Ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus

• US 20060074311A1
• Filed: 09/27/2004
• Published: 04/06/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 09/27/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: FUJIFILM Healthcare Corp. (Fujifilm Holdings Corporation), Isao Ohnishi, Kozo Nakamura
• Original Assignee: Aloka Company Limited (Hitachi, Ltd.), Isao Ohnishi, Kozo Nakamura
• Inventors: Nakamura, Kozo, Sakai, Ryoichi, Harada, Akimitsu, Ohnishi, Isao, Uehara, Toshiro, Matsuyama, Jyuntaro
• Granted Patent: US 7,806,823 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 600/437
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0048 Detecting, measuring or recording by applying mechanical forces or stimuli A61B5/021, A61B5/4884 and A61B9/00 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/4504 Bones A61B5/4547 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 8/0875 for diagnosis of bone A61B5/4504 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 8/485 involving measuring strain or elastic properties

Abstract

An echo tracking processor unit detects a bone surface section based on an echo signal and tracks a position of the bone surface section. An interpolation line generator unit generates an interpolation line connecting tracking points which represent the tracked bone surface section. A translational displacement corrector unit removes a translational displacement component between an interpolation line corresponding to a time phase of a no-load state stored in a memory and an interpolation line corresponding to a time phase in a loaded state output from the interpolation line generator unit. A strain calculator unit calculates an amount of strain of bone for each time phase and outputs to a characteristic curve generator unit. The characteristic curve generator unit generates a characteristic curve related to the strain of bone based on a load value output from a load measurement device and the amount of strain of bone output from the strain calculator unit.

Claims

1. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus comprising:

a transceiver unit which generates a plurality of ultrasonic beams with respect to a bone in a subject and obtains a plurality of echo signals corresponding to the ultrasonic beams; and

a shape measurement unit which identifies a surface point corresponding to a bone surface for each of the echo signals and generates shape data of the bone surface based on the plurality of surface points obtained from the plurality of echo signals.

2. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising:

a characteristic evaluation unit which evaluates a mechanical characteristic of the bone based on a change in the shape data when an external action is applied to the bone.

3. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 2, wherein

the transceiver unit genearates the ultrasonic beams within a same cross section of the bone in the subject.

4. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 3, wherein

the shape measurement unit comprises a tracking unit which tracks the surface points from a state in which the external action is not applied to a state in which the external action is applied.

5. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 4, wherein

the shape measurement unit comprises a shape data generator unit which generates the shape data for each time phase in the state in which the external action is not applied and the state in which the external action is applied.

6. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 5, wherein

the shape data generator unit generates, as the shape data, an interpolation line connecting the plurality of surface points for each time phase.

7. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 6, wherein

the characteristic evaluation unit overlaps the interpolation line corresponding to the state in which the external action is not applied and the interpolation line corresponding to the state in which the external action is applied by overlapping one of the interpolation lines on the other to correct a displacement due to a movement of the bone between the two interpolation lines and evaluates the mechanical characteristic of the bone based on the two corrected interpolation lines.

8. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus comprising:

a transceiver unit which generates a plurality of ultrasonic beams with respect to a bone in a subject and obtains a plurality of echo signals corresponding to the ultrasonic beams; and

a tracking unit which identifies a surface point corresponding to a bone surface for each of the echo signals and tracks the surface points from a no-load state in which no load is applied to the bone to a loaded state in which a load is applied to the bone.

9. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 8, wherein

the tracking unit detects a zero-cross point as the surface point and tracks the detected zero-cross point.

10. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 9, wherein

the zero-cross point is detected as a time at which a polarity of the echo signal is inverted from positive to negative or from negative to positive within a tracking gate period.

11. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 8, further comprising:

an interpolation line generator unit which generates an interpolation line connecting a plurality of the surface points for each time phase in the no-load state and in the loaded state.

12. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 11, wherein

the interpolation line generator unit generates an interpolation line using a spline interpolation.

13. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 11, wherein

the interpolation line generator unit generates an interpolation line using a least square interpolation.

14. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 11, further comprising:

a translational displacement corrector unit which translates one of the interpolation line corresponding to the no-load state and the interpolation line corresponding to the loaded state such that one of the interpolation line is over the other interpolation line and corrects a translational displacement component between the two interpolation lines.

15. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 14, further comprising:

a strain calculator unit which calculates an amount of strain of the bone in the loaded state based on the two interpolation lines in which the translational displacement component is corrected.

16. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 15, further comprising:

a characteristic curve generator unit which generates a characteristic curve indicating a relationship between the load value and the amount of strain of the bone in the loaded state.

17. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 16, wherein

the characteristic curve generator unit generates a characteristic curve in which one axis represents time and another axis represents the load value.

18. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 16, wherein

the characteristic curve generator unit generates a characteristic curve in which one axis represents time and another axis represents the amount of strain of the bone.

19. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 16, wherein

the characteristic curve generator unit generates a characteristic curve in which one axis represents the amount of strain of the bone and another axis represents the load value.

20. An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 16, further comprising:

a display unit which displays a cross sectional image of the bone based on the plurality of echo signals, wherein the display unit displays the interpolation line at a suitable position on the cross sectional image of the bone.