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LandmarkShoulderDraft

Spine of scapula

The bony ridge that runs across the back of the shoulder blade, from its medial border out to the acromion.

BoneScapula
RegionShoulder

Find it

  1. Client prone with the arms resting by the sides, or seated.
  2. Place your fingers on the acromion at the top of the shoulder, then walk them medially along the bony ridge on the back of the scapula.
  3. Follow the ridge until it flattens into a smooth triangle at the medial border (the root of the spine), roughly level with the spinous process of T3.
  4. Feel the hollows either side: the supraspinous fossa sits above the spine and the larger infraspinous fossa below it.

The middle and lower fibres of trapezius insert on the upper lip of the spine, and the posterior fibres of deltoid arise from its lower lip. Supraspinatus arises from the fossa above it and infraspinatus from the fossa below.

At the root of the spine, levator scapulae inserts above and rhomboid minor inserts level with it. The spine is a useful dividing line when you work the upper and lower parts of the scapula.

Sources

  1. Wikipedia: Spine of scapula
  2. Gray's Anatomy (1918), The Scapula (Bartleby, archived)