Your Digestive System & How it Works

Your Digestive System & How it Works
Good digestion is the foundation to good health because it provides the essential substances your body needs to sustain itself. Shutterstock
|Updated:

What is the Digestive System?

The digestive system is made up of the gastrointestinal tract—also called the GI tract or digestive tract—and the liverpancreas, and gallbladder. The GI tract is a series of hollow organs joined in a long, twisting tube from the mouth to the anus. The hollow organs that make up the GI tract are the mouth, esophagus, stomach, small intestine, large intestine, and anus. The liver, pancreas, and gallbladder are the solid organs of the digestive system.
The small intestine has three parts. The first part is called the duodenum. The jejunum is in the middle and the ileum is at the end. The large intestine includes the appendix, cecum, colon, and rectum. The appendix is a finger-shaped pouch attached to the cecum. The cecum is the first part of the large intestine. The colon is next. The rectum is the end of the large intestine.
National Institutes of Health
National Institutes of Health
Author
A part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, NIH is the largest biomedical research agency in the world.
Related Topics