JP4526815B2 - Ultrasonic diagnostic equipment - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus, and in particular, captures a moving image of a circulatory system with periodic movement such as a moving image of a heart, and repeatedly reproduces the moving image for diagnosis. The present invention relates to an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus suitable for the above.

  The ultrasonic device has a function for storing an ultrasonic moving image of a circulatory system such as the heart (hereinafter simply referred to as a moving image) and repeatedly reproducing the moving image at an arbitrary time for use in diagnosis. There is. Furthermore, in Patent Document 1, a past moving image of a heart recorded on a video tape and a moving image of a current heart of the same person are displayed side by side on the same screen, and both are compared and observed accurately. It describes what can be diagnosed. In particular, according to this document, in order to make it easy to compare and compare the moving images of the heart, the past moving images recorded in the VTR are frame-by-frame-played and reproduced when the image corresponds to a desired cardiac phase. Is temporarily stopped and synchronized with the cardiac phase of the current moving image stored in the moving image memory such as a semiconductor memory, and then the VTR is re-driven to synchronize and reproduce both images. It has been broken.

Japanese Patent No. 2813382

  According to the conventional technique described in Patent Document 1, past moving images are recorded on a video tape from an arbitrary cardiac phase and are recorded over a plurality of arbitrary cardiac cycles. Therefore, in order to synchronize with the playback of the current moving image, it is necessary to perform frame-by-frame playback of the VTR and select a playback start image corresponding to a desired cardiac time phase, which is inconvenient.

  In addition, regardless of the current or past moving images, there is a demand for accurate diagnosis by repeatedly observing the movement of the heart, etc., but recording is started from any cardiac phase, and any multiple When recording over a heartbeat cycle, if the recorded image is repeatedly reproduced, the image may be interrupted at repeated joints, which is difficult to see.

  SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to make it possible to display the movement of the circulatory system without interruption when the moving picture of the circulatory system recorded in the recording device is repeatedly reproduced.

The ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus of the present invention that solves the above-described problem is a first in which a moving image is stored by marking an ultrasonic image of a circulatory system imaged at a time phase corresponding to a specific electrocardiogram signal. A recording medium, a second recording medium that cuts out and stores a moving image captured during at least one heartbeat period based on the specific electrocardiogram signal from the first recording medium, a first recording medium, and Moving image recording control means for controlling the second recording medium, and the specific electrocardiographic signal of the moving image of the circulatory system displayed by capturing the moving image stored in the second recording medium in real time And a means for repeatedly reproducing and displaying in synchronization with each other,
The moving image recording control means corresponds to the recording time, a means for setting a recording time based on the heart rate of the subject measured based on the specific electrocardiogram signal and the set heart rate cycle number. Means for reading out the moving image from the first recording medium and temporarily storing it in an arbitrary storage medium; sequentially reading out the moving image stored in the arbitrary storage medium in units of frames; And a means for extracting frame images corresponding to the set number of heartbeat cycles and storing them in the second recording medium on the basis of when a frame image with a number is read out. To do.

In this case, the means for setting the recording time can set the recording time by adding an arbitrary number of heartbeat cycles to the set number of heartbeat cycles.
Further, the storing means can display a detection error when there is no frame image to which the specific electrocardiogram signal is attached in the arbitrary storage medium. Further, the storing means can delete a moving image other than the extracted frame image from the moving image stored in the arbitrary storage medium. Further, an R wave can be used as a specific electrocardiogram signal.

  That is, the present invention is characterized in that a moving image from contraction to expansion of at least one heartbeat is cut out, and other images are not recorded. In this way, when the moving image stored in the second recording medium is repeatedly reproduced, the reproduction is started from the image of the cardiac phase corresponding to the specific electrocardiogram signal, and the moving image corresponding to at least one heartbeat period. Is played. Therefore, since the moving image of the circulatory device having a periodic motion can be displayed repeatedly without any interruption by simply reproducing the moving image of the second recording medium in a loop, it can contribute to an accurate diagnosis and is easy to use. Can be

  In addition, for example, even when displaying a moving image of a circulatory system captured and displayed in real time, the second recording is performed in synchronization with a specific electrocardiogram signal output from an electrocardiograph or the like. By reading out the moving image from the medium and displaying the image, it is possible to display a contrasted image that is naturally synchronized. In other words, synchronized contrast observation can be realized without performing selection such as setting the range of the cardiac time phase of the reproduced image, so that the operation is simple and extremely easy to use. Furthermore, a contrast image necessary for diagnosis can be displayed quickly.

  According to the present invention, when a circulatory system moving image recorded on a recording medium is repeatedly reproduced, the circulatory movement can be displayed without interruption.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. As shown in FIG. 1, an ultrasonic probe 1 is driven by an ultrasonic signal output from an ultrasonic transmission / reception circuit 2 to irradiate a subject (not shown) with an ultrasonic beam and A reflection echo generated from a person is received and output to the ultrasonic transmission / reception circuit 2. The reflected echo signal received by the ultrasonic transmission / reception circuit 2 is subjected to reception processing such as amplification, detection, and phasing, and is input to the ultrasonic signal conversion unit 3 as a one-dimensional reflected echo signal corresponding to the reception beam line. . The ultrasonic signal converter 3 sequentially reconstructs an ultrasonic image corresponding to the reception beam line based on the input one-dimensional reflected echo signal, and stores the two-dimensional ultrasonic image in the video memory 4. It has become. The video memory 4 is a so-called frame memory, and is composed of, for example, a semiconductor memory that stores a two-dimensional ultrasonic image in units of frames. The ultrasonic image stored in the video memory 4 is appropriately read and displayed on the monitor screen of the image display unit 5. In addition to the ultrasonic image stored in the video memory 4, the image display unit 5 displays characters and graphics such as various image parameters and comments input by the user. The operations of the ultrasonic transmission / reception circuit 2, the ultrasonic signal conversion unit 3, the video memory 4 and the image display unit 5 are controlled by a main control unit 9 of a central processing unit (CPU) 6, respectively. . An operation panel 7 is connected to the CPU 6, and necessary operation commands are input from the operation panel 7. The operation panel 7 includes a keyboard, various switches, a trackball, a mouse, and the like. Further, an electrocardiogram signal obtained by detecting an R wave of the subject's electrocardiogram waveform is inputted from the electrocardiograph 8 to the CPU 6. The CPU 6 controls the video memory 4 so as to attach a trigger mark to the two-dimensional image captured at the timing when the R wave detection signal is input. The trigger mark is stored in the video memory 4 in a form combined with the ultrasonic image and is displayed on the image display unit 5.

  Next, the configuration of the moving image recording control unit according to the feature of the present invention will be described. Basically, the moving image recording processing unit 10 reads out moving images for the recording time designated by the recording time setting processing unit 12 of the CPU 6 from the video memory 4 and stores them in the moving image recording unit 11. Also, the recorded image extraction processing unit 13 cuts out a moving image for the set heartbeat period designated by the CPU 6 from the moving image recording unit 11 and overwrites the moving image recording unit 11 again. It is stored in an area (file). The moving image recorded in the moving image recording unit 11 is read out and displayed by the image display unit 5. The moving picture recording unit 11 uses a disk-type recording medium in the present embodiment, but is not limited to this.

  The detailed configuration of the moving image recording control unit of the present invention configured as described above will be described together with the operation. First, a moving image obtained by capturing a tomographic image (B-mode image) of the heart by a normal imaging operation will be described as an example. When imaging is started by placing the probe 1 on the subject, a B-mode image of the heart is stored in the video memory 4 from the ultrasonic signal converter 3 at a predetermined frame rate. At this time, the trigger mark is recorded on the B-mode image captured at the timing when the R-wave detection signal is input.

  Next, when recording a moving image to be repeatedly observed in the moving image recording unit 11, or referring to FIGS. 2 to 4 for features of the present embodiment in which a moving image as a heart diagnostic image is recorded in the moving image recording unit 11. To explain. FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing a processing procedure for recording a moving image in the moving image recording unit 11, and FIGS. 3 and 4 are timing charts for explaining the operation.

  When the operator gives an instruction to start moving image recording to the moving image recording unit 11, the flowchart of FIG. This flow is premised on the case where a heart is diagnosed using R waves in an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus. First, the operator sets a cardiac cycle number N (N is a natural number) to be recorded from the operation panel 7 in step S1, and operates the operation panel 7 to input a recording start command in step S2. Thereby, the recording time setting processing unit 12 operates in step S3, and the heart rate n of the subject at the start of recording based on the R wave detection signal input from the electrocardiograph 8 (n is per minute) Heart rate). Further, the optimum recording time T (seconds) is calculated based on the set heart rate N, for example, by the following equation (1).

T = (60 / n) × (N + k) (1)
Here, k is a margin (integer) in consideration of the arrhythmia and the start of recording and the timing shift of the R wave detection signal.

  This k setting method will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 3A is a diagram for explaining an allowance in consideration of arrhythmia. The horizontal axis indicates time (seconds), and the R wave detection signal 21 is input at the illustrated timing. First, the recording time T when recording a moving image corresponding to the set heart rate number N is T = (60 / n) × N if the heart rate n and the heart rate cycle are fixed. In the case where a moving image for two heartbeat cycles is recorded as an example, since N = 2, the recording time T is the time indicated by reference numeral 22 in FIG. However, the heart rate is not always constant, and the heart rate may be lowered due to arrhythmia or the like, and the R wave detection signal may be shifted as indicated by reference numeral 23. In this case, even if a moving image is recorded for a time of T = (60 / n) × N, an image for a desired two heartbeat periods cannot be accommodated. Therefore, in the present embodiment, as shown by reference numeral 24 in the figure, by setting an extra recording time for the set heart rate cycle number N by one heart cycle, even if the heart rate fluctuates, the set heart rate cycle number is set. The image can be recorded.

  FIG. 3B is a diagram for explaining an allowance in consideration of a deviation in timing between the start of recording and the timing of the R-wave detection signal. The horizontal axis indicates time (seconds), and the R-wave detection signal 21 indicates the illustrated timing. It is input with. When recording is performed, if the start timing of the recording time T is arbitrarily set, the recording start and the R-wave detection signal do not necessarily coincide with each other as indicated by reference numeral 25 in FIG. Recording may start from. In this case, even if recording is performed for the time of the set heart rate cycle number N, images corresponding to the desired heart rate cycle number synchronized with the R wave cannot be accommodated. Therefore, in the present embodiment, as indicated by reference numeral 27 in the figure, by setting an extra recording time by one heartbeat period to the set heartbeat number N, the set heartbeat period for which the recording start and the R wave are synchronized is set. It is possible to record images. For these reasons, k = 2 is adopted in the present embodiment.

  When the recording time T obtained in this way by the recording time setting processing unit 12 is input to the moving image recording processing unit 10, the moving image recording processing unit 10 displays a B-mode image corresponding to the recording time T in step S4. The data is read from the video memory 4 and stored in the moving image recording unit 11. That is, as shown in FIG. 4B, a moving image having the number of frames m corresponding to the recording time T shown in FIG. 4C is obtained from a moving image composed of a plurality of frame images 31 stored in the video memory 4. Is read and recorded in the moving image recording unit 11. FIG. 4A is a timing chart of the R wave detection signal 21. Also, the R-wave trigger mark 32 represented by a black square in FIG. 4B is attached to the frame image captured in agreement with the R-wave detection signal 21.

  Next, the characteristic processing of the recorded image extraction processing unit 13 that extracts a moving image that matches the set heart rate number N and records it in the moving image recording unit 11 in steps S5 to S13 in FIG. 2 will be described. First, the recorded image extraction processing unit 13 starts scanning from the first frame of the image recorded in the moving image recording unit 11 in order to extract an image having the set heartbeat cycle number N that is closest to the time point of recording start t0. Specifically, the first (first) frame is designated as the scanning frame in step S5. Next, an image corresponding to the current scanning frame number is extracted from the moving image recording unit 11 in step S6. In step S7, it is determined whether or not an R-wave trigger mark exists in the image obtained in step S6. If there is no R wave trigger mark, the process proceeds to step S8 via step S14, and the next frame is designated by adding “1” to the scan frame number. On the other hand, if the R wave trigger mark exists, the process moves to step S9 to check whether it is the first R wave trigger mark. In the case of the first R-wave trigger mark, the current scanning frame is set as the extraction start frame in step S10. If it is not the first R-wave trigger mark, the process proceeds to step S11 to check whether it is the Nth R-wave trigger mark for the set heart rate cycle number. If it is determined in step S11 that the set R-wave trigger mark is the Nth heartbeat cycle number, the frame immediately before the current scanning frame is set as the extraction completion frame in step S12. Thus, when the extraction completion frame is set, the image from the extraction start frame to the extraction completion frame is stored as a final recording moving image in the moving image recording unit 11 as a separate file in step S13.

  On the other hand, if it is neither the first R-wave trigger mark nor the N-th set heartbeat cycle R-wave trigger mark, it is checked in step S14 if it is the last frame, and if it is not the last frame, the process proceeds to step S8. Scan frames. If the determination in step S14 is the last frame, it means that the R wave detection signal having the set heart rate N has not been detected, and a detection error is displayed on the image display unit 5 to notify the operator.

  As described above, the recorded image extraction processing unit 13 of the present embodiment deletes the moving image of the portion until the R-wave trigger mark is first found, stores the section of the set heart rate cycle number N in the moving image recording unit 11, Processing for deleting the moving image of the subsequent portion is performed.

  As a result, according to the present embodiment, when the operator sets a desired heart rate cycle number N and captures a B-mode image of the heart, a moving image with the automatically set heart rate cycle number is recorded in the moving image recording unit. 11 is recorded. Moreover, since the recorded moving image is a moving image synchronized with the heartbeat cycle based on the R wave, the moving image recorded in the moving image recording unit 11 is repeatedly reproduced and displayed on the image display unit 5. It is possible to display a continuous and continuous heart motion video. As a result, it can contribute to accurate diagnosis.

  In addition, since the moving image recorded in the moving image recording unit 11 is a moving image corresponding to the number of heartbeat cycles synchronized with the R wave, when performing a contrast observation with a B-mode image of the same person's heart captured thereafter, By simply starting the reproduction of the moving image of the moving image recording unit 11 in synchronization with the R wave detection signal of the moving image of the heart captured in real time, the aspect of the expansion and contraction of the heart is compared and observed in the same cardiac phase. be able to.

  In addition, since the moving image recording unit 11 has only to record a minimum amount of moving images, the storage capacity can be saved.

It is a block block diagram of the ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus of one embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart showing the procedure of one Embodiment of the moving image recording process and moving image extraction process which concern on the characteristic part of this invention. It is a figure explaining the process which sets the recording time in consideration of the arrhythmia and the shift | offset | difference of timing of a recording start, and an R wave detection signal. It is a figure explaining the operation | movement of the moving image extraction process which concerns on the characteristic of this invention.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Probe 2 Ultrasonic wave transmission / reception circuit 3 Ultrasonic signal conversion part 4 Video memory 5 Image display part 6 CPU
7 Operation Panel 8 ECG 9 Main Control Unit 10 Movie Recording Processing Unit 11 Movie Recording Unit 12 Recording Time Setting Processing Unit 13 Recorded Image Extraction Processing Unit

Claims (4)

A first recording medium on which a moving image is stored by marking an ultrasonic image of the circulatory system imaged at a time phase corresponding to a specific electrocardiogram signal; and the specific recording medium from the first recording medium moving image recording controlling the electrocardiogram signal to a reference and a second recording medium for storing cut out moving image captured during at least one heartbeat period, the first recording medium and the second record medium The control unit and the moving image stored in the second recording medium are repeatedly reproduced in synchronization with the specific electrocardiogram signal of the moving image of the circulatory system captured and displayed in real time. an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus comprising a means for displaying Te,
The moving image recording control means corresponds to the recording time, a means for setting a recording time based on the heart rate of the subject measured based on the specific electrocardiogram signal and the set heart rate cycle number. Means for reading out the moving image from the first recording medium and temporarily storing it in an arbitrary storage medium; sequentially reading out the moving image stored in the arbitrary storage medium in units of frames; And a means for extracting frame images corresponding to the set number of heartbeat cycles and storing them in the second recording medium on the basis of when a frame image with a number is read out. Ultrasound diagnostic device. The ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein the recording time setting unit sets a recording time by adding an arbitrary number of heartbeat cycles to the set heartbeat cycle number. The ultrasound according to claim 1 or 2 , wherein the storing means displays a detection error when there is no frame image to which the specific electrocardiogram signal is attached in the arbitrary storage medium. Diagnostic device. The ultrasound according to any one of claims 1 to 3 , wherein the storing means deletes a moving image other than the extracted frame image from the moving image stored in the arbitrary storage medium. Diagnostic device.

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