RadiologyQuizLabCT HEAD ANATOMY · AXIAL CT
CT head anatomy
CT head anatomy is what you read first in any emergency scan. Practise naming the structures on real axial CT slices — the fastest way to make head and brain CT anatomy stick. Free, no account needed.
Try it now — read the slice, name the arrowed structure:
SAG · T1TE 12 · TR 500Which anatomical structure is arrowed?
Single answer — type the structure
Correct — corpus callosum
Reading a head CT
A head CT is read on a few windows: brain window for grey–white differentiation, bone window for the skull and skull base, often a subdural window too. The same slice tells you different things depending on the window.
The landmarks to know
Work from the ventricles outward — lateral, third and fourth — then the basal ganglia, thalami and internal capsule. At the skull base, identify the sphenoid, petrous temporal bones and foramina that orient every study.
CT vs MRI of the brain
CT is fast and superb for bone, acute blood and calcification; MRI wins on soft-tissue and posterior-fossa detail. Learning both means recognising the same structure whichever modality shows it.
Keep practising by region
Move through the rest of cross-sectional anatomy one region at a time — brain and abdominal CT, cardiac MRI and more — and let each explanation fix the structure in memory.
Ready for the full set?
Get 40 free questions across 9 body regions — name the structure, get the explanation, and track what sticks.
Start free — 40 questions