COMMON EAR DISEASES

PARTS OF THE NOSE

PARTS OF THE SKIN
Skin has several jobs
• It holds the body together.
• It stops water and body fluids from leaking out of
the body.
• It stops germs and dirt from getting into the body.
• It senses how things feel (touch).
• It can sense the temperature of things.
• It can tell you when you have been hurt (pain).
• It is waterproof so that rain slides off.
 Epidermis
 The epidermis (ep-i-der-miss) is the outside layer.
 The epidermis makes the cells which are on the outside of the skin.
Deep in the epidermis are growing cells, and on the outside of this are
flat, dead skin cells. Because the cells are dead they easily rub off.
Other cells come to the surface, harden and take their place.

 Thesecells contain Keratin (ker-a-tin), which makes the skin waterproof

and tough.
 Other cells in the epidermis produce a pigment called melanin (mel-an-
in).This darkens the skin and protects you from strong sunlight. The
darker your skin the more melanin you have. You still need to wear
sunscreen no matter how dark your skin is, but people with fair skin get
sunburnt more quickly than people with dark skin.
 Dermis
 The dermis (der-miss) is a thicker and more elastic (stretchy) layer.
 In this layer there are:
 glands
 hair follicles
 nerves
 blood vessels.
 Glands
 skinYou have two types of glands.
 Sebaceous glands (seb-ay-shus) produce sebum, a kind of oil, which helps keep your skin soft and
waterproof. (I know you can get your skin wet but the water can't get inside your skin.)
 Sweat glands make sweat. When your body gets hot, the sweat glands make a lot of sweat which they
send up through pores (tiny holes) to the surface of your skin to cool you down.
 skinHair follicles
 Hair covers most of your body (except your lips, the palms of your hands and the soles of your feet).
The hair is made in the dermis in the hair follicles (foll-i-culs). Hair follicles look like tiny bulbs from
which your hair grows. Most of the hair on your body is short and fine.
 Nerves
 Tiny networks of nerves act as sensors to let us feel the world
around us. They tell us the temperature around us, make us
feel pain if something hurts our skin and let us feel how
smooth or rough things are and how hard our skin is being
pressed.
 Blood vessels
 Blood vessels carry oxygen and nutrients (food) to the cells
and carry away the waste.
 The Subcutaneous (sub-cute-ay-nee-us) layer is under the
skin.
 It is mostly made up of fat. Fat acts as a cushion to protect
Keeping you warm or cool
When your body gets too hot.
•Blood vessels widen to bring heat to the surface of your body.
•Sweat glands send sweat up to cool down the skin's surface.
•Hairs lie flat on your skin so that they don't trap any warm air (which
would make you feel hotter.)
When your body gets too cold.
  

•Blood vessels narrow so that you keep warmer inside.

•Sweat glands don't send sweat to the surface.
•Hairs stand up straight to trap a warm layer of air next to your skin.
When you are cold (or frightened) your skin gets "goose bumps".
These are made by tiny muscles pulling your hairs to make them stand up
straight.
How does your body know what to do?
Remember that your skin can sense temperature?
Well, the nerves in your skin send a message to
the hypothalamus (hypo-thal-am-us) in your brain
and back comes the signal to swing into action.
The hypothalamus is in charge of keeping your
body's core temperature at the right level
(around 37°C or 98°F).
 Types of skin
 Look at your body and you will see that your skin looks different in different places.
 Skin is not the same thickness all over your body.
On most of your body the skin is around 2mm thick.
On the soles of your feet it is much thicker, while on your eyelids it is only 0.5mm
thick. 
1.  I wonder if you can guess why the skin on your soles is so thick?
 Skin does not have the same form everywhere.
Look at the skin around your elbows and knees. 
You will see that it is much looser than the skin on the rest of your arm or leg.
2.  Why do you think this is so?
 The skin on the palm of your hand is much firmer than the skin on the back of your
hand. 
3.  Can you think why it needs to be?
Were you right?
1. The skin on your soles needs to be thick
because it gets rubbed a lot when you're
moving around, and would wear out too
fast otherwise.
2.The skin over your knees and elbows has
to do a lot of stretching when you move.
3.The skin on your palms needs to be firm
as you use your hands to grasp things.