The Overuse of Eponyms: Time to Retire Them?

Eponymous anatomical terms were never designed for modern evidence-based education or global communication. They arose as historical rewards for discoverers, long before international terminology committees or digital search existed.² Today, however, anatomy is taught in multilingual, highly standardised curricula, and official nomenclature explicitly rejects eponyms in favour of descriptive Latin- and Greek-based terms.¹

This narrative review argues that routine use of anatomical eponyms has outlived its usefulness. Far from being harmless tradition, eponyms obstruct learning, fracture communication between specialties and countries, and blur ethical accountability. With robust descriptive terminology now available in Terminologia Anatomica and related systems, it is time to treat eponyms as historical artefacts—not required vocabulary. This review synthesises arguments from historical, educational, clinical and editorial sources to clarify the case for phasing out eponyms from core anatomical language.

Eponyms as historical convenience, not scientific language

Most anatomical eponyms were coined between the 17th and 19th centuries, when honouring a prominent European anatomist mattered more than teaching structural logic.² They compress complex descriptions into a surname but encode no information about morphology, location or function. Terms such as “Aqueduct of Sylvius”, “Circle of Willis” or “Fallopian tube” are historically meaningful but anatomically opaque.³

Descriptive terms—cerebral aqueduct, cerebral arterial circle, uterine tube—explicitly state what the structure is and where it is. Once descriptive terminology exists and is standardised, continuing to privilege the surname version is educationally irrational. It preserves hierarchy and nostalgia, not clarity.

How Eponyms Harm Learning

Anatomy already demands memorisation of thousands of terms. Adding a second, structurally useless name for the same structure doubles the lexical burden without adding understanding. Viewpoint work on eponyms in the anatomy classroom shows that students must learn both the descriptive term and the eponym to pass assessments and communicate with senior clinicians, increasing cognitive load and encouraging rote learning.⁴

Educational analyses of Terminologia Anatomica emphasise that official terms were deliberately constructed to be “self-intelligible” compounds that reveal region, relation and sometimes function.⁷ Eponyms cannot be decomposed into meaningful roots, so they cannot be inferred, only memorised. In high-stakes, time-limited curricula, that is not a neutral choice; it crowds out conceptual teaching and three-dimensional understanding.

Communication and Patient-safety Implications

Eponyms are not merely colourful; they are inconsistent. The same surname may refer to multiple structures, and different regions may use different eponyms for the same anatomy.³ Clinical commentaries on eponyms highlight that terminology often shifts with country, journal and specialty, generating avoidable ambiguity in reports and operative notes.⁵

Audit of conference presentations and teaching sessions confirms that obsolete eponyms and non-standard anatomical terms still appear frequently, even where official terminology has moved on.⁸ Every time “Pott’s fascia” or “Douglas pouch” is used instead of a clear, topographically anchored term, there is a chance that the listener will misinterpret the anatomical plane or space. In a surgical or emergency context, that is not a small problem.

Anatomists and Editors have Largely Moved on

Survey work among editors of major anatomy journals paints a clear picture: most prefer Latin- and Greek-derived descriptive terms for communication with students and peers, while accepting eponyms only as secondary usage in manuscripts.⁶ A substantial majority acknowledge valid reasons for discontinuing eponyms, even if they value them as part of anatomy’s historical narrative.

Corpus-based analyses of medical writing show that eponyms remain common in case reports and clinical discourse, but their use is uneven and often stylistic rather than functionally necessary.⁹ In other words, the inertia is cultural, not scientific. Where gatekeepers have actively pushed descriptive terminology—such as in official atlases, TA-based teaching or journal style guides—eponyms retreat quickly.

“Keep the Stories, Not the Labels"

One of the strongest arguments for eponyms is that they connect students with the history of anatomy and, in some cases, with difficult ethical lessons from the discipline’s past.¹⁰ That argument is valid—but it does not require the eponym to remain a primary anatomical term. Historical essays, sidebars and dedicated teaching sessions can explore why certain names were coined, who was excluded and when an eponym should be retired.

Reviews of anatomical eponyms emphasise that many honorifics are misattributed, Eurocentric or linked to ethically compromised figures, particularly in the context of Nazi medicine and exploitative research.³ Teaching these biographies is important; pretending that the associated surnames are neutral scientific descriptors is not.

Terminologia Anatomica - The Standard Terminology

The international community has, in effect, already decided against eponyms. From Nomina Anatomica through to Terminologia Anatomica and its second edition, official nomenclature committees have systematically removed eponyms from the canonical lists, retaining them only in indices to help users find the corresponding descriptive terms.^{1, 7}

Where institutions have aligned teaching, atlases and assessments with TA codes, students report less confusion and better transfer of terminology across basic science and clinical rotations.⁷ The bottleneck is no longer the absence of standardised terminology; it is the reluctance of curricula, exam boards and senior clinicians to let go of long-familiar eponyms.

How to Retire Eponyms without Losing History

Retiring eponyms does not mean erasing history overnight. It means changing what is considered mandatory vocabulary:

• Teaching: Always introduce the descriptive term first and, where needed, mention the eponym in parentheses as a transitional aid (e.g. “cerebral arterial circle (circle of Willis)”), then phase out the parenthesis over a few cohorts.
• Assessment: Accept eponyms only as secondary answers and clearly signal that descriptive terms are preferred or required.
• Textbooks and atlases: Move eponyms into footnotes, figure legends or historical boxes rather than bold labels.
• Journals: Update author guidelines to require TA-compliant terminology in titles, abstracts and main text, with eponyms mentioned once on first use if truly necessary.
• Clinical documentation: Encourage descriptive language in operative notes and imaging reports, reserving eponyms for legacy comparison with older literature.

This incremental approach preserves continuity for older clinicians while making it clear to new learners that descriptive, standardised terminology is the default.

Eponyms once served a purpose: they rewarded discovery and created a shared culture among a small, homogeneous group of anatomists and physicians. In contemporary anatomy, that bargain no longer holds. We have precise, descriptive terminology; we have international standards; we have a far more diverse student body and patient population.

Persisting with routine eponym use now mainly signals resistance to change. It adds cognitive load, muddies communication and occasionally glorifies the wrong people for the wrong reasons. The rational compromise is straightforward: keep the stories, retire the labels. Make Terminologia Anatomica-compliant terms non-negotiable in teaching, publishing and documentation, and let eponyms live where they belong—in the history and ethics of our discipline, not in its core vocabulary.