’ve got a proximal row, with the two large bones - the talus and the calcaneus. And you've got a distal row, which contains the cuneiform, the three cuneiform bones and laterally you've got the cuboid bone. And then you've got an intermediate bone, called the navicular, which sits in between the proximal and the distal row of tarsals.

 

Metatarsals

Anterior, or distal to the distal tarsal bones, you've got the five metatarsals, so you've got a base a shaft and a head to each metatarsal.

 

Phalanges

And even more distally, you've got the phalanges, so the phalanges consist of three bones.  You’ve got a proximal, middle and a distal phalanx, except for the great toe which just has a proximal and distal phalanx.