JP3047265B2 - Three-dimensional image creation method for ultrasonic diagnostic equipment - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus for obtaining a tomographic image of a diagnostic part of a subject using ultrasonic waves. The present invention relates to a three-dimensional image creation method that can be created and displayed on a computer.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In order to create a three-dimensional image of a certain diagnostic site in a conventional ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus, for example, a black and white tomographic image (B-mode image) of several tens of slices is collected from the diagnostic site, and these diagnostic images are collected. The edges of blood vessel walls and myocardial walls that appear brightly lit on a black-and-white tomographic image are detected using an image processing method called edge extraction. By joining together, a three-dimensional image of a blood vessel, a heart, or the like has been created.

[0003]

However, in such a conventional three-dimensional image forming method, a black-and-white tomographic image collected by an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus includes multiple echoes and acoustic directivity characteristics of ultrasonic waves. In some cases, virtual images such as artifacts due to side lobes may occur, or the data of the boundary in the edge extraction may be missing due to improper gain setting of signal acquisition. In any of the above cases, boundaries such as blood vessel walls and myocardial walls cannot be clearly recognized, and boundary detection by edge extraction may not be performed well. Therefore, a three-dimensional image of the blood vessel, the heart, or the like may not be created accurately.

Accordingly, the present invention addresses such a problem and provides a three-dimensional ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus capable of creating and displaying a shape of an inner wall of a blood vessel, an inner wall of a myocardium, etc. more accurately and better as a three-dimensional image. It is intended to provide an image creation method.

[0005]

In order to achieve the above object, a method for producing a three-dimensional image in an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to the present invention provides a method for projecting an ultrasonic beam toward a subject and reflecting the beam from the subject. Receiving the echo signal, a black-and-white tomographic image of the diagnosis site is created, and at the same time, a blood flow component is detected from the reflected echo signal using an MTI filter that detects a Doppler effect or a moving object, and the portion is displayed in color. A color flow mapping image to be created, an ultrasound image of a plurality of slices in which a blood flow portion is colored using these black-and-white tomographic images and a color flow mapping image is created, and these ultrasound images are used. Detect the boundary between the part with blood flow and the part without blood flow, use this boundary as the inner wall surface, connect the data of this inner wall surface for a plurality of slices to form a three-dimensional image,
This three-dimensional image is converted into an image viewed from a predetermined angle direction to be displayed on a television monitor, thereby creating a three-dimensional ultrasonic image.

[0006]

The three-dimensional image creation method configured as described above is
Using a black-and-white tomographic image and a color flow mapping image created by launching an ultrasonic beam toward the subject and receiving an echo signal reflected from the subject, a plurality of slices in which a blood flow portion is colored are used. An ultrasonic image is created, and a boundary between a portion having a blood flow and a portion having no blood flow is detected using these ultrasonic images. In this case, since the portion having the blood flow is colored, the boundary with the portion having no blood flow can be clearly detected. The detected boundary is used as an inner wall surface, and data of the inner wall surface is connected for a plurality of slices to form a three-dimensional image. Thereby, the shape of the inner wall of the blood vessel, the inner wall of the myocardium, and the like can be created and displayed more accurately and favorably as a three-dimensional image.

[0007]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram for explaining an embodiment of a three-dimensional image creating method in an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus used for implementing the three-dimensional image creating method. FIG.

First, as shown in FIG. 2, an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus used for implementing the method of the present invention comprises a probe 1, an ultrasonic transmitting / receiving unit 2, a black-and-white tomographic image creating circuit 3, a color flow Mapping image (hereinafter referred to as "CFM image") creation circuit 4
, Image memory 5, and first television signal generation circuit 6a
A first television monitor 7a for color display, a three-dimensional image operation creating circuit 8, and a second television signal creating circuit 6b
And a second television monitor 7b for monochrome display, and a control circuit 9
And

The probe 1 transmits and receives ultrasonic waves toward a subject by mechanically or electronically performing linear scanning, sector scanning, and the like. A vibrator that is a source of a sound wave and receives a reflected echo is built in. The ultrasonic transmission / reception unit 2 drives the probe 1 to generate ultrasonic waves and amplifies the received reflected echo signal. Although not shown, a pulser for transmitting a driving pulse to the probe 1 And a preamplifier for amplifying the reflected echo signal received by the probe 1. The black-and-white tomographic image creating circuit 3 receives the reflected echo signal output from the ultrasonic transmitting / receiving unit 2 and converts it into a digital signal, thereby creating a black-and-white tomographic image (B-mode image) of the diagnostic site. Further, the CFM image creation circuit 4 detects a blood flow component using a Doppler effect or an MTI filter that detects a moving object using the reflected echo signal input from the ultrasonic transmission / reception unit 2, and detects a color component in the portion. In order to create a CFM image to be displayed by adding a symbol, the signal is converted into a digital quantity and output. The image memory 5 receives the monochrome tomographic image and CFM image data created as described above and creates and stores, for example, an ultrasound image of several tens of slices in which the blood flow portion is colored. And has a storage capacity for several tens of frames.

The first television signal generating circuit 6a inputs ultrasonic image data read from the image memory 5 and converts the data into a television signal (analog video signal) for image display. The first television monitor 7a receives a television signal from the first television signal generation circuit 6a and displays an ultrasonic image in which a blood flow portion is colored, and includes a color CRT. .

Further, the three-dimensional image calculation / creation circuit 8 detects a boundary between a portion having a blood flow and a portion having no blood flow based on the presence or absence of coloring by using the data of the ultrasonic image read out from the image memory 5. Is used as an inner wall of a blood vessel, for example, and data of the inner wall of the blood vessel is connected by a plurality of slices by a voxel method or the like to create a three-dimensional image. Also,
The second television signal creation circuit 6b receives the three-dimensional image data output from the three-dimensional image calculation creation circuit 8 and inputs the three-dimensional image data into a television signal (analog video signal) for image display.
Is converted to And the second television monitor 7
“b” is for inputting a television signal from the second television signal generation circuit 6b to display, for example, a three-dimensional image of an inner wall of a blood vessel, and is composed of a black and white CRT.

In FIG. 2, reference numeral 9 denotes a control circuit for controlling the operation of each of the above-mentioned components, and is composed of, for example, a CPU.

Next, a method for creating a three-dimensional image using the ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus configured as described above will be described with reference to FIG. First, the probe 1 is driven by the ultrasonic transmission / reception unit 2 shown in FIG. 2, and as shown in FIG. The tomographic images I ₁ , I ₂ ,..., In of several tens of slices from the slice are taken. At this time, for the blood flow portions B ₁ , B ₂ ,..., Bn of the tomographic images I _{1 to} In, blood flow components are detected by using, for example, the Doppler effect, and the CFM image generation circuit 4 shown in FIG. create a CFM image display with a color to the bloodstream portion B ₁ to Bn.

Each of the tomographic images I _{1 to} I thus obtained is
n, as shown in FIG. 1 (b), only the attached color bloodstream portion B ₁ to Bn in the vessel 10, these image data are stored in the image memory 5 shown in FIG. After that, the image data of the tomographic images I _{1 to} In is read out from the image memory 5 and is taken into the three-dimensional image operation creating circuit 8 shown in FIG. Then, by the three-dimensional image operation creating circuit 8,
Each tomographic image I ₁ -In partial data having the processing to the blood stream of (B ₁ to Bn) and detects the boundary between the portion having no blood flow around them, the tomographic image I ₁ the border interior vessel wall W _1, W ₂ in the -In, ..., and Wn. Further, FIG.
(B), the removed data of these inner vessel wall W ₁ wn, for example stitching together several 10 slices the three-dimensional image creation techniques, such as the voxel method. Thereby, a three-dimensional image W of the inner wall of the blood vessel is created.

Next, a three-dimensional image W of the inner wall of the blood vessel is shown in FIG.
In order to display the image on the second television monitor 7b, the image is converted into an image viewed obliquely from a predetermined angle direction, for example.
Thereby, as shown in FIG. 1B, a three-dimensional ultrasonic image I for displaying the three-dimensional image W of the inner wall of the blood vessel with depth is created. Thereafter, the image data created in this way and output from the three-dimensional image calculation creating circuit 8 is input to the second television monitor 7b via the second television signal creating circuit 6b, and the image of the blood vessel inner wall is displayed on the screen. The three-dimensional image W is displayed.

As shown in FIG. 1B, using the data of the inner walls W _{1 to} Wn of the blood vessels detected for the respective tomographic images I _{1 to} In, the specifications such as the circumference and the cross-sectional area of the blood vessel 10 are obtained. It can also be measured automatically. Also, in FIG. 1, a case has been described in which the inner wall of the blood vessel 10 is detected, and a three-dimensional image W of the inner wall of the blood vessel is created and displayed. can do.

[0017]

The present invention has been configured as described above.
An ultrasonic beam for a plurality of slices in which a blood flow portion is colored using a black-and-white tomographic image and a CFM image created by emitting an ultrasonic beam toward the subject and receiving an echo signal reflected from the subject. An image is created, and a boundary between a portion having blood flow and a portion having no blood flow can be detected using these ultrasonic images. In this case, since the portion having the blood flow is colored, the boundary with the portion having no blood flow can be clearly detected. The detected boundary is used as an inner wall surface, and data of the inner wall surface is connected for a plurality of slices to form a three-dimensional image. Thereby, the shape of the inner wall of the blood vessel, the inner wall of the myocardium, and the like can be created and displayed more accurately and favorably as a three-dimensional image.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram for explaining an embodiment of a three-dimensional image creating method in an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus used for implementing the three-dimensional image creating method.

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Probe, 2 ... Ultrasonic transmission / reception part, 3 ... Black-and-white tomographic image creation circuit, 4 ... CFM image creation circuit, 5 ... Image memory, 6a, 6b ... Television signal creation circuit, 7a, 7b
... TV monitor, 8 ... 3D image calculation and creation circuit, 9
... control circuit, 10 ... vessel, I ₁ -In ... tomogram, B ₁
~Bn ... blood flow portion, W ₁ ~Wn ... the inner wall of a blood vessel, W ... blood vessel inner wall of the three-dimensional image.

Claims (1)

(57) [Claims] 1. An ultrasonic beam is emitted toward a subject, and an echo signal reflected from the subject is received to create a black-and-white tomographic image of a diagnostic site. A blood flow component is detected by using an MTI filter for detecting the blood flow component, a color flow mapping image is displayed by coloring the portion, and the black and white tomographic image and the color flow mapping image are used to generate a color flow mapping image. Ultrasound images of a plurality of slices with colors are created, and a boundary between a portion having blood flow and a portion having no blood flow is detected using these ultrasonic images. Creates a three-dimensional image by joining multiple slices into a three-dimensional image, and converting this three-dimensional image into an image viewed from a predetermined angle for display on a TV monitor A method for creating a three-dimensional image in an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus.