Anatomy study note · Head and neck

Eyelids and conjunctiva

The eyelids protect the eye from injury and excess light. Each is covered by skin outside and lined by conjunctiva, which reflects onto the front of the eyeball at the fornices to form the conjunctival sac.

Key points

• Skin outside, conjunctiva inside.
• Tarsal plates contain the tarsal glands.
• Close: orbicularis oculi (VII). Open: levator palpebrae (III) + superior tarsal (sympathetic).
• Foreign bodies lodge in the subtarsal sulcus.
• Lids: ectodermal folds, fused until the 7th month.
• Conjunctiva: ectoderm.
• Conjunctiva: stratified columnar with goblet cells.
• Meibomian glands = modified sebaceous.

The full note in the atlas also covers

Features · Action · Histology · Development · Clinical notes

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Written from

• Snell’s Clinical Anatomy by Regions, 10th ed., ch. 12, PDF pp. 1569–1575
• Inderbir Singh’s Human Embryology, ch. 19, PDF pp. 352, 358, 361
• BRS Cell Biology & Histology, 7th ed., ch. 21, PDF p. 388

More from the head and neck

• Facial bones of the orbit and nasal cavity
• Facial nerve
• Frontal bone
• Frontal lobe
• Genioglossus
• Geniohyoid
• Glossopharyngeal nerve
• Hippocampus
• Hyoglossus
• Hyoid bone
• Hypoglossal nerve
• Hypothalamus

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