CN116019487A

CN116019487A - Mammary gland ultrasonic scanning method and device

Info

Publication number: CN116019487A
Application number: CN202111249617.3A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 朱子俨; 史志伟
Original assignee: Shenzhen Mindray Bio Medical Electronics Co Ltd
Current assignee: Shenzhen Mindray Bio Medical Electronics Co Ltd
Priority date: 2021-10-26
Filing date: 2021-10-26
Publication date: 2023-04-28

Abstract

A method and apparatus for breast ultrasound scanning, the method comprising: after the breast machine probe covers the breast of the tested object, controlling the transducer to emit ultrasonic waves to breast tissue of the tested object before and during the movement; obtaining a two-dimensional ultrasonic image based on the ultrasonic echo signals, and carrying out three-dimensional reconstruction on a group of two-dimensional ultrasonic images to obtain a whole milk ultrasonic image of the measured object, wherein the group of two-dimensional ultrasonic images are obtained according to ultrasonic echo signals corresponding to ultrasonic waves emitted by the transducer during the period from a starting position to an ending position in the accommodating space; before or during the movement of the transducer in the accommodating space, acquiring a scanning range of the transducer in the current scanning for acquiring a starting position, an ending position and an array element for transmitting ultrasonic waves during the movement of the transducer from the starting position to the ending position; the scan range is determined from the characteristics of the body tissue of the two-dimensional ultrasound image or from the coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast.

Description

Mammary gland ultrasonic scanning method and device

Technical Field

The present application relates to the field of breast ultrasound scanning technology, and more particularly to a breast ultrasound scanning method and apparatus.

Background

At present, a full-breast ultrasonic automatic scanning device (hereinafter referred to as a breast machine) is commonly used for implementing breast ultrasonic scanning. The working principle of the breast machine is that a large probe is adopted to automatically scan the breast of a patient, a group of two-dimensional (2D) gray-scale images are obtained, then three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction is carried out, three-dimensional whole-breast data are obtained, and any new fault section such as coronal, sagittal and transversal sections are displayed. The single-side breast scanning 3-5 standard scanning surfaces can cover whole breast, and a doctor screens breast cancer by reading three-dimensional whole breast data and outputs a diagnosis report.

The mammary gland machine can realize medical technology separation due to the characteristic of standard scanning image standard, namely, a technician scans and screens at a basic level end, and a doctor remotely reads the film offline at the expert end. The method is very suitable for basic-level breast cancer screening work, realizes remote medical treatment and grading diagnosis and treatment by utilizing the Internet technology, reduces the workload of doctors, and realizes medical resource sharing. However, the existing mammary gland machine still has the defects of fixed scanning range, long time, large data, slow transmission and low film reading efficiency in the prior mammary gland machine for scanning 6 standard surfaces on two sides.

Disclosure of Invention

According to an aspect of the present application, there is provided a breast ultrasound scanning method, the method being applied to a breast machine, the breast machine including a breast machine probe, the breast machine probe including a housing, an acoustic window, a transducer and a driving mechanism capable of driving the transducer to move, the acoustic window being connected to the housing, the acoustic window and the housing forming a receiving space, the transducer being disposed in the receiving space, the method comprising: after the breast machine probe covers the breast of the tested object, controlling the driving mechanism to drive the transducer to move in the accommodating space, and controlling the transducer to transmit ultrasonic waves to breast tissues of the tested object before and during the movement, receiving echo waves of the ultrasonic waves and acquiring ultrasonic echo signals based on the echo waves of the ultrasonic waves; obtaining a two-dimensional ultrasonic image based on the ultrasonic echo signals, and carrying out three-dimensional reconstruction on a group of two-dimensional ultrasonic images to obtain a whole milk ultrasonic image of the measured object, wherein the group of two-dimensional ultrasonic images are obtained according to ultrasonic echo signals corresponding to ultrasonic waves emitted by the transducer during the period from a starting position to an ending position in the accommodating space; before or during controlling the transducer to move in the accommodating space, acquiring a scanning range of the transducer in the current scanning, wherein the scanning range is used for acquiring the starting position, the ending position and an array element of the transducer for transmitting the ultrasonic wave during the period from the starting position to the ending position; and wherein the scan range is determined from a human tissue characteristic of the two-dimensional ultrasound image or from a coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast.

According to another aspect of the present application, there is provided a breast ultrasound scanning apparatus comprising a breast machine probe, a transmit circuit, a receive circuit and a processor, wherein: the breast machine probe comprises a shell, an acoustic window, a transducer capable of emitting ultrasonic waves to scan tissues to be detected and a driving mechanism capable of driving the transducer to move, wherein the acoustic window is connected to the shell, and the transducer and the driving mechanism are arranged in the shell; the transmitting circuit excites the transducer to transmit ultrasonic waves to breast tissue of a tested object; the receiving circuit controls the transducer to receive the echo of the ultrasonic wave so as to acquire an ultrasonic echo signal; the processor is used for executing the mammary gland ultrasonic scanning method.

According to the breast ultrasonic scanning method and device, the scanning range can be reduced, the scanning time is shortened, the scanning efficiency is improved, the data volume obtained by scanning is reduced, the transmission storage efficiency is improved, the doctor film reading time is shortened, and the effective human tissue area is not reduced, so that the diagnosis result is not influenced.

Drawings

The foregoing and other objects, features and advantages of the present application will become more apparent from the following more particular description of embodiments of the present application, as illustrated in the accompanying drawings. The accompanying drawings are included to provide a further understanding of embodiments of the application and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate the application and not constitute a limitation to the application. In the drawings, like reference numerals generally refer to like parts or steps.

Fig. 1 shows an exemplary schematic view of an ultrasound image obtained by a conventional breast ultrasound scanning method based on a breast machine.

Fig. 2 shows a schematic flow chart of a breast ultrasound scanning method according to an embodiment of the present application.

Fig. 3 shows an exemplary schematic of a human tissue region and an inactive region in a ultrasound image.

Fig. 4 shows a schematic view of one embodiment of determining a scan range in a breast ultrasound scan method according to an embodiment of the present application.

Fig. 5 shows an exemplary schematic of an ultrasound image obtained according to the example of fig. 4.

Fig. 6 shows a schematic diagram of another embodiment of determining scan ranges in a breast ultrasound scanning method according to an embodiment of the present application.

Fig. 7 shows an exemplary schematic of an ultrasound image obtained according to the example of fig. 6.

Fig. 8 shows a schematic block diagram of a breast ultrasound scanning apparatus according to an embodiment of the present application.

Detailed Description

In order to make the objects, technical solutions and advantages of the present application more apparent, exemplary embodiments according to the present application will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings. It should be apparent that the described embodiments are only some of the embodiments of the present application and not all of the embodiments of the present application, and it should be understood that the present application is not limited by the example embodiments described herein. Based on the embodiments of the present application described herein, all other embodiments that may be made by one skilled in the art without the exercise of inventive faculty are intended to fall within the scope of protection of the present application.

The transducer of the existing mammary gland machine moves at a constant speed in the shell of the volume probe and scans while moving from one end (starting position) to the other end (ending position). Thus, the scan range of the breast machine is fixed and the size of the whole milk data obtained is fixed. Fig. 1 shows an exemplary schematic view of an ultrasound image obtained by a conventional breast ultrasound scanning method based on a breast machine. As shown in fig. 1, the width of each of the 6 images is determined by the physical length of the probe, the length is determined by the travel of the probe, and the depth is determined by the depth of scan. Such 3D whole milk images contain relatively many non-tissue images (light gray areas), waste scanning time, reduce film reading efficiency, increase data storage/transmission amount, and are not helpful for diagnosis.

Based on this, this application provides a quick scanning scheme of mammary gland machine, reduces the scanning scope on the one hand, shortens scanning time, improves technician work efficiency, reduces 3D whole milk data size on the other hand, improves transmission storage efficiency, also shortens doctor and reads the time, and the effective image of "human tissue area" does not reduce simultaneously, so does not have the influence to the diagnosis result. A breast ultrasound scanning protocol according to an embodiment of the present application is described below in connection with fig. 2-8.

Fig. 2 shows a schematic flow chart of a breast ultrasound scanning method 200 according to an embodiment of the application, the breast ultrasound scanning method 200 being applicable to a breast machine comprising a breast machine probe comprising a housing, an acoustic window, a transducer and a driving mechanism capable of driving the transducer to move, the acoustic window being connected to the housing, the acoustic window and the housing forming a receiving space, the transducer being arranged in the receiving space. As shown in fig. 2, the breast ultrasound scanning method 200 may include the steps of:

in step S210, after the breast machine probe covers the breast of the tested object, the driving mechanism is controlled to drive the transducer to move in the accommodating space, and the transducer is controlled to transmit ultrasonic waves to breast tissue of the tested object before and during the movement, receive echoes of the ultrasonic waves, and acquire ultrasonic echo signals based on the echoes of the ultrasonic waves.

In step S220, a two-dimensional ultrasound image is obtained based on the ultrasound echo signals, and a group of two-dimensional ultrasound images are three-dimensionally reconstructed to obtain a whole milk ultrasound image of the measured object, wherein the group of two-dimensional ultrasound images are obtained according to ultrasound echo signals corresponding to ultrasound waves emitted by the transducer during the period from the start position to the end position in the accommodating space; before or during the movement of the transducer in the accommodating space, acquiring a scanning range of the transducer in the current scanning for acquiring a starting position, an ending position and an array element for transmitting ultrasonic waves during the movement of the transducer from the starting position to the ending position; and wherein the scan range is determined from the characteristics of the body tissue of the two-dimensional ultrasound image or from the coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast.

In embodiments of the present application, the subject may be a person to be subjected to a breast ultrasound examination. In the embodiment of the present application, the scanning range of the transducer is not fixed, but the scanning range of the present scan is acquired according to the coupling range of the acoustic window and the breast or according to the human tissue characteristics of the pre-scanned two-dimensional ultrasound image before or during the movement of the transducer, so as to acquire the start scanning position (hereinafter simply referred to as the start position), the end scanning position (hereinafter simply referred to as the end position) of the transducer in the accommodating space, and the array element for transmitting the ultrasound wave from the start position to the end position. The scanning range is determined according to the coupling range of the acoustic window and the breast or according to the human tissue characteristics of the pre-scanned two-dimensional ultrasonic image, so that only the effective human tissue area is scanned or mainly scanned each time, and the ineffective area which is not coupled with the tissue is not scanned or scanned in a small amount, thereby reducing the scanning range, shortening the scanning time, improving the scanning efficiency, reducing the data volume obtained by scanning, improving the transmission and storage efficiency, shortening the doctor reading time, and having no influence on the diagnosis result because the effective human tissue area is not reduced.

The human tissue regions and inactive regions in the ultrasound images described hereinabove are understood below in conjunction with fig. 3. Typically, each scan of the breast machine is a series (set) of a-plane (cross-section of tissue) ultrasound images that are sequentially scanned, and then C-plane (coronal plane of tissue) ultrasound images are reconstructed from the set of a-plane ultrasound images. There may be an inactive area and a body tissue area in each a-plane. Wherein, the invalid area is that, for example, in the A plane, the near field has a highlight cross grain of 0.3cm and the back is hypoechoed; the human tissue region refers to, for example, in the a-plane, the near field having no (or a small amount of cross-hatching) and the whole field having a brighter tissue image. The ratio of the inactive area to the body tissue area may be different for each a-plane. For example, in the scan, there is a large area of human tissue (as shown in fig. 3, the solid line below the coronal plane of the left figure and the right lower box of its corresponding cross section). Just before or near the end of the scan, there are many inactive areas (as shown in fig. 3, the middle solid line of the left coronal plane and its corresponding cross-sectional right middle box), and even all inactive areas (as shown in fig. 3, the upper solid line of the left coronal plane and its corresponding cross-sectional right upper box). The more plump breasts are scanned, the more tissue areas are in the A-plane of each frame. Thus, human tissue regions can be distinguished from inactive regions by subjective judgment by an operator or by automatic detection by the ultrasound system. For example, a human tissue region may be determined and painted before scanning (automatic operation of a breast machine or visual image determination by an operator), or a human tissue region may be determined and painted during scanning to acquire a scanning range of the current scanning based on the determination.

In the embodiment of the application, the scanning range acquired before the transducer is controlled to move in the accommodating space can be determined according to the coupling range of the acoustic window and the breast or according to the human tissue characteristics of the two-dimensional ultrasonic image; the scanning range obtained in the process of controlling the transducer to move in the accommodating space is determined according to the human tissue characteristics of the two-dimensional ultrasonic image. Specific embodiments are described below.

In one embodiment, the scan range of the transducer may have a rectangular boundary, and in controlling the movement of the transducer within the receiving space, determining the scan range from the human tissue characteristics of the two-dimensional ultrasound image may include: before controlling the transducer to move in the accommodating space, acquiring a first ultrasonic image, and determining the left and right boundaries of the rectangular boundary according to the left and right boundaries of the human tissue region in the first ultrasonic image; in the process of controlling the transducer to move from the central position of the accommodating space to one end of the accommodating space, acquiring a second ultrasonic image, stopping the movement of the transducer when the human tissue area in the second ultrasonic image gradually decreases to be absent, wherein the position of the transducer is the starting position; in the process of controlling the transducer to move from the starting position to the other end of the accommodating space, acquiring a third ultrasonic image, and stopping the movement of the transducer when the human tissue area in the third ultrasonic image is gradually increased and gradually reduced to be absent, wherein the position of the transducer is the ending position; the start position and the end position are the upper and lower boundaries of the rectangular boundary, and the scanning range is a rectangular area surrounded by the left and right boundaries and the upper and lower boundaries.

In an embodiment of the present application, the first ultrasound image refers to: before the transducer moves in the accommodating space, namely, generally in the central position of the accommodating space, transmitting an ultrasonic wave to obtain an ultrasonic echo signal, and generating an ultrasonic image according to the ultrasonic echo signal; the second ultrasound image refers to: in the process that the transducer starts scanning and moves from the central position of the accommodating space to the scanning starting position (namely the starting position), transmitting ultrasonic waves to acquire ultrasonic echo signals, and generating an ultrasonic image according to the ultrasonic echo signals; the third ultrasound image refers to: the transducer starts scanning, in the process of moving from a starting position to an ending position, ultrasonic waves are transmitted to obtain ultrasonic echo signals, ultrasonic images are generated according to the ultrasonic echo signals, and a group of ultrasonic images generated in the process are a group of two-dimensional ultrasonic images used for three-dimensional reconstruction. The first, second and third ultrasound images are so named for distinguishing from each other.

This embodiment is described below in conjunction with fig. 4 and 5.

Fig. 4 shows a schematic view of one embodiment of determining a scan range in a breast ultrasound scan method according to an embodiment of the present application. The scanning process of this embodiment may be as follows:

1) Before scanning, the patient lies on his back, and the user pulls the full-breast volume probe to cover the compressed breast, while the transducer is in the center position of the probe housing (as in the middle solid line position on the left side of fig. 4), and the ultrasound system displays the ultrasound cross section in real time (lower right of fig. 4). In most cases, this location is where the lateral (left-right) boundary of the body tissue region is greatest.

2) Before starting scanning, the operator manually selects (user inputs) the lateral (left-right direction) ab boundary (two left-right broken lines in the lower right diagram of fig. 4) of the human tissue region for the image feature at that time, or the system automatically acquires the ab boundary according to an image detection algorithm. Then in this scan, the width of the scan range is the ab boundary.

3) In the scanning, only the scanning lines between ab are effective, only the array elements related to the transducer are transmitted and received, and the rest array elements do not work.

4) Clicking on "start scan" the transducer slides from the neutral position to one end of the probe volume housing, allowing the operator to manually select or the system to automatically detect the start position of the present scan. In the moving process, the proportion of the human tissue area in the surface A gradually decreases, when an operator observes or the system automatically detects that no human tissue area exists in the image (upper right of fig. 4), the operator manually clicks to determine or the system automatically determines the starting position of the current scanning (upper left broken line c of fig. 4), and the transducer stops to start moving reversely.

5) And (3) entering a scanning stage, moving the transducer reversely while scanning, wherein the proportion of the human tissue area in the surface A gradually changes in the moving scanning process, and at the moment, an operator manually selects or the system automatically determines the end position of the scanning. When the operator observes or the system automatically detects that no human tissue area exists in the image again, the operator manually clicks to determine or the system automatically determines the end position of the current scanning (the dotted line d at the lower side of the left diagram in fig. 4), the transducer stops moving, and the current scanning is ended.

6) 3D whole milk data was reconstructed.

Because the whole scanning is only carried out within the broken line rectangle of abcd, the scanning range is reduced, the scanning time is reduced, the 3D whole milk data size is reduced, but the human tissue area is not reduced, and therefore the diagnosis result is not affected. The abcd position per patient scan may be different and therefore requires visual inspection by the operator of either a manual single click determination or automatic detection by the system.

Fig. 5 shows an exemplary schematic of an ultrasound image obtained according to the embodiment of fig. 4. As shown in fig. 5, 6 standard surfaces of each patient's bilateral breast can set a scanning range according to human tissue image boundaries, a user or a system automatically sets left and right direction boundaries (left and right solid lines in the figure) according to image characteristics at the middle dotted line position of a transducer before scanning, and during the scanning process, the user or the system automatically detects that no human tissue exists in the image and can set head and foot direction boundaries (upper and lower solid lines in the figure).

In general, in the embodiments shown in fig. 4 to 5, the scan width of the breast machine is the lateral (left-right) boundary of human tissue in the image (ab boundary in fig. 4), the length is the longitudinal boundary of human tissue (cd boundary in fig. 4), and the depth is the scan depth, so that the ineffective area scan can be reduced to some extent. The scheme of the embodiment is simple to realize, the requirement on hardware (a driving mechanism of the transducer) is low, and the transducer can move at a uniform speed; the scan width (number of active elements) is determined before each scan and remains unchanged during the scan. In addition, the boundary of the scanning range can be set manually by an operator, the setting can be automatically detected according to an algorithm, and manual correction can be allowed on the basis of the automatic detection setting, so that the scanning range can be determined more accurately and more efficiently.

Furthermore, the above embodiments may also be derived from a simplified embodiment. That is, only the ab boundary may be determined, and the cd boundary may not be determined, but one end and the other end of the housing space of the transducer may be directly defined as the cd boundary, respectively, and the scanning range may be reduced to some extent. In this simplified embodiment, the scan range still has a rectangular boundary, and determining the scan range from the human tissue characteristics of the two-dimensional ultrasound image prior to controlling the transducer to move within the receiving space may include: before controlling the transducer to move in the accommodating space, acquiring a first ultrasonic image, and determining the left and right boundaries of the rectangular boundary according to the left and right boundaries of the human tissue region in the first ultrasonic image; determining the upper and lower boundaries of the rectangular boundary according to the position from one end to the other end of the accommodating space; the scanning range is a rectangular area surrounded by a left-right boundary and an upper-lower boundary.

In another embodiment, the scan range may have irregularly shaped boundaries, and determining the scan range from the coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast prior to controlling the transducer to move within the receiving space may include: before controlling the transducer to move in the accommodating space, the coupling range of the acoustic window and the breast is acquired, and the coupling range is used as the scanning range of the transducer. Described below in connection with fig. 6 and 7.

Fig. 6 shows a schematic diagram of another embodiment of determining scan ranges in a breast ultrasound scanning method according to an embodiment of the present application. The scanning process of this embodiment may be as follows: before scanning, the patient lies on his back and the user pulls the full-milk-volume probe to cover the compressed breast (as shown in the left view of fig. 6), where the acoustic window of the full-milk-volume probe is coupled to the breast portion area. Then, the coupling range of the acoustic window and the breast can be obtained according to the input of the user, or the coupling range (shown by a dotted line in the right graph of fig. 6) can be automatically detected by the system, and the coupling range is the scanning range of the current scanning. In this embodiment, the scanning range can be automatically decomposed into left and right boundaries (as shown by the broken lines in the right diagram ab of fig. 6). During scanning, the transducer scans while moving, the scanning range (i.e. the range between a point above the broken line a and a point above the broken line b) is different for each frame, and only the array elements in the scanning range participate in transmitting and receiving. In the reconstruction stage, the frame spacing of the reconstructed 3D whole milk data needs to be kept consistent.

Because the whole scanning is only carried out in the coupling range, and the coupling range generally does not comprise invalid areas except for human tissue areas, the scanning range can be reduced to the greatest extent, the scanning time is reduced, the size of the 3D whole milk data is reduced, but the human tissue areas are not reduced, and therefore the diagnosis result is not influenced.

Fig. 7 shows an exemplary schematic of an ultrasound image obtained according to the embodiment of fig. 6. As shown in fig. 7, the scanning range can be set according to the coupling range of the acoustic window and the breast (irregular human tissue area) on 6 standard surfaces of each patient, the starting position and the ending position of the transducer before scanning and the array elements which need to participate in transmitting and receiving in each frame are determined, and the ineffective area is reduced to the minimum in the finally scanned ultrasonic image. Thus, in the embodiment shown in fig. 6 and 7, the scan range of the breast machine is the coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast tissue, which can minimize ineffective area scanning and improve the scanning efficiency.

In the above embodiment, the coupling range between the acoustic window and the breast may be acquired according to the user input, or the coupling range may be automatically detected. Illustratively, obtaining the coupling range according to the user input may include: capturing an image by the image acquisition device aiming at a coupling boundary between the acoustic window and the breast, which is drawn by a user on the acoustic window, and acquiring a coupling range between the acoustic window and the breast according to the captured image; or the projector arranged on the mammary gland machine shell projects the coupling condition of the sound window and the breast to the touch screen to obtain a projection image, and the coupling range of the sound window and the breast is obtained according to the coupling boundary of the sound window and the breast drawn by the user on the projection image.

Illustratively, automatically detecting the coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast may include: and detecting the pressure between the acoustic window and human tissue by the acoustic window with the pressure detection function, and taking the area with the pressure larger than a preset threshold value as a coupling range. In this example, the acoustic window of the whole milk volume probe may be provided with a pressure detection function, the acoustic window is in a region well coupled with the tissue, the acoustic window receives an upward pressure value from the human tissue, and the acoustic window is in a region poorly coupled with the tissue or not in contact at all, the pressure value received by the acoustic window is very small or even 0, so that the coupling range can be obtained through pressure detection.

Illustratively, automatically detecting the coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast may include: projecting the coupling condition of the sound window and the breast to a touch screen by a projector arranged on the shell to obtain a projection image, and detecting the coupling boundary of the sound window and the breast according to an image detection algorithm to obtain the coupling range of the sound window and the breast. In this example, the coupling range may be acquired through image detection. When the coupling boundary between the acoustic window and the breast is detected, the boundary of the shielded area can be predicted according to a smoothing algorithm when part of the area of the projection image is shielded by the transducer; or supplementing the boundary of the blocked area according to the boundary detected by the image detection algorithm.

In yet another embodiment, the scan range may have irregularly shaped boundaries, and in controlling movement of the transducer within the receiving space, determining the scan range from the characteristics of the body tissue of the two-dimensional ultrasound image may include: in the process of controlling the transducer to move from the central position of the accommodating space to one end of the accommodating space, acquiring a second ultrasonic image, stopping the movement of the transducer when the human tissue area in the second ultrasonic image gradually decreases to be absent, wherein the position of the transducer is the starting position; in the process of controlling the transducer to move from the starting position to the other end of the accommodating space, acquiring a third ultrasonic image, and stopping the movement of the transducer when the human tissue area in the third ultrasonic image is gradually increased and gradually reduced to be absent, wherein the position of the transducer is the ending position; in the process of controlling the transducer to move from a starting position to an ending position, controlling the transducer to transmit and receive in a mode of spreading from a central array element to two end array elements so as to acquire the left and right boundaries of a human tissue area in each frame of third ultrasonic image; the scan range is determined based on the start position, the end position, and the left and right boundaries of the human tissue region in the third ultrasound image per frame. In the above embodiment, the coupling boundary is determined as the scanning range immediately before scanning, and in this embodiment, the coupling boundary (ab dotted line in the right diagram of fig. 6) is determined as the scanning range according to the image characteristics during scanning, and the determined coupling boundary is more accurate.

The method for controlling the transducer to transmit and receive in a mode of spreading from the central array element to the two end array elements so as to acquire the left and right boundaries of the human tissue region in each frame of the third ultrasonic image can comprise the following steps: controlling the transducer to transmit and receive in a mode of spreading from the central array element to the two end array elements so as to generate a third ultrasonic image of each frame; in the generation process of the third ultrasonic image of each frame, the left-end array element sequentially transmits and receives to generate a left image of the third ultrasonic image, and when human tissue in the left image gradually decreases to no, the left-end spreading is stopped, and the left boundary of the third ultrasonic image is acquired; and the right-end array element sequentially transmits and receives to generate a right image of the third ultrasonic image, and when human tissue in the right image gradually decreases to be absent, the right-end array element stops spreading, and a right boundary of the third ultrasonic image is acquired.

The scanning process in this embodiment is described below in connection with a specific example as follows:

1) The operator clicks the 'start scanning', the transducer rapidly slides to one end of the volume shell of the probe from the middle position, the proportion of the human tissue area in the A surface gradually decreases in the moving process, and when the mammary gland machine algorithm automatically detects that no human tissue area exists in the image, the transducer stops moving, and the position is the starting position of the scanning.

2) And (3) entering a formal scanning stage, reversely moving the transducer, scanning while moving, and detecting the ab boundary of each frame of human tissue region by using a mammary gland machine algorithm in real time. Each frame of image is transmitted and received from the central array element of the probe, and is transmitted and received to the array elements at two ends in sequence, for example, firstly, the array elements at the left end are transmitted and received in sequence, and when detecting that a certain array element does not have image information any more, the image is a boundary of the current frame; and then sequentially transmitting and receiving to the right end, and when detecting that a certain array element does not have image information, determining the b boundary of the current frame. In the current frame, the probe only has the scanning lines between ab to be effective, only the array elements related to the probe transmit and receive, and the rest array elements do not work.

3) When the mammary gland machine algorithm automatically detects no human tissue area in the image again, the probe stops moving, and the position is the end position of the scanning.

4) And (3) a reconstruction stage.

The ab position is different for each patient scan, and thus real-time detection by the breast machine algorithm is required. In this embodiment, each patient scan is not a rectangle, but an irregular area of human tissue, minimizing ineffective areas. In addition, since the coupling boundary is determined as the scanning range according to the ultrasonic image characteristics in the scanning process, the determined coupling boundary is the most accurate.

Further, in this embodiment, when the aforementioned left and right boundaries are acquired, the left and right boundaries of the third ultrasound image of the current frame may be acquired based on the left and right boundaries of the third ultrasound image of the previous frame. This is because, in the moving scanning process, the ratio of the human tissue area in the a plane gradually changes, and given that the two boundary positions of a (N) and b (N) of the nth frame are known, in the n+1th frame, only m array elements/sound beams are detected more about the positions of a (N) and b (N) to determine whether there is a human tissue area, so that the boundaries of a (n+1) and b (n+1) of the new frame can be obtained, which can reduce the calculation amount. In addition, the detection of the human tissue region may be a frame-by-frame detection, which may further improve the computational efficiency.

Based on the above description, the breast ultrasound scanning method according to the embodiment of the application can reduce the scanning range, shorten the scanning time, improve the scanning efficiency, reduce the data volume obtained by scanning, improve the transmission and storage efficiency, shorten the doctor film reading time, and have no influence on the diagnosis result because the effective human tissue area is not reduced.

A breast ultrasound scanning device provided in accordance with another aspect of the present application is described below in connection with fig. 8. Fig. 8 shows a schematic block diagram of a breast ultrasound scanning apparatus 800 according to an embodiment of the present application. As shown in fig. 8, the breast ultrasound scanning apparatus 800 includes a breast probe 810, a transmit circuit 820, a receive circuit 830, and a processor 840. Wherein the breast machine probe 810 comprises a housing, an acoustic window, a transducer capable of emitting ultrasonic waves to scan tissue to be tested, and a driving mechanism (not shown) capable of driving the transducer to move, the acoustic window being connected to the housing, the transducer and the driving mechanism being disposed in the housing; the transmitting circuit 820 is used for exciting the transducer to transmit ultrasonic waves to breast tissue of the tested object; the receiving circuit 830 is configured to control the transducer to receive an ultrasonic echo returned from the breast tissue, so as to obtain an ultrasonic echo signal; processor 840 is configured to perform the breast ultrasound scanning method 200 described previously in accordance with embodiments of the present application. Those skilled in the art may understand the structure of the breast ultrasound scanning apparatus 800 and the operation thereof according to the embodiments of the present application in conjunction with the foregoing description of the breast ultrasound scanning method according to the embodiments of the present application, and for brevity, specific details of the operation of each component of the breast ultrasound scanning apparatus 800 will not be described herein.

Furthermore, according to an embodiment of the present application, there is also provided a storage medium on which program instructions are stored, which program instructions, when executed by a computer or processor, are adapted to carry out the respective steps of the breast ultrasound scanning method of an embodiment of the present application. The storage medium may include, for example, a memory card of a smart phone, a memory component of a tablet computer, a hard disk of a personal computer, read-only memory (ROM), erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), portable compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM), USB memory, or any combination of the foregoing storage media.

Based on the above description, the breast ultrasound scanning method and the device according to the embodiments of the present application can reduce the scanning range, shorten the scanning time, improve the scanning efficiency, reduce the data volume obtained by scanning, improve the transmission storage efficiency, shorten the doctor's film reading time, and have no influence on the diagnosis result because the effective human tissue area is not reduced.

Although the illustrative embodiments have been described herein with reference to the accompanying drawings, it is to be understood that the above illustrative embodiments are merely illustrative and are not intended to limit the scope of the present application thereto. Various changes and modifications may be made therein by one of ordinary skill in the art without departing from the scope and spirit of the present application. All such changes and modifications are intended to be included within the scope of the present application as set forth in the appended claims.

Those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that the various illustrative elements and algorithm steps described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented as electronic hardware, or combinations of computer software and electronic hardware. Whether such functionality is implemented as hardware or software depends upon the particular application and design constraints imposed on the solution. Skilled artisans may implement the described functionality in varying ways for each particular application, but such implementation decisions should not be interpreted as causing a departure from the scope of the present application.

In the several embodiments provided in this application, it should be understood that the disclosed apparatus and method may be implemented in other ways. For example, the above-described device embodiments are merely illustrative, e.g., the division of the elements is merely a logical functional division, and there may be additional divisions when actually implemented, e.g., multiple elements or components may be combined or integrated into another device, or some features may be omitted or not performed.

In the description provided herein, numerous specific details are set forth. However, it is understood that embodiments of the present application may be practiced without these specific details. In some instances, well-known methods, structures and techniques have not been shown in detail in order not to obscure an understanding of this description.

Similarly, it should be appreciated that in order to streamline the application and aid in understanding one or more of the various inventive aspects, various features of the application are sometimes grouped together in a single embodiment, figure, or description thereof in the description of exemplary embodiments of the application. However, the method of this application should not be construed to reflect the following intent: i.e., the claimed application requires more features than are expressly recited in each claim. Rather, as the following claims reflect, inventive aspects lie in less than all features of a single disclosed embodiment. Thus, the claims following the detailed description are hereby expressly incorporated into this detailed description, with each claim standing on its own as a separate embodiment of this application.

It will be understood by those skilled in the art that all of the features disclosed in this specification (including any accompanying claims, abstract and drawings), and all of the processes or units of any method or apparatus so disclosed, may be combined in any combination, except combinations where the features are mutually exclusive. Each feature disclosed in this specification (including any accompanying claims, abstract and drawings), may be replaced by alternative features serving the same, equivalent or similar purpose, unless expressly stated otherwise.

Furthermore, those skilled in the art will appreciate that while some embodiments described herein include some features but not others included in other embodiments, combinations of features of different embodiments are meant to be within the scope of the present application and form different embodiments. For example, in the claims, any of the claimed embodiments may be used in any combination.

Various component embodiments of the present application may be implemented in hardware, or in software modules running on one or more processors, or in a combination thereof. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that some or all of the functions of some of the modules in an item analysis device according to embodiments of the present application may be implemented in practice using a microprocessor or Digital Signal Processor (DSP). The present application may also be embodied as device programs (e.g., computer programs and computer program products) for performing part or all of the methods described herein. Such a program embodying the present application may be stored on a computer readable medium, or may have the form of one or more signals. Such signals may be downloaded from an internet website, provided on a carrier signal, or provided in any other form.

It should be noted that the above-mentioned embodiments illustrate rather than limit the application, and that those skilled in the art will be able to design alternative embodiments without departing from the scope of the appended claims. In the claims, any reference signs placed between parentheses shall not be construed as limiting the claim. The word "comprising" does not exclude the presence of elements or steps not listed in a claim. The word "a" or "an" preceding an element does not exclude the presence of a plurality of such elements. The application may be implemented by means of hardware comprising several distinct elements, and by means of a suitably programmed computer. In the unit claims enumerating several means, several of these means may be embodied by one and the same item of hardware. The use of the words first, second, third, etc. do not denote any order. These words may be interpreted as names.

The foregoing is merely illustrative of specific embodiments of the present application and the scope of the present application is not limited thereto, and any person skilled in the art can easily think about changes or substitutions within the technical scope of the present application, and the changes or substitutions are intended to be covered by the scope of the present application. The protection scope of the present application shall be subject to the protection scope of the claims.

Claims

1. The utility model provides a mammary gland ultrasonic scanning method, is applied to the mammary gland machine, characterized in that, the mammary gland machine includes the mammary gland machine probe, the mammary gland machine probe includes shell, acoustic window, transducer and can drive the actuating mechanism of transducer motion, the acoustic window is connected to on the shell, the acoustic window with the shell forms accommodation space, the transducer sets up in the accommodation space, the method includes:

after the breast machine probe covers the breast of the tested object, controlling the driving mechanism to drive the transducer to move in the accommodating space, and controlling the transducer to transmit ultrasonic waves to breast tissues of the tested object before and during the movement, receiving echo waves of the ultrasonic waves and acquiring ultrasonic echo signals based on the echo waves of the ultrasonic waves;

obtaining a two-dimensional ultrasonic image based on the ultrasonic echo signals, and carrying out three-dimensional reconstruction on a group of two-dimensional ultrasonic images to obtain a whole milk ultrasonic image of the measured object, wherein the group of two-dimensional ultrasonic images are obtained according to ultrasonic echo signals corresponding to ultrasonic waves emitted by the transducer during the period from a starting position to an ending position in the accommodating space;

Before or during controlling the transducer to move in the accommodating space, acquiring a scanning range of the transducer in the current scanning, wherein the scanning range is used for acquiring the starting position, the ending position and an array element of the transducer for transmitting the ultrasonic wave during the period from the starting position to the ending position;

and wherein the scan range is determined from a human tissue characteristic of the two-dimensional ultrasound image or from a coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the scan range acquired prior to controlling the transducer to move within the receiving space is determined from a coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast or from a human tissue feature of a two-dimensional ultrasound image;

the scanning range acquired in controlling the movement of the transducer within the receiving space is determined from the characteristics of the human tissue of the two-dimensional ultrasound image.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the scan range has a rectangular boundary, wherein determining the scan range from a human tissue characteristic of a two-dimensional ultrasound image prior to controlling movement of the transducer within the receiving space comprises:

Before controlling the transducer to move in the accommodating space, acquiring a first ultrasonic image, and determining left and right boundaries of the rectangular boundary according to left and right boundaries of a human tissue area in the first ultrasonic image;

determining the upper and lower boundaries of the rectangular boundary according to the position from one end to the other end of the accommodating space;

the scanning range is a rectangular area surrounded by the left and right boundaries and the upper and lower boundaries.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the scan range has a rectangular boundary, and wherein determining the scan range from the characteristics of human tissue of the two-dimensional ultrasound image in controlling the movement of the transducer within the receiving space comprises:

acquiring a second ultrasonic image in the process of controlling the transducer to move from the central position of the accommodating space to one end of the accommodating space, stopping moving the transducer when the human tissue area in the second ultrasonic image gradually decreases to be absent, wherein the position of the transducer is the starting position;

In the process of controlling the transducer to move from the starting position to the other end of the accommodating space, acquiring a third ultrasonic image, and stopping the movement of the transducer when the human tissue area in the third ultrasonic image is gradually increased and gradually reduced to be absent, wherein the position of the transducer is the ending position;

the starting position and the ending position are upper and lower boundaries of the rectangular boundary, and the scanning range is a rectangular area surrounded by the left and right boundaries and the upper and lower boundaries.

5. The method of claim 3 or 4, wherein the rectangular boundary is obtained from a user input or is obtained automatically from an image detection algorithm.

6. A method according to claim 3 or 4, wherein the movement of the transducer within the receiving space is uniform.

7. The method of claim 2, wherein the scan range has irregularly shaped boundaries, wherein determining the scan range from the coupling range of the acoustic window to the breast prior to controlling the transducer to move within the receiving space comprises:

before controlling the transducer to move in the accommodating space, acquiring the coupling range of the acoustic window and the breast, and taking the coupling range as the scanning range of the transducer.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the coupling range is obtained based on user input or is automatically detected.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein automatically detecting the coupling range comprises:

detecting the pressure between the acoustic window and human tissue by the acoustic window with a pressure detection function, and taking a region with the pressure larger than a preset threshold value as the coupling range; or alternatively

Projecting the coupling condition of the acoustic window and the breast to a touch screen by a projector arranged on the shell to obtain a projection image, and detecting the coupling boundary of the acoustic window and the breast according to an image detection algorithm to obtain the coupling range of the acoustic window and the breast.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein when detecting the coupling boundary of the acoustic window to the breast when a partial region of the projected image is occluded by the transducer, predicting the boundary of the occluded region further according to a smoothing algorithm; or supplementing the boundary of the blocked area according to the boundary detected by the image detection algorithm.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein obtaining the coupling range based on user input comprises:

Capturing, by an image capturing device, an image of a coupling boundary of the acoustic window and the breast, which is drawn on the acoustic window by a user, and acquiring a coupling range of the acoustic window and the breast according to the captured image; or alternatively

Projecting the coupling condition of the sound window and the breast to a touch screen by a projector arranged on the shell to obtain a projection image, and acquiring the coupling range of the sound window and the breast according to the coupling boundary of the sound window and the breast drawn by a user on the projection image.

12. The method of claim 2, wherein the scan range has irregularly shaped boundaries, and wherein determining the scan range from the characteristics of human tissue of the two-dimensional ultrasound image in controlling movement of the transducer within the receiving space comprises:

In the process of controlling the transducer to move from the starting position to the ending position, controlling the transducer to transmit and receive in a mode of spreading from a central array element to two end array elements so as to acquire the left and right boundaries of a human tissue area in each frame of the third ultrasonic image;

the scan range is determined based on the start position, the end position, and left and right boundaries of a human tissue region in the third ultrasound image per frame.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein controlling the transducers to transmit and receive in a manner that extends from a center element to both end elements to acquire left and right boundaries of a human tissue region in each frame of the third ultrasound image comprises:

controlling the transducer to transmit and receive in a mode of spreading from the central array element to the two end array elements so as to generate the third ultrasonic image of each frame;

in the generation process of the third ultrasonic image of each frame, the left-end array element sequentially transmits and receives to generate a left-side image of the third ultrasonic image, and when human tissue in the left-side image gradually decreases to be absent, the left-end spreading is stopped, and the left boundary of the third ultrasonic image is acquired; and the right-end array element sequentially transmits and receives to generate a right image of the third ultrasonic image, and when human tissue in the right image gradually decreases to be absent, the right-end array element stops spreading, and a right boundary of the third ultrasonic image is acquired.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the left and right boundaries of the third ultrasound image of the current frame are acquired based on the left and right boundaries of the third ultrasound image of the previous frame when the left and right boundaries are acquired.

15. The method of claim 12, wherein the detection of the human tissue region is a frame-spaced detection.

16. A breast ultrasound scanning device, the device comprising a breast machine probe, a transmitting circuit, a receiving circuit, and a processor, wherein:

the breast machine probe comprises a shell, an acoustic window, a transducer capable of emitting ultrasonic waves to scan tissues to be detected and a driving mechanism capable of driving the transducer to move, wherein the acoustic window is connected to the shell, and the transducer and the driving mechanism are arranged in the shell;

the transmitting circuit excites the transducer to transmit ultrasonic waves to breast tissue of a tested object;

the receiving circuit controls the transducer to receive the echo of the ultrasonic wave so as to acquire an ultrasonic echo signal;

the processor is configured to perform the breast ultrasound scanning method of any of claims 1-15.