BRACHIAL PLEXUS

Brachial plexus is the network of nerves formed by anterior division of spinal nerves of the four lower cervical nerves (C5,C6,C7&C8)

And the first upper thoracic nerve T1 STRUCTURE Brachial plexus is divided into roots,

trunks, divisions, chords and branches

Roots ;the lower four cervical nerves C5,C6,C7 and the upper first thoracic nerve T1 forms the roots of the brachial plexus

Trunk; each root merge to form three trunks upper middle and the lower trunk

C5,and C6 merge to form the upper trunk

C7 remains to form the middle trunk C8 and T1 merge to form the lower

trunk

The C5, and C6 merge to form the upper trunk

The C7 remains continuously to form the medial trunk

The C8 , and the T1 merge to form the lower trunk of the brachial plexus

Division; each trunk split to form the posterior and the anterior divisions of the upper , middle and the lower trunk

Anterior and posterior division of the upper trunk, anterior and posterior division of the middle trunk ,anterior and posterior division of the lower trunk

Cords; the divisions of the upper, lower and the middle trunk re emerge to form the three chords namely lateral ,posterior, and medial chord

the anterior division of the upper and middle trunk merge to form the lateral cord ,the anterior division of the lower trunk remains continuously to form the medial chord , the posterior divisions of upper ,middle and

The lower trunk merge to form the posterior chord

There are three cords namely the lateral , posterior and the medial cord and they are named in relationship to their position from the axillary artery

Branches; branches are formed by the nerves these nerves are those which comes from roots, upper trunk, lateral cord, posterior cord and medial cord

Each nerve innervate/supply muscle at specific region of the body

from the roots; from C5,C6 and C7 there is a long thoracic nerve which supplies the serratus anterior muscle responsible to rise the rib cage, and the dorsal scapular nerve which innervates the levator scapulae, rhomboid major and rhomboid minor muscles

Only the upper trunk gives the branch. The upper trunk gives the suprascapular nerve which innervates the supraspinatus and infraspinatus muscles

divisions won’t give us the branches Branches from the cord from the cord there are nerves which

emerge from lateral , posterior and from medial chord

There are three branches from lateral cord namely lateral pectoral nerve , muscular

coetaneous nerve and ,median nerve There are five branches from the posterior

cord namely Upper sub scapular, thoracodorsal axillary,

radial nerve And the lower sub scapular nerve To remember the branches of the posterior

cord we normally use the mnemonic STAR

Upper S ubscapular Thoracodorsal nerve Axillary nerve Radial nerve Lower sub scapular nerve The medial cord gives five branches namely Medial ante brachial coetaneous nerve ,

medial brachial coetaneous ,medial pectoral , ulna nerve and the medial branch of median nerve

General description of brachial plexus showing the roots, trunks ,division, and cords

BRACHIAL PLEXUSThe full caption of the brachial plexus showing the roots, trunks ,divisions, cords and the branches