Respiration monitor
First Claim
1. A method of non-invasively detecting a position of a diaphragm of a patient comprising:
- placing over a lung sinus in the body of the patient an array of at least two ultrasound transducer elements extending in a direction of a longitudinal (z) axis of the patient;
transmitting ultrasound signals into the body;
receiving ultrasound signals reflected from the body; and
non-invasively detecting a position of a diaphragm of the patient based upon a difference between the signals received by the individual transducer elements.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A respiration monitor comprises a transducer array 5 having a plurality of individual transducer elements 7 that span at least part of the region of diaphragm movement of a patient. A patient 1 having a lung 2 and an abdomen 3 being separated therefrom by a diaphragm 4 is fitted with an ultrasound transducer array 5 over the lung sinus 6 prior to being given a CT or MRI scan. Each individual transducer element 6 emits an ultrasound pulse and then detects its echo in the known manner. Because air has a much higher acoustic impedance than tissue, the reflection of the ultrasound beam is much more pronounced when the lung is insonated.
By measuring the strength of the receiving signal, it is possible to determine to a high degree of accuracy the position of the patient'"'"'s diaphragm.
174 Citations
20 Claims
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1. A method of non-invasively detecting a position of a diaphragm of a patient comprising:
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placing over a lung sinus in the body of the patient an array of at least two ultrasound transducer elements extending in a direction of a longitudinal (z) axis of the patient; transmitting ultrasound signals into the body; receiving ultrasound signals reflected from the body; and non-invasively detecting a position of a diaphragm of the patient based upon a difference between the signals received by the individual transducer elements. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 11)
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7. An apparatus for monitoring a position of a diaphragm of a patient comprising:
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an array of at least two ultrasound transducer elements for placing on the patient in the direction of a longitudinal (z) axis of the patient to extend over a lung sinus; and a controller configured to; transmit ultrasound signals from the at least two transducer elements; and determine the position of the diaphragm based upon a difference between signals received by each of the at least two ultrasound transducer elements. - View Dependent Claims (8, 9, 12, 13, 14, 15)
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16. An apparatus for monitoring a diaphragm of a patient, the apparatus comprising:
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an array of at least two ultrasound transducer elements for placement on the patient in a direction of a longitudinal (z) axis of the patient to extend over a lung sinus, each of the at least two transducer elements being configured to detect an ultrasound beam which is reflected from tissue adjacent to the transducer element and to provide an output signal; and a controller configured to; measure the strength of each output signal to obtain a value for the acoustic impedance of the tissue adjacent to a respective transducer element; and determine a position of the diaphragm based upon a comparison of the acoustic impedance values. - View Dependent Claims (17, 18, 19, 20)
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Specification