00:01
In this topic,
we're going to look at the kidneys,
and the suprarenal,
or the adrenal glands.
00:07
So let's start off by having
a look at the location
of the kidneys and
the suprarenal glands.
00:14
So here we can see on a posterior
view of the human abdomen.
00:18
We've indicated the vertical
levels T11 through to L4.
00:23
And you can see the right kidney
is situated approximately
around L1 to L4.
00:28
And this is slightly lower
than the left kidney,
which is around T12 to L3 or 4.
00:34
And that's mostly due to the
presence of the liver
on the right side, which just forces
the kidney down a small little way.
00:42
If we then have a look on the
anterior aspect of the abdomen,
we can again see the kidneys
and how they're associated with
various different structures.
00:50
Here we can see both the
right and the left kidney.
00:53
And here we can know that they are
in fact retroperitoneal organs.
00:58
That is they lie
behind the peritoneum.
01:01
There's a layer of peritoneum
that is going around the abdomen,
and these organs are situated
posterior to it
retroperitoneal organs.
01:11
They're positioned on the
posterior abdominal wall.
01:13
And you can see they're
associated with two muscles
that form part of the
posterior abdominal wall,
as we've seen previously.
01:20
These are the Quadratus Lumborum
more laterally,
and then running either side
of the vertebral column,
we have the psoas major muscle.
01:28
Two important muscles on
the posterior abdominal wall
that the kidneys sit on.
01:33
Centrally, we have the aorta
and coming away from the aorta
to supply each of the kidneys
are the renal arteries
and draining the kidneys
into the inferior vena cava,
we have the renal veins,
and here we can see
the inferior vena cava.
01:49
Situated on the superior
poles of each kidney,
we have two suprovisional
or adrenal glands.
01:55
And these are important
hormonal structures
that release important hormones
into the bloodstream.
02:01
We'll come back to that later on.
02:03
Emerging away from each of the
kidneys, we have the ureters
and these will pass all the
way down to the bladder.