JPH03170143A - Calculus crushing device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To shorten the distance extending from an energy generating element to a calculus, to reduce an unnecessary burden of a patient, and to improve the medical treatment efficiency by arranging the element in the recessed surface of a shape adhering closely to the body surface of the part in which the calculus exists. CONSTITUTION:As for a holding plate 2 in which many piezoelectric elements 1 are attached onto the surface, for instance, in the case a renal calculus exists in a living body 3, its surface is formed to a shape running along the back of the lower belly. Each piezoelectric element 1 is connected to a high voltage pulse generating circuit 11, respectively, and to each high voltage pulse generating circuit 11, a reference pulse from a reference pulse generating circuit 13 is sent as a trigger pulse through a delay control circuit 12. By this delay control circuit 12, pulse generation timings from the high voltage pulse generating circuits 11 are adjusted, respectively, so that ultrasonic pulses generated from many piezoelectric elements 1 become the same phase in a focal position. As for internal organs in which a calculus exists, a position of the calculus to the kidney, etc., and the human body can also be made stereotyped, and a shape of the holding plate 2 adhering closely to the body surface being near the calculus can also be prepared in advance.

Description

[Detailed description of the invention] [Industrial application field]

This invention involves generating acoustic (vibration) energy such as shock waves and ultrasonic waves outside the body, and concentrating it on the stone as energy for crushing the stone formed in the body, thereby crushing the stone. between the devices.

[Conventional technology]

In order to crush in-vivo stones using a stone crusher,
It is necessary to effectively focus the crushing energy on the stone. Therefore, conventionally, a large number of piezoelectric elements that generate acoustic energy are held on the spherical surface of a spherical shell holding plate whose surface is a part of the spherical surface, and the acoustic energy from the large number of piezoelectric elements is To efficiently focus energy on one predetermined point (Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 63-260546),
Alternatively, by arranging a large number of piezoelectric elements horizontally on a flat holding plate and adjusting the trigger timing of each piezoelectric element, the acoustic energy from each piezoelectric element is in the same phase at the stone location, and the energy is focused. are doing(
(Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 63-267347).

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

However, when holding a large number of piezoelectric elements on a spherical shell holding plate as in the past, it is certainly possible to efficiently focus the crushing energy, but the spherical holding plate becomes very large, and in practice It is inconvenient to use, and the distance from each piezoelectric element to the stone location becomes large.
There is a problem in that the energy from each piezoelectric element is diffused while reaching the stone, reducing its utilization efficiency. Furthermore, when the crushing energy is focused only by phase control, there is a problem in that the crushing energy is similarly inefficiently focused at the focusing point due to the directivity of the piezoelectric element. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to provide a stone crushing device with improved efficiency in utilizing generated crushing energy for stone crushing.

[Means to solve the problem]

In order to achieve the above object, the stone crushing device according to the present invention includes a plurality of elements that generate crushing energy to crush stones formed in a living body, and the elements are held on the surface of the stone crushing device. It is characterized by being equipped with a holding plate that has a concave surface that conforms to the surface of the living body.

[For production]

Multiple elements for generating crushing energy are held on the surface of the holding plate. The surface of this holding plate is a concave shape that follows the surface of the living body. The crushing energy generated from each of these elements is focused on the location of the stone within the living body. In this way, multiple fragmentation energy generating elements are provided on the concave surface shaped to follow the body surface, so each of these elements comes into close contact with the body surface at the shortest distance from the calculus, causing fragmentation from each element. The distance to the stone location where the energy is focused is extremely short. Therefore, the crushing energy generated from each element is effectively used to crush the stone, making it possible to utilize the crushing energy effectively and reducing unnecessary burden on the patient.

【Example】

Next, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. In this embodiment, ultrasonic pulses generated when the piezoelectric element is pulse-driven are used as crushing energy. In FIG. 1, a large number of piezoelectric elements 1 are attached to the surface of a holding plate 2. The holding plate 2 has a concave surface on the side to which the piezoelectric element 1 is attached. ．． This concave surface has a shape that follows the body surface of the living organism 3. In other words, when a kidney stone 4 exists in a living body 3 and it is to be crushed, the concave surface of the holding plate 2 has a shape along the back surface of the lower abdomen, that is, a part of a so-called barrel shape (basically a cylindrical shape). Although only a portion of the cylinder is curved in the axial direction of the cylinder). Each of these piezoelectric elements 1 is connected to a high voltage pulse generation circuit 11, as shown in FIG. A reference pulse from a reference pulse generation circuit 13 is sent as a trigger pulse to each high voltage pulse generation circuit 11 via a delay control circuit 12, respectively. The delay control circuit 12 adjusts the pulse generation timing from the high-voltage pulse generation circuit 11 so that the ultrasonic pulses generated from a large number of piezoelectric elements 1 are in phase at the focal position. When actually crushing and treating a kidney stone 4 of a patient, the concave surface of the holding plate 2 is brought into close contact with the back surface of the patient's lower abdomen. In this state, each piezoelectric element l generates an ultrasonic pulse. The focal position of this ultrasonic pulse is predetermined with respect to the holding plate 2, so before generating the ultrasonic pulse, the stone position is determined using a stone position detection device such as another ultrasonic diagnostic device, and the position of the stone is determined. The position of the holding plate 2 is adjusted so that the focal position matches the determined position. As a result, the ultrasonic pulse is focused on the stone 4 as crushing energy, and the stone 4 is crushed. In this case, since each piezoelectric element 1 is in close contact with the body surface of the living body 3, the distance from the calculus 4 is very short. Generally, an ultrasonic pulse is diffused at an angle proportional to si'l(1.2λ/b), where λ is the wavelength of its center frequency and b is the aperture of the piezoelectric element. Therefore, the fact that the distance between the crushing focus and the piezoelectric element l is short as described above means that
This is extremely favorable in terms of effective use of energy. When reduced, the ultrasonic energy generated from the piezoelectric element 1 can be used effectively, and the energy diffused in directions other than the stone 4 can be reduced, contributing to reducing the burden on the patient. Figure 3 shows the second embodiment. In this embodiment, as shown in FIG. 3, the holding plate 2l is a part of a cylinder and has a concave surface that is not curved in the axial direction of the cylinder, and a large number of piezoelectric elements 1 are disposed on this concave surface. Arranged. In a plane including the central axis of the cylindrical shape formed by this concave surface, the direction of the piezoelectric element 1 can be determined so as to face the crushing focal point F as shown in FIG. In this way, the ultrasonic waves will be focused on the fracture focal point F on a plane that includes the central axis of the cylinder. On the other hand, in the plane direction perpendicular to the central axis, the ultrasonic waves can be focused on the crushing focal point F simply by arranging the piezoelectric element 1 along the concave surface. Of course, good focusing on the focal point F can also be achieved by controlling the phase by adjusting the delay amount in addition to the direction of the piezoelectric element 1. Note that such direction control of the piezoelectric element 1 may also be introduced in the case of FIG. In general, the organ in which stones occur is usually determined to be the kidney, etc., and therefore, the location of stones in the human body can be categorized in advance. Accordingly, it is possible to prepare in advance the shape of the holding plate 2 that will come into close contact with the body surface near the stone. By selecting the holding plate 2 that best fits the type of stone location, each piezoelectric element 1 can be brought into close contact with the body surface, and efficient crushing energy can be applied. Although ultrasonic pulses are used as the crushing energy in the above, it is also possible to use not only ultrasonic pulses but also shock waves and other sound (vibration) energy.

【Effect of the invention】

According to the stone crushing device of the present invention, the elements that generate energy for stone crushing are arranged in a concave shape that is in close contact with the body surface of the area where the stone is present, so that the distance from the element to the stone is becomes shorter, and the utilization efficiency of the crushing energy generated from each element improves. As a result, the incidence of crushing energy for purposes other than stone crushing can be reduced, and efficient stone crushing treatment can be performed while reducing unnecessary burden on the patient due to such crushing energy for purposes other than stone crushing.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a block diagram of the same embodiment, FIG. 3 is a perspective view of a second embodiment, and FIG.
The figure is a sectional view of FIG. 3. DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1... Piezoelectric element, 2, 21... Holding plate, 3... Living body, 4... Stone, 11... High voltage pulse generation circuit, 12
... Delay control circuit, 13... Reference pulse generation circuit.

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) A plurality of elements that generate crushing energy to crush stones formed in the living body, and a holding device in which the elements are held on the surface, and the surface is a concave shape that conforms to the surface of the living body. A stone crushing device comprising: a plate.