Video: Endocrine system: Quiz questions, diagrams and study tools

The endocrine system – you either love it or you hate it. When you look at the list of systems in the human body, you find so many that are interesting and a lot more connected to our common knowledge. For example, the cardiovascular system, which is composed of one of the star organs on the human body – the heart. But the endocrine system – what does it do or what organs are part of this system? Well, today, I'm going to give you a quick intro to the endocrine system and show you a couple of fun ways to learn the organs that make up this system, so stick around.

Before we get into learning the organs of the endocrine system, let's answer the basic question – what is the endocrine system? The endocrine system is basically a collection of glands. And now I can see your face of confusion, “But, Joao, didn't you say that the endocrine system is made up of organs?” Well, a gland is basically an organ responsible for secreting stuff in your body. These glands secrete a variety of hormones which travel to specific target organs via the bloodstream. Hormones have specific functions such as regulating growth, metabolism, temperature, and reproductive development. So you can see that without a system like the endocrine system, our bodies would basically be a mess.

Like the nervous system, the endocrine system acts as a signaling pathway even though hormones are slower acting than nerve impulses. Endocrine signals can last from a few hours to a few weeks. The main control center for the organs in the endocrine system is the hypothalamus in the brain.

When you learn the endocrine system or any other system in the human body, the first thing you should always do is learn what organs are part of that system. Once you know which organs are which, you can start the business of learning exactly what is that they do. So this is where we start answering the question – how can you learn to easily identify the organs of the endocrine system?

There are two ways. First one – tada! – labeling worksheets. You can download this worksheet for free by heading over to our website at kenhub.com and search for endocrine system. In our Free Knowledge Library, you'll find this first article ‘Endocrine system: Quiz questions, diagrams, and study tools.’ Click here and it will take you to this page, scroll down all the way to where you can find this button ‘Download PDF Worksheet (Blank),’ and voila! You got your worksheet and you are now ready to print it. Alternatively, you can also label it on your tablet. By the way, I will leave the link to the worksheet in the video description below.

Before you start labeling, start by observing the labeled endocrine system diagram in that previous page where we downloaded the sheet. Spend some time familiarizing yourself with the location and appearance of each organ then try labeling each one using the unlabeled version of the diagram. Now time to quickly label this sheet. We will cover the organs from head to, well, gonads. We have both a female and male model here because you will see later in this video that there is one difference between the endocrine systems of females and males.

Right at the top, we find the pineal gland. This gland is found in the brain. The pineal gland has a more specific function being involved only in the secretion of the hormone melatonin. This hormone is involved in both sexual development and the sleep/wake cycle. Next up, we have this label here where you can add two important components of the endocrine system – the hypothalamus and the pituitary gland. The hypothalamus produces releasing and inhibiting hormones that affect the pituitary gland while the pituitary gland produces stimulating hormones that affect endocrine glands of the body.

Now moving on to the neck region where we find this structure here that we can label as the thyroid and parathyroid glands. The thyroid gland is important in regulating metabolism while the parathyroid glands maintain calcium levels in the blood by producing parathyroid hormone. The next structure that we're going to label is slightly controversial – the thymus. Some people consider it to be part of the immune system since it helps the body protect itself from autoimmunity which happens when the immune system turns against itself. Others say it also plays a role in the endocrine system since the thymus produces thymosin which stimulates development of disease-fighting T cells.

Next up, we have this organ here – the pancreas. The pancreas is particularly important in the enteric endocrine system as it releases the hormones insulin and glucagon which regulate blood sugar levels. And here, just over the kidneys, we find the suprarenal or adrenal glands. They regulate blood pressure, electrolyte balance, and stress response. Finally, we get to the part of the endocrine system where in males we find the testes which produce testosterone, and females, we find the ovaries which produce estrogen and progesterone. These hormones are involved in regulating sexual development, behavior, and physical characteristics, and also involved in gametogenesis.

And that is it. We have completed here our worksheet with all the organs and structures of the endocrine system. Looking good.

Remember, in the beginning, I said there are two ways to easily learn how to identify the organs of the endocrine system. Well, let's quickly talk about the second way – quizzes. At Kenhub, we have quizzes to suit every level from beginner to advanced. If you're just starting out learning about the endocrine system, quizzes on basic identification would be a great place to begin. If you fancy more of a challenge, try our advanced identification or clinical question bank questions. These endocrine quizzes are set up to emulate the same types of questions you'll find in your exam making them the perfect preparation tool. As you progress through the quiz, our intelligent algorithm learns which endocrine system questions you need more practice on based on your answers, and for those areas, you'll automatically get tested on them more frequently.

Ready to test your knowledge on the endocrine system? Then time to get started on our quizzes. Well, until then. I will see you next time.

There are two ways.

Ah, just…I think I broke my neck. I need to do less neck like this, cannot…not at my age. No, doesn't work.