The most reliable answer to how to study anatomy and physiology is to treat it as two skills. Anatomy is vocabulary and location, so you learn it with word roots and blank-diagram drills. Physiology is cause and effect, so you learn it by drawing flowcharts. Then you quiz yourself on both, chapter by chapter, spread across the week.
Key takeaways
- A&P is two skills in one course: structure vocabulary (anatomy) and cause-and-effect mechanisms (physiology). Each needs its own method.
- Learn word parts first. Roots such as cardi (heart) and oste (bone) combine with endings such as -itis (inflammation) and -ectomy (removal).
- Label blank diagrams from memory, then check. Dunlosky et al. (2013) rated practice testing high utility and rereading and highlighting low.
- Draw each physiology process as stimulus, sensor, control center, effector and response, with a direction on every arrow.
- Spread self-quizzing across the week; distributed practice was the other technique rated high utility.
- A&P carries forward: ATI lists 18 human A&P questions in the TEAS 7 science section, and pathophysiology texts revisit normal function before disease.
Why Anatomy and Physiology Feels Hard, and How to Study It
A&P feels hard because it packs two kinds of learning into one course: a large new vocabulary of structures, and mechanisms that only make sense as chains of cause and effect. Generic anatomy and physiology study tips like “reread your notes” help with neither. You need one method for names and locations and another for processes.
Courses also move system by system. OpenStax describes its Anatomy and Physiology 2e as written for a two-semester course and organized by body systems. This plan for how to study anatomy and physiology follows the same rhythm: language, then structures, then mechanisms, then self-testing, one system at a time.
| Anatomy | Physiology | |
|---|---|---|
| What you learn | Names, locations and relationships of structures | How structures work and what changes when a variable shifts |
| Typical question | “Identify the structure labeled C.” | “What happens to heart rate when blood pressure falls?” |
| Best tool | Word parts plus blank-diagram drills | Flowcharts plus “what if” questions |
It matters for nursing because later courses assume you kept it. ATI’s TEAS exam details list 18 human anatomy and physiology questions in the science section, more than any other science topic. For chapter-matched practice, see our anatomy and physiology test banks once you know your edition.
Learn the Language First: Prefixes, Roots and Directional Terms
Spend the first week or two on word parts and directional terms before you memorize structures. OpenStax’s chapter on anatomical terminology explains that anatomical terms are built from Greek and Latin roots, prefixes and suffixes: hypertension is hyper- (high or over) plus tension (pressure). Once you know the parts, learning anatomy and physiology terms becomes decoding instead of memorizing.
| Word part | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| cardi, cardio | heart | bradycardia (slow heartbeat) |
| oste, osteo | bone | osteology (study of bones) |
| myo | muscle | myocardium (heart muscle) |
| neph | kidney | nephrectomy (removal of a kidney) |
| hepat, hepato | liver | hepatitis (inflammation of the liver) |
| hyper- / hypo- | above / below normal | hyperglycemia / hypoglycemia |
| tachy- / brady- | fast / slow | tachycardia / bradycardia |
| peri- | around | pericarditis (inflamed area around the heart) |
| -itis / -ectomy | inflammation / removal | gastritis / appendectomy |
Directional terms all assume the anatomical position: standing upright, feet parallel at shoulder width, palms facing forward. Learn them as opposite pairs:
- Anterior / posterior (ventral / dorsal): front / back
- Superior / inferior (cranial / caudal): above / below
- Medial / lateral: toward the middle / toward the side
- Proximal / distal: nearer to / farther from a limb’s attachment to the trunk
- Superficial / deep: closer to / farther from the body surface
Add the three planes: sagittal (right from left), frontal or coronal (front from back) and transverse (upper from lower, giving cross sections). Drill everything with two-way flashcards for about 10 minutes a day. The MedlinePlus tutorial has short quizzes that make a good first check.
Anatomy: Diagram Drills That Actually Stick
Label blank diagrams from memory, check them against the book, and redraw what you missed a day or two later. Looking at a labeled figure feels like studying, but a lab practical asks you to produce the name with nothing in front of you, so practice exactly that.
- Pick one figure or lab model per session, such as the bones of the upper limb or the chambers of the heart.
- Hide the labels with sticky notes, or screenshot the figure and blank them out.
- Label from memory for five minutes. Write a question mark instead of peeking.
- Check and mark misses in a different color.
- Add one fact per structure, such as an attachment or what its name means.
- Redraw only the misses a day or two later, then the full figure at the end of the week.
Muscle names are less random than they look. OpenStax’s section on naming skeletal muscles lists the criteria anatomists use: shape, size, location, attachments, number of origins, fiber direction and action. Gluteus maximus, medius and minimus are the largest, medium and smallest buttock muscles. Biceps brachii has two origins (bi) and sits in the arm (brachi). Sternocleidomastoid runs from the sternum and clavicle to the mastoid process.
Use mnemonics for short ordered lists, not as your main method. Dunlosky and colleagues rated the keyword mnemonic low utility because it seems to help with a limited range of material and over short retention intervals.
Physiology: Draw the Cause-and-Effect Flowchart
For every physiology process, draw the chain: stimulus, sensor, control center, effector, response, and the feedback that switches it off. Put a direction on every box (rises, falls, more, less), then check that you can redraw it from memory and predict what happens when one link changes.
Example: baroreceptor reflex
OpenStax’s section on homeostatic regulation of the vascular system describes baroreceptors as stretch receptors found mainly in the aortic and carotid sinuses. When blood pressure drops, they’re stretched less and fire more slowly. The cardiovascular center in the medulla oblongata responds by increasing sympathetic stimulation of the heart, which raises cardiac output, and of the peripheral vessels, which causes vasoconstriction. Blood pressure rises back toward normal.
Now run the “what if” drills:
- What if pressure rises instead? Reverse the arrows. OpenStax describes faster firing, parasympathetic stimulation of the heart that lowers cardiac output, and less sympathetic stimulation of the arterioles, so they dilate.
- What if blood volume falls after bleeding? The same reflex speeds the heart and constricts arterioles and veins.
- What if a drug slows the heart? MedlinePlus says metoprolol, a beta blocker, works by relaxing blood vessels and slowing heart rate, and lists dizziness or lightheadedness among its side effects. Find the boxes it touches on your chart, then check your reasoning against your pharmacology textbook.
This flowchart is a simplified learning model, not clinical guidance. Follow your program’s textbook, your instructor’s reference ranges and your facility’s policies for anything involving patient care.
How to Study Anatomy and Physiology Each Week
Touch each chapter at least four times a week: preview it before lecture, recall it the same day, apply it in lab, and self-quiz at the end of the week, plus a short cumulative review on the weekend. The spacing is deliberate: Cepeda et al. (2006) found that the best gap between study sessions grows with how long you need to remember the material.
For time, a useful floor is the federal credit-hour definition: one hour of class plus at least two hours of out-of-class work each week per semester credit. A 3-credit lecture works out to about 6 hours a week outside class. Your college sets its own credit rules, including for labs, so treat this as a baseline.
The lecture, lab and self-quiz cycle
| When | What you do | Time |
|---|---|---|
| Before lecture | Skim headings, figures and learning outcomes | 20 min |
| Lecture evening | Blank-page recall, then fill gaps from notes | 30 min |
| Day 2 | Read assigned pages in chunks; word-part flashcards | 75 min |
| Lab day | Identify structures on models, then one blank-diagram drill | Lab + 30 min |
| Day 4 | Redraw the week’s flowchart from memory; three what-ifs | 40 min |
| Day 5 | Closed-book chapter self-quiz; read every rationale | 60 min |
| Weekend | Last week’s misses plus one older system | 60 min |
Don’t skip the same-day recall or the weekend review: the first catches gaps while lecture is fresh, and the second keeps the first system alive while you learn the fourth.
Turn your notes into an anatomy and physiology study guide
When you finish a system, condense your anatomy and physiology study notes onto one page: one blank diagram, one flowchart, the ten terms you missed most, and five questions you got wrong, each with the rule it taught you. A stack of these pages is a study guide built from your own errors, and far quicker to review before a cumulative final than the textbook.
Using Practice Questions by Chapter
Use practice questions after you’ve studied a chapter, with the book closed, and spend as much time on the rationales as on the questions. Practice testing was one of only two techniques Dunlosky et al. (2013) rated high utility, and they suggest it in place of rereading. Tag every miss by type, because each type has its own fix:
- Vocabulary (didn’t know the term): back to word-part flashcards.
- Location (knew the term, placed it wrong): another blank-diagram round.
- Mechanism (wrong direction of change): redraw the flowchart.
- Reading (misread the stem): slow down and underline what is asked.
Good sources are your textbook’s end-of-chapter questions, questions you write from your flowcharts, and edition-matched test banks. Our guide to practice testing for nursing school lays out a three-pass review routine.
A note on test banks: publishers write them mainly for instructors, and some programs restrict students from using them. Read your honor code or handbook, and ask your instructor if you’re unsure. If your program prohibits them, don’t use one; your textbook’s questions and the drills above do the same job. Where allowed, a test bank is a self-quizzing aid matched to one edition. It isn’t your instructor’s exam, and no question set can promise a grade.
Edition matters. McGraw Hill now lists Saladin’s Anatomy & Physiology: The Unity of Form and Function in its 10th edition and Hole’s Human Anatomy & Physiology in a 16th edition (©2022), so the Saladin and Hole’s test banks below fit courses still on those earlier editions. Pearson lists Visual Anatomy & Physiology by Martini and colleagues in its 3rd edition (©2021), which the Martini test bank matches.
If your course uses one of these textbooks and your program allows test banks, these supply chapter questions with rationales for the end-of-week self-quiz.
- Hole’s Human Anatomy and Physiology, 14th Edition Test Bank — for courses still assigned the 14th edition.
- Anatomy & Physiology: The Unity of Form and Function, 8th Edition (Saladin) Test Bank — for sections using Saladin’s 8th edition.
- Anatomy and Physiology: The Unity of Form & Function, 9th Edition (Saladin) Test Bank — for sections on the 9th edition.
- Visual Anatomy & Physiology, 3rd Edition (Martini) Test Bank — for courses on Martini’s current 3rd edition.
Each test bank is matched to one edition and ISBN-13. Check the number on your book before you buy.
How A&P Connects to Pathophysiology and Pharmacology
Pathophysiology is physiology with a link in the chain broken, and pharmacology studies drugs that push on those same links. The flowcharts you build in A&P become the base you add disease and drug effects to.
The textbooks show the dependency. In Elsevier’s listing for Understanding Pathophysiology, 8th edition (Huether, McCance and Brashers), most body systems start with a chapter on normal structure and function before the chapters on alterations. Our pathophysiology test banks for the Huether text currently match earlier editions, so check your ISBN there too.
Pharmacology works the same way. When you read that metoprolol slows heart rate and relaxes blood vessels, you’re reading two boxes of the baroreceptor flowchart. Keep your A&P charts and mark, in later courses, where a disease breaks the chain and where a drug acts. Next, see our guide on how to study pharmacology in nursing school, or browse our nursing test banks by course.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best way to study anatomy and physiology?
Use a different method for each half and test yourself on both. For anatomy, learn word parts, then label blank diagrams from memory and redraw your misses. For physiology, draw cause-and-effect flowcharts and predict what happens when one link changes. Then spread short self-quizzes across the week instead of rereading.
How many hours a week should I study A&P?
Plan on at least two hours outside class for every lecture credit, the floor in the federal credit-hour definition. For a 3-credit lecture, that’s roughly 6 hours a week, plus lab preparation. Split it into 20- to 60-minute blocks on most days, and add time before a lab practical.
Is A&P 2 harder than A&P 1?
Neither is harder for everyone. Course splits vary, so check your syllabus, but A&P 2 often covers systems such as cardiovascular, respiratory and urinary, where questions lean on mechanisms like pressure, flow and feedback. A&P 1 tends to carry more straight memorization, such as bones and muscles. If you got through A&P 1 mostly by memorizing, start drawing flowcharts in week one of A&P 2.
How do I memorize the bones and muscles?
Decode the names, then drill them on blank diagrams. OpenStax notes that muscle names describe shape, size, location, attachments, number of origins, fiber direction or action, so biceps brachii tells you two origins and the arm. Learn one region at a time, label from memory, and redraw misses over several days. Keep mnemonics for short ordered lists.
Do I need to know A&P for the TEAS or HESI?
Yes for the TEAS, and often for the HESI A2. ATI lists 18 of the 50 TEAS 7 science questions under human anatomy and physiology. Elsevier’s official A2 review covers A&P alongside math, reading, vocabulary, grammar, biology and chemistry, and Elsevier calls the A2 a customizable admissions tool, so your program decides which sections you take. See our ATI TEAS 7 guide and HESI A2 exam guide.
Bottom line: start with this week’s chapter
Don’t wait for a fresh start. Take the chapter you’re on now and do three things this week: learn its ten most common word parts, label one blank diagram from memory, and draw one physiology flowchart with a direction on every arrow. Then put three short self-quiz sessions in your calendar, including one on the weekend. Repeat for the next system, and keep every page.
Sources & further reading
- OpenStax — Anatomy and Physiology 2e, 20.4 Homeostatic Regulation of the Vascular System
- OpenStax — Anatomy and Physiology 2e, 1.6 Anatomical Terminology
- MedlinePlus (National Library of Medicine) — Understanding Medical Words Tutorial
- Psychological Science in the Public Interest (PubMed) — Dunlosky et al., Improving Students’ Learning With Effective Learning Techniques (2013)
- Psychological Bulletin (PubMed) — Cepeda et al., Distributed Practice in Verbal Recall Tasks (2006)
- ATI — TEAS Exam Details
- Elsevier — Understanding Pathophysiology, 8th Edition
