Method and system for instant biopsy specimen analysis

• US 7,018,333 B2
• Filed: 11/20/2001
• Issued: 03/28/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 11/24/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: U Systems Inc (General Electric Company)
• Original Assignee: U Systems Inc (General Electric Company)
• Inventors: Wang, Shih-Ping, Cupples, Tommy Earl, Cheng, Xiangyong
• Primary Examiner(s): IMAM, ALI M
• Application Number:
  US10/466,568
• Publication Number:
  US 20040152981A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,589 Days
• Field of Search: 600437-472
• US Class Current: 600/443
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 10/0096 Casings for storing test samples A61B10/0038 and A61B10/0045 take precedence; preservation of living parts of the human or animal body A01N1/02; containers for retaining a material to be analysed B01L3/50; containers for enzymology or microbiology C12M1/16; swab-sampler being part of enzymology or microbiology container C12M1/30
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 2090/378 using ultrasound
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 8/0833 involving detecting or locating foreign bodies or organic structures
• CPC Class Codes: G01N 2291/02466 Biological material, e.g. blood
• CPC Class Codes: G01N 29/0609 Display arrangements, e.g. colour displays indicating or recording in connection with measuring in general G01D
• CPC Class Codes: G01N 29/223 Supports, positioning or alignment in fixed situation mounting transducers per se G10K11/004
• CPC Class Codes: G01N 29/28 providing acoustic coupling , e.g. water impedance matching G10K11/02
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 15/8993 Three dimensional imaging systems
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 7/52017 particularly adapted to short-range imaging G01S7/53 takes precedence

Abstract

An apparatus and related methods for ultrasound-assisted surgical removal of a tumor or other biological object from a patient, the tumor requiring complete removal such that no portion thereof remains inside the patient, is described. According to a preferred embodiment, a specimen containing the tumor is extracted from the patient and suspended in a container holding an acoustically conductive fluid. An ultrasound probe is brought into acoustic communication with the fluid and scans the specimen, preferably at an acoustic power setting higher than a maximum ultrasonic power permitted on live human tissue. Resulting two-dimensional and/or three-dimensional ultrasound images of the specimen, which have a higher quality due to the increased acoustic power of the scan, are viewed on an output display for examining whether any portion of the tumor comes into contact with a surface of the specimen. Preferably, the ultrasound images are segmented and processed by the ultrasound system in a manner that further assists in the determination of whether the specimen contains the entire tumor.

Claims

1. An apparatus for facilitating examination of a specimen removed from a patient during a surgical removal process, the specimen containing a tumor and surrounding tissue, comprising:

a container structured to suspend the specimen in an acoustically conductive fluid such that the acoustically conductive fluid substantially surrounds the specimen;

an ultrasound probe for placement in acoustic communication with the acoustically conductive fluid, the ultrasound probe having an ultrasonic power setting higher than a maximum ultrasonic power permitted on live human tissue;

an ultrasound processor coupled to the ultrasound probe, the ultrasound processor receiving scan information from the ultrasound probe and computing ultrasound images of the specimen therefrom; and

a display device coupled to the ultrasound processor for displaying the ultrasound images of the specimen to a user, said high ultrasonic power setting resulting in ultrasound images having higher signal-to-noise characteristics as compared to images obtained from probes set below said maximum ultrasonic power, said high signal-to-noise ultrasound images enhancing the user'"'"'s ability to determine whether or not the tumor is completely surrounded by the surrounding tissue in the specimen.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the ultrasound images displayed to the user are two-dimensional ultrasound slices.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising a position determining system coupled to said ultrasound probe and to said ultrasound processor, said position determining system structured to detect positions of the ultrasound probe as it scans the specimen and to provide said positions to the ultrasound processor, said ultrasound processor computing a volumetric representation of the specimen, said display displaying a three-dimensional volumetric representation of the specimen.

4. The apparatus of claim 3, further comprising a user input for receiving image manipulation commands from the user, the three-dimensional volumetric representation being rotated and/or scaled on the display device according to said image manipulation commands.

5. The apparatus of claim 3, said ultrasound processor segmenting the tumor and the surrounding tissue, wherein said three-dimensional volumetric representation displayed to the user comprises segmented versions of the tumor and surrounding tissue.

6. The apparatus of claim 5, said ultrasound processor computing a closest distance between a tumor surface and a specimen surface, said display device displaying said closest distance in numerical form.

7. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the specimen is suspended in the container by ultrasonically transparent mechanical supports extending from a frame of the container.

8. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the acoustically conductive fluid is a gel having a specific gravity similar to that of the specimen, the specimen being supported solely by the gel.

9. An apparatus for facilitating examination of a specimen removed from a patient during a surgical removal process, the specimen containing a tumor and surrounding tissue, comprising:

a container structured to suspend the specimen in an acoustically conductive fluid such that the acoustically conductive fluid substantially surrounds the specimen;

an ultrasound probe for placement in acoustic communication with the acoustically conductive fluid to scan the specimen;

a position determining system coupled to said ultrasound probe to detect positions of the ultrasound probe as it scans the specimen;

an ultrasound processor coupled to the ultrasound probe and to the position determining system, the ultrasound processor receiving scan information from the ultrasound probe and corresponding probe positions from the position determining system, the ultrasound processor computing a volumetric representation of the specimen; and

a display device coupled to the ultrasound processor for displaying the volumetric representation of the specimen to a user, the volumetric representation of the specimen enhancing the user'"'"'s ability to determine whether or not the tumor is completely surrounded by the surrounding tissue in the specimen.

10. The apparatus of claim 9, further comprising a user input for receiving image manipulation commands from the user, the volumetric representation being rotated and/or scaled on the display device according to said image manipulation commands.

11. The apparatus of claim 9, said ultrasound processor segmenting the tumor and the surrounding tissue, wherein said volumetric representation displayed to the user comprises segmented versions of the tumor and surrounding tissue.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, said ultrasound processor computing a closest distance between a tumor surface and a specimen surface, said display device displaying said closest distance in numerical form.

13. The apparatus of claim 12, wherein said ultrasound probe has an ultrasonic power setting higher than a maximum ultrasonic power permitted on live human tissue, said high ultrasonic power setting resulting in ultrasound images having improved signal-to-noise characteristics as compared to in vivo ultrasound scans.

14. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the acoustically conductive fluid is a gel having a specific gravity comparable to that of the specimen, and wherein the specimen is supported solely by the gel.

15. A surgical method of removing a biological object from a patient, the biological object requiring complete removal such that no portion thereof remains inside the patient, comprising:

surgically extracting a specimen from the patient, the specimen comprising the biological object and a surrounding tissue portion, the surrounding tissue portion substantially surrounding the biological object according to an initial approximation of a spatial extent of the biological object;

ultrasonically scanning the specimen using an acoustic power setting higher than a maximum ultrasonic power permitted on live human tissue;

viewing a display device displaying one or more ultrasound images of the specimen derived from the ultrasonic scan thereof;

determining whether the specimen completely contains the biological object by examining whether any portion of the biological object comes into contact with a surface of the specimen according to said ultrasound images; and

concluding the removal procedure for the biological object if no portion thereof comes into contact with the surface of the specimen.

16. The surgical method of claim 15, ultrasonically scanning the extracted specimen comprising:

suspending the specimen in an acoustically conductive fluid such that the acoustically conductive fluid surrounds the specimen; and

bringing an ultrasound probe into contact with the acoustically conductive fluid such that an acoustic coupling is formed between the specimen and the ultrasound probe.

17. The surgical method of claim 15, wherein said biological object is a breast tumor.

18. The surgical method of claim 15, wherein said one or more ultrasound images are three-dimensional volumetric representations of the specimen.

19. The surgical method of claim 18, further comprising manipulating an ultrasound system user input to cause said three-dimensional volumetric representation to be rotated and/or scaled on the display device.

20. The surgical method of claim 19, further comprising viewing a numerical metric on the display device, the numerical metric corresponding to a closest distance between the biological object and the specimen surface as computed by an ultrasound processor processing the ultrasound images.

21. An apparatus for facilitating examination of a specimen removed from a patient during a surgical removal process, the specimen containing a tumor and surrounding tissue, comprising:

means for suspending the specimen in an acoustically conductive fluid such that the acoustically conductive fluid substantially surrounds the specimen;

means for examining the suspended specimen with ultrasound at an ultrasonic power higher than a maximum ultrasonic power permitted on live human tissue;

means for processing ultrasound information received from the means for examining and for computing ultrasound images of the specimen therefrom; and

means for displaying the ultrasound images of the specimen to a user, said high ultrasonic power resulting in ultrasound images having higher signal-to-noise characteristics as compared to images obtained using ultrasound power below said maximum ultrasonic power, said high signal-to-noise ultrasound images enhancing the user'"'"'s ability to determine whether or not the tumor is completely surrounded by the surrounding tissue in the specimen.