JPH02107237A - Puncture needle type ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To perform the ultrasonic diagnosis of tissue to be examined with high resolving power of a microscopic level by projecting a probe to insert the same in the tissue to be examined and transmitting ultrasonic beams from a plurality of the ultrasonic vibrators arranged to the outer periphery of the leading end part of the probe in a ring shape. CONSTITUTION:An ultrasonic oscillation part 16 formed by arranging a plurality of ultrasonic vibrators 14 in a ring shape is provided to the outer periphery of the leading end part of a probe 12 and the electronic control of the radial scanning of the ultrasonic oscillation part 16 is performed by a scanning control circuit 23 and, further, the focus control of the ultrasonic beams from the respective ultrasonic vibrators 14 of the ultrasonic oscillation part 16 is also performed. At first, a trocar is punctured in the tissue to be examined of an examinee and ultrasonic beams of high frequency capable of obtaining high resolving power of a microscopic level are transmitted toward the tissue to be examined from the ultrasonic oscillation part 16. By this method, since the transmitting depth in the tissue is about 0.2-5mm but resolving power is high, an image an be displayed up to an erythrocyte level of about 10mum.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Industrial Application Field] The present invention relates to an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus, and more particularly to a puncture needle type ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus that performs image display diagnosis of directly adjacent tissue within a test tissue of a subject.

[Prior Art] Conventionally, ultrasound diagnostic equipment has been designed to emit an ultrasound beam from the body surface of the subject into the body of the subject, and receive the reflected waves reflected within the body to obtain information within the body. Common. In addition, in order to perform ultrasound diagnosis from a position closer to the tissue to be examined, a probe equipped with an ultrasound transducer is inserted into the body cavity to transmit and receive ultrasound beams from inside the body to perform ultrasound diagnosis. Internally inserted ultrasound diagnostic devices are also known.

Such an intra-body cavity insertion type ultrasound diagnostic apparatus performs diagnosis by inserting an ultrasound probe into the rectum, for example, to diagnose the prostate. Then, from the probe of such a diagnostic device, ultrasonic pulses are set at 3~
A 10 MHz ultrasonic beam is used.

On the other hand, conventional ultrasound technology related to puncture needles used for deep treatment and diagnosis of a subject is for accurately inserting the puncture needle toward the target tissue, and is used on the surface of the body, for example. A device is known that performs safe and reliable puncture using a probe that has a puncture hole in the center of the probe that allows the puncture needle to pass through.
Publication No. 9).

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] According to the probe inserted into the body cavity, ultrasonic diagnosis can be performed from inside the subject. However, since ultrasonic diagnosis is not performed by directly puncturing the tissue to be examined, it is necessary to transmit an ultrasonic beam at a frequency that reaches a predetermined depth. In other words, it is necessary to set the frequency of the ultrasound beam so that the ultrasound beam can reach the tissue suspected of having a lesion from the probe inserted into the body cavity. is used. When using an ultrasonic beam with such a relatively low frequency, it is possible to ensure a penetration depth of the ultrasonic beam of about 15 cm to 3 cff+, but there is a problem in that high resolution cannot be obtained.

That is, in order to obtain high resolution, for example, in order to be able to diagnose the level of red blood cells, a resolution that can discriminate up to about 10 μ is required, and the frequency is 400 to 500 MHz.
It is necessary to set the degree of However, when using such a high frequency ultrasound beam, the penetration depth is 0. 2-0.
The amount is about 5 aua, making it impossible to diagnose tissues far from the body cavity into which the probe is inserted. Therefore, in the case of a probe that can be inserted into a body cavity, an ultrasonic beam with a relatively low frequency is used to ensure a certain level of penetration depth, and the high resolution at the microscopic level allows for microscopic examination of tissues. Imaging diagnosis could not be performed.

In addition, conventional puncture needles do not perform ultrasound image diagnosis by emitting ultrasound beams directly from the puncture needle punctured into the tissue to be examined, but instead use an ultrasound probe for puncturing the inside of the patient from the body surface. The patient performs the puncture operation by visually confirming the location to be punctured with the puncture needle. Therefore, there is a problem in that the frequency of the ultrasonic beam cannot be increased in order to improve the resolution to the microscopic level, similar to an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus using a probe inserted into a body cavity.

Purpose of the Invention The present invention was made to solve the above-mentioned problems, and its purpose is to directly insert an ultrasonic oscillator into the tissue to be examined to perform ultrasonic diagnosis of the tissue to be examined at a microscopic level. An object of the present invention is to provide a puncture needle type ultrasonic diagnostic device that can perform diagnosis using resolution.

[Means for Solving the Problems] In order to achieve the above object, a puncture needle type ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to the present invention includes a hollow trocar that is punctured into the tissue to be examined, and a mantle that is inserted into the trocar. A probe needle whose tip protrudes from an opening at the tip of the needle and can be inserted into the test tissue, and a probe needle arranged in a ring shape around the outside of the tip of the probe to obtain microscopic level resolution into the adjacent test tissue. a plurality of ultrasonic transducers that transmit ultrahigh frequency sound waves and receive reflected waves thereof; an excitation signal generation circuit for causing the ultrasonic transducers to transmit the ultrahigh frequency sound waves; and the plurality of ultrasonic transducers. a scanning control circuit that electronically controls an excitation signal to the ultrasonic transducer, a receiving circuit that receives reflected waves received by the ultrasonic transducer, and a microscopically enlarged image display of the tissue to be examined based on the output signal from the receiving circuit. and an image display means for performing the image display.

[Operation] According to the above configuration, the probe needle is inserted protrudingly into the test tissue from the tip opening of the hollow trocar punctured into the test tissue, and arranged in a ring shape around the outer circumference of the tip of the probe needle. Ultrasonic beams can be transmitted from the plurality of ultrasonic transducers to the test tissue close to the outer periphery of the probe needle.

Here, the ultrasound beam can be transmitted directly to the tissue to be examined that is in contact with the outer periphery of the probe needle, and in order to perform ultrasound diagnosis of this tissue, it is necessary to An extremely small depth is sufficient.

Therefore, it is not necessary to ensure a large penetration depth of the ultrasonic beam, so it is possible to increase the frequency of the ultrasonic beam in order to obtain a high-resolution image on a microscopic level.

In addition, the ultrasonic transducer installed at the tip of the probe needle is installed in a ring shape around the outer periphery, so that the ultrasonic beam is transmitted in a ring shape to the sample tissue close to the probe needle. Can transmit and receive waves. Thereby, a ring-shaped tissue cross-sectional image having a width corresponding to the penetration depth of the ultrasound beam can be obtained.

Furthermore, each ultrasonic transducer is electronically scan-controlled by a scan control circuit, and the cross-sectional image signal that can be obtained thereby is almost a real-time image signal.
The use of ultrasonic beams with high resolution on a microscopic level also makes it possible to recognize blood flow.

In this way, the ultrasonic beam's microscopic resolution provides fine tissue image information, and by displaying an enlarged image based on this, tissue diagnosis such as the presence or absence of a lesion can be performed more accurately. Can be done.

[Embodiments] Hereinafter, preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described based on the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows a partial perspective view of the distal end of the trocar and probe needle, which are the characteristic components of the present invention.
It has a hollow structure with a diameter of approximately 3II11, and its tip is tapered to form an acute angle to facilitate puncturing into a subject. The probe needle 12 is inserted into the inside of the trocar 10, and the probe needle 12 is configured so that its tip portion protrudes from its tip opening 10a.

An ultrasonic oscillation section 16 is provided around the outer periphery of the tip of the probe 12, which is formed by arranging a plurality of ultrasonic transducers 14 in a ring shape. That is, by transmitting an ultrasonic beam from each ultrasonic transducer 14, the ultrasonic beam can be transmitted outward from the outer periphery of the probe needle 12 in a range of 360 degrees. has been done.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a cross section of the ultrasonic oscillating portion 16 of the probe needle 12, which has a solid structure in this embodiment, but may also have a hollow structure. Each transducer 14 of the ultrasonic oscillator 16 is attached to the probe needle 12 so as to transmit an ultrasonic beam outward. A surface coating material 18 is provided on the surface side of the probe needle 12 with the ultrasonic transducer 14 in between, and a damper material 20 is provided on the inner surface side of the ultrasonic transducer 16. Here, surface coating material 1
8 also functions as an acoustic lens for focusing the ultrasonic beam, and the damper material 20 provides acoustic absorption attenuation to the ultrasonic waves emitted from the ultrasonic transducer 16 to the back surface and displays them on the image. It functions to prevent this from happening.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing the main components of the puncture needle type ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to the present invention. Further, a scan control circuit 23 is connected to this excitation signal generation circuit 22 . Excitation signal generation circuit 22
outputs an excitation signal for causing the ultrasonic transducer 14 to transmit ultrahigh-frequency sound waves with high frequencies capable of obtaining microscopic-level resolution.

Then, the scan control circuit 23 electronically controls the radial scan of the ultrasonic oscillator 16. That is, by controlling on/off the transmission of the excitation signal to each ultrasonic transducer 14, control is performed to sequentially shift the group of transducers to be driven by electronic means. Therefore, since the ultrasonic oscillator 16 is formed by arranging the ultrasonic transducers 14 in a ring shape, the ultrasonic beam can be transmitted and received in the vicinity of the ultrasonic oscillator 16, that is, in a circular area for a short period of time. Radial scanning is possible.

Further, the scanning control circuit 23 also performs focus control of the ultrasound beams from each ultrasound transducer 14 of the ultrasound oscillation unit 16.

Further, a receiving circuit 24 is connected to the ultrasonic oscillator 16, and the receiving circuit 24 receives the reflected wave received by the ultrasonic oscillator 16, and performs amplification, A/D conversion, and the like. The output signal from this receiving circuit 24 is sent to an image processing circuit 26, and the image processing circuit 26 performs signal processing for displaying an ultrasound diagnostic image on the CR 72g.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be explained.

First, the trocar 10 is punctured into the tissue to be examined of the subject. At this time, the probe needle 12 is kept in a state in which it does not protrude from the front end opening 10a of the trocar 10.

That is, the trocar 10 is inserted into the tissue to be examined in the state shown in FIG. Then, the probe needle 12 is lowered in the tissue to be examined, and the tip protrudes from the tip opening 10a of the trocar 10,
The ultrasonic oscillator 16 is inserted into the tissue to be examined.

Then, the ultrasonic oscillator 16 transmits a high-frequency ultrasonic beam capable of obtaining microscopic-level high resolution, for example, an ultrasonic beam with a frequency of about 400 to 500 MHz, toward the tissue to be examined.

According to this ultrasonic beam with a frequency of 400 to 500 MHz, the penetration depth into the tissue is about 0.2 to 0.5 mm, but the resolution is high, so it is possible to display images down to the level of red blood cells of about 10 microns. It is.

FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram showing the region in which tissue diagnosis can be performed by the device according to the embodiment, and the ultrasound beam transmitted from the ultrasound oscillation unit 16 is transmitted from the outer periphery of the probe needle 12 to the outside. Since the ultrasonic diagnosis is performed in the opposite direction, the area where ultrasonic diagnosis can be performed is a ring-shaped area X close to the ultrasonic oscillation unit 16. This region
This is a circular region with a width l, and within this region X, tissue diagnostic images can be obtained using ultrasonic beams that can be highly differentiated.

In order to obtain cross-sectional image information in this region X,
The scan control circuit 23 is capable of high-speed radial scanning by electronic means, is capable of displaying an image in almost real time in the area
Image display can be performed with relatively high resolution.

Next, the reflected waves of the ultrasonic beams received by each ultrasonic transducer 14 pass through a receiving circuit 24, are processed by an image processing circuit 26, and are displayed as images on a CRT 28. Note that this image display does not always need to display the entire range of area X, and any area can be set by radial scanning by the scan control circuit 23. For example, Y in Figure 2
It is also possible to drive the vibrator only in the range of , and display based on the image information of only that area.

In this manner, by performing a fine image diagnosis of a portion directly in contact with the tissue to be examined, it is possible to more accurately determine whether or not the lesion in the tissue to be examined is, for example, cancerous tissue.

[Effects of the Invention] As explained above, according to the puncture needle type ultrasonic diagnostic device according to the present invention, the ultrasound oscillator can be inserted directly into the tissue to be examined using the puncture needle, so a large ultrasound beam can be generated. It is not necessary to ensure a penetration depth of 100%, and ultrasonic image diagnosis becomes possible using high-frequency ultrahigh-frequency sound waves that have a small penetration depth but can obtain high resolution on a microscopic level.

As a result, ultrasonic image diagnosis can be performed by obtaining minute image information of the tissue to be examined. Furthermore, since the radial scan of ultrasonic transmission can be electronically controlled at high speed by the scan control circuit, it is possible to display an image of a nearby predetermined area in real time.

This further improves the reliability of diagnosis of lesions and the like in the tissue to be examined.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Fig. 1 is a perspective view of the tip of the trocar and probe needle of the embodiment, Fig. 2 is a cross-sectional view of the tip of the probe, and Fig. 3 is a block diagram showing the main configuration of the embodiment. FIG. 4 is a perspective view showing the trocar at the time of puncturing the test tissue, and FIG. 5 is an explanatory view showing the diagnostic region of the embodiment. Trouser Probe needle Ultrasonic transducer Ultrasonic oscillator Surface coating material Damper material Excitation signal generation circuit Scanning control circuit Receiving circuit Image processing circuit RT0

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) A hollow trocar that is punctured into the test tissue, a probe needle that is inserted into the trocar and whose tip can be inserted into the test tissue with its tip protruding from the opening at the tip of the trocar, and the probe needle. a plurality of ultrasonic transducers arranged in a ring shape around the outer circumference of the tip of the ultrasonic transducer for transmitting ultra-high frequency sound waves capable of obtaining microscopic level resolution to the nearby tissue to be examined and receiving the reflected waves; an excitation signal generation circuit for transmitting the ultrahigh-frequency sound waves from a transducer; a scanning control circuit for electronically controlling excitation signals to the plurality of ultrasonic transducers; and a scanning control circuit for receiving reflected waves received by the ultrasonic transducers. A puncture needle type ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus comprising: a receiving circuit that performs the following steps; and an image display unit that displays a microscopically enlarged image of a tissue to be examined based on an output signal from the receiving circuit.