Electronic cassette for recording X-ray images
First Claim
Patent Images
1. A portable electronic cassette for recording X-ray images, comprising:
- a portable enclosure capable of being transported by hand, said enclosure including a first housing member having a recess therein, said first housing member being substantially transparent to X-radiation and opaque to low energy radiation and a second housing member connected to the first housing member to form a chamber between the first and second housing members;
an X-ray image capture panel disposed within the chamber for producing a plurality of electrical charges in a pattern representative of the intensity of said X-radiation;
converting means also disposed within the chamber and connected to said image capture panel for converting the plurality of electrical charges into a plurality of digitized picture element values;
memory storage means located within said cassette and connected to said converting means for receiving and storing the plurality of digitized picture element values, said memory storage means having connection means to allow access to the memory storage means; and
an electrical power source disposed within said cassette and connected to said X-ray image capture panel, said converting means and said memory storage means, said electrical power source being sufficient to activate the X-ray image capture panel, the converting means and the memory storage means so that the electronic cassette is capable of being freely transported by hand.
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Accused Products
Abstract
An electronic cassette contains an X-ray image capturing panel comprising a solid state transistor array and storage capacitors on which is built a layered structure including a photoconductive layer. The storage capacitors capture electrical charges generated in the photoconductive layer by incident X-radiation and the image-wise charges are read out by the transistor array. The cassette contains an internal power supply and a built-in image storage medium among a plurality of electronic components to allow self-contained operation and temporary recording of digitized values which are representative of the pattern of incident X-radiation.
127 Citations
13 Claims
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1. A portable electronic cassette for recording X-ray images, comprising:
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a portable enclosure capable of being transported by hand, said enclosure including a first housing member having a recess therein, said first housing member being substantially transparent to X-radiation and opaque to low energy radiation and a second housing member connected to the first housing member to form a chamber between the first and second housing members; an X-ray image capture panel disposed within the chamber for producing a plurality of electrical charges in a pattern representative of the intensity of said X-radiation; converting means also disposed within the chamber and connected to said image capture panel for converting the plurality of electrical charges into a plurality of digitized picture element values; memory storage means located within said cassette and connected to said converting means for receiving and storing the plurality of digitized picture element values, said memory storage means having connection means to allow access to the memory storage means; and an electrical power source disposed within said cassette and connected to said X-ray image capture panel, said converting means and said memory storage means, said electrical power source being sufficient to activate the X-ray image capture panel, the converting means and the memory storage means so that the electronic cassette is capable of being freely transported by hand. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11)
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12. A method for capturing an X-ray radiogram, comprising:
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placing a portable electronic cassette having an X-ray image capture panel disposed within said cassette in a first radiation imaging location located in close proximity to a first human body said cassette having a first housing member being positioned adjacent said body and being substantially transparent to X-radiation; impinging the first housing member of the electronic cassette with imagewise modulated X-radiation; producing an imagewise modulated pattern of electrical charges within said X-ray image capture panel disposed within said cassette; converting the pattern of electrical charges into digitized picture element values representing the distribution and magnitude of electrical charges produced within the X-ray image capture panel; preserving said digitized picture element values in memory storage means; neutralizing the electrical charges remaining within the X-ray image capture panel so that the imagewise modulated pattern is eliminated; and
,transporting by hand the portable electronic cassette to a second radiation imaging location located in close proximity to a second human body, said second human body being the same or different from said first human body without removing the image capture panel from said cassette or reading out from said cassette the digitized picture element values. - View Dependent Claims (13)
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Specification