JPH0363041A - Ultrasonic therapeutic apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To attempt to improve therapeutic efficiency and to obtain miniaturization and lightweight by amplifying ultrasonic oscillation generated by means of an ultrasonic oscillator by means of a horn and radiating it from an oscillating plate fixed on an apex part of the horn into a living body through an ultrasonic transmitting means. CONSTITUTION:A tube 24 such as a catheter, a tube etc., is introduced percutaneously or orally into the gall bladder 21 from a drug soln.-feeding and discharging apparatus 23 and a calculus dissolving agent is fed, discharged and recycled in the gall bladder 21 through the tube 24. The gall bladder thus filled with a calculus dissolving agent is irradiated with an ultrasonic wave from an ultrasonic probe 1 to accelerate a dissolving action of the calculus 22 with the calculus dissolving agent. In this case, as a small and simple Langevin oscillator 3 amplifies and oscillates an oscillating plate 11 with a diameter smaller than the wave length of an exciting oscillation by means of the horn 7, a strong ultrasonic wave can be radiated to a wide range in the body. Therapeutic efficiency can be improved without an accurate positioning.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Industrial Application Field] The present invention relates to an ultrasonic treatment device, and more specifically, the present invention relates to an ultrasonic treatment device, and more specifically, an ultrasonic probe that generates an ultrasonic transducer transmits ultrasonic waves generated outside the body to the gallbladder, etc. Aiming at the treatment χ1 phenomenon
The present invention relates to an ultrasonic treatment device that facilitates treatment with cross-agents such as stone-dissolving agents.

[Prior Art] Conventionally, in JP-A No. 62-120846, in order to easily crush a stone formed in the body, a stone dissolving agent is injected around the stone to dissolve the stone, and then the stone is dissolved. There is a known device that uses ultrasonic waves from outside the body to easily break up stones. This involves immersing the patient in degassed water in a water tank and irradiating the patient with ultrasound.

[Problems to be solved] However, in the conventional treatment device described above, the convergence state of the irradiated ultrasonic waves is not sufficient, and it is also difficult to concentrate the ultrasonic waves on the treatment area. I couldn't do it.

For this reason, unpublished applications (Japanese Patent Application No. 131494/1982 and Japanese Patent Application No. 206074/1983) have been proposed.

The second unpublished ultrasonic treatment device has a large ultrasonic emission η
, an ultrasonic photobiological body formed with an ultrasonic transducer having tILi is brought into contact with the surface of the human body facing the treatment area via an acoustic matching layer or a water bag filled with a water-based ultrasonic propagation medium. , stones that occur in the gallbladder, bile ducts, etc.
Ultrasonic waves from the ultrasonic transducer are focused 1, thereby performing treatment to promote dissolution of the calculus dissolving agent.

In other words, in the therapeutic ultrasonic wave transmitting means using an ultrasonic transducer as described above, since the intensity of the ultrasonic S waves is generally weak, it is necessary to focus the ultrasonic waves on a target region. For this reason, an acoustic lens is placed on the ultrasonic transducer,
Attach a high number of ultrasonic transducers to the blood inside the spherical shell, or place multiple piezoelectric transducers mounted on a flat surface.
It used seven stages that were driven in a staggered manner.

However, with such ultrasonic wave transmitting means, the ultrasonic wave is
81 Because it is necessary to focus on a specific part of the target,
It was extremely difficult to position the ultrasonic generator to make contact with the body surface.

In addition, inside the ultrasound generator, ultrasound is emitted from a large ultrasound radiation surface made up of a single ultrasound generator, and since it is focused inside the body, the ultrasound generator outside the body can reach the body surface. The tfj product of contact becomes large. This causes a state in which the focusing state can be adversely affected, such as reflection or scattering of the ultrasound due to an acoustic obstacle such as a meter in the ultrasound propagation means. At the same time, as the area of contact between the ultrasonic generator and the body surface increases, the shape of the ultrasonic propagation medium of the ultrasonic generator, such as a water bag, becomes larger, which inevitably increases the size of the ultrasonic wave generator. , which causes the problem of increased weight.

The present invention was made in response to the above-mentioned problems in ultrasonic treatment devices, and its main purpose is to emit powerful ultra-8 waves over a wide range to improve treatment efficiency. The object of the present invention is to develop an ultrasonic treatment device which is excellent in 1β1 composition and is extremely small and lightweight.

[Means and Effects for Solving the Problems] In order to solve the above problems, the present invention provides an ultrasonic treatment device that irradiates ultrasonic waves to an affected area in the body from outside the body, using ultrasonic vibrations that generate ultrasound waves. a horn that amplifies the ultrasonic vibrations generated by the ultrasonic vibrator, a diaphragm attached to the tip of the horn, and a diaphragm installed in front of the diaphragm between the diaphragm and the body wall. and ultrasonic wave propagation means for transmitting ultrasonic waves emitted from the diaphragm.

The ultrasonic vibrations generated by the ultrasonic transducer are amplified by the horn, and the amplified ultrasonic waves are emitted from the diaphragm attached to the tip of the horn to the living body through the ultrasonic transport means. . Therefore, powerful ultrasonic waves can be emitted over a wide range.

[Embodiment] FIGS. 1 and 2 show an ultra-wave therapy device according to a first embodiment of the present invention. In each figure, reference numeral 1 denotes an ultrasonic probe formed by incorporating an ultrasonic wave generating body, which will be described later. This ultrasonic probe 1 has a Langevin transducer 3 as a tlt- ultrasonic generator installed in its exterior case 2. A power cord 5 is connected to the electrode 4 of the Langevin transducer 3 constituting the rll- ultrasonic transducer. This power cord 5 passes through the rear end of the exterior case 2 and is led out to the outside, and is connected to a drive device 20. The Langevin vibrator 3 also uses a flange portion 7a, which will be described later, formed near the vibration node to mount the outer case 2.
The support is fixed.

Further, a vibration amplifying horn 7 is fixed in communication with the front end of the positive electric element 6 constituting the Langevin vibrator 3. The horn 7 is integrally formed with the flange portion 7a. The Langevin vibrator 3 has an electrode 4 and a piezoelectric element 6 sandwiched between the horn 7 and the rear metal block 8, and is fastened with a bolt 9 and a nut 10 to integrally connect them. It is configured.

Further, at the tip of the horn 7, a disc-shaped vibrator 11 is integrally attached by circumferentially defining the horn 7 with a screw 2.

The diaphragm 11 is mounted in the axial direction of the Langevin oscillator 3 with an angle of .chi..multidot.1 in the Tachikawa direction -C. The diameter of this diaphragm 11 is smaller than the wavelength of the ultra-8 wave vibration excited by the vibration F3. Furthermore, on the periphery of the vibrating member 11,
The periphery of the bow portion 13, which is made of a tungsten film, is made liquid-tight so that the pouch 13 covers the front surface of the diaphragm 11. Then, the front surface of the diaphragm 11 and the inner surface of the pouch 13 are sealed, and the ultrasonic wave 11i carrier medium 14, such as water, is filled in the sealed western part.

In other words, it constitutes an ultrasonic propagation means that transmits ultrasonic waves emitted from the diaphragm 11 into the body.

Furthermore, a substantially cylindrical cover 15 that surrounds the horn 7 to a point slightly beyond the diaphragm 11 is described. This cover 15 is detachably attached to the tip of the exterior case 2 by screwing it in. That is, a threaded portion 16 is formed on the outer periphery of the base end of the cover 15, and a female threaded portion 17 into which the male threaded portion 16 is screwed is formed on the western periphery of the distal end of the outer case 2.

The ultrasonic probe 1 configured in this way expands the amplitude of ultrasonic vibrations excited in the Langevin transducer 3 in the horn 7, and transmits ultra-8 wave vibrations to the diaphragm 11 attached to the tip of the horn 7. let The ultrasonic waves emitted from the diaphragm 11 are radiated into the human body via the ultra-T8 wave propagation medium 14 in contact with the front surface of the diaphragm 11 and the pouch 13 in contact with the body surface. Further, since the diameter of the diaphragm 11 is smaller than the wavelength of the ultrasonic vibration excited by the Langevin oscillator 3, the ultrasonic waves emitted from the diaphragm 11 exhibit extremely gentle directivity. Therefore, when the pouch 13 of the ultrasound probe 1 is pressed against the patient's body surface blood to irradiate ultrasound, powerful low-frequency ultrasound can be uniformly radiated over an extremely wide range inside the body. Moreover, Langevin oscillator 3
Since the ultrasonic waves excited by the ultrasonic wave usually have a low frequency, they tend to radiate widely. Due to the synergistic effect of this tendency and the diaphragm 11, powerful low-frequency ultrasonic waves can be uniformly radiated.

In FIG. 2, an ultrasonic probe 1 in this embodiment is shown.
Here is an example of its usage. There is a stone 22 in the gallbladder 21 of a patient. The gallbladder 2 of the patient A is percutaneously or orally connected to the drug supply/discharge device 23 through a tube 24 such as a catheter or tube.
1, and the stone-dissolving agent is supplied, discharged, and perfused into the gallbladder 21 through the tube 24. In this way, the ultrasound probe 1 irradiates ultrasound toward the gallbladder 21 filled with the stone-dissolving agent. Thus, the action of the stone dissolving agent to dissolve the stone 22 is promoted.

Therefore, according to this embodiment, the Langevin oscillator 3, which is a small and medium-sized oscillator, amplifies and oscillates the diaphragm 11, which has a diameter smaller than the wavelength of the excitation vibration, by the horn 7, so that it can be used over a wide range in the body. Emits powerful ultrasonic waves. Therefore, accurate alignment toward the treatment site is not required, and since the radiation surface is small, the contact area with the human body surface is small.

As described above, the small and lightweight ultrasonic probe 1 can improve treatment efficiency, and furthermore, it is possible to realize an extremely simple ultrasonic treatment device with excellent operability.

In addition, in the above description, the vibration plate 11 and the pouch 13 are connected integrally, but vibration! ! 1211 so that the pouch 13 can be separated so that the pouch 13 is in close contact with the entire front surface of the diaphragm 11.

In this case, it is preferable to attach the side peripheral edge of the pouch 13 to the tip of the cover 15.

FIG. 3 shows an ultrasonic treatment apparatus according to a second embodiment of the present invention. In the first embodiment described above, the ultrasound probe 1 emits ultrasound waves over a wide range inside the body, but when it comes to treatment targets, there are times when it is desired to irradiate ultrasound waves to a relatively limited range. There may also be cases where it is desired to suppress the decrease in intensity due to spherical diffusion of ultrasonic waves. The ultrasonic treatment apparatus of this second embodiment is constructed to be suitable for such a case.

In other words, in this embodiment, the diameter of the diaphragm 11 incorporated into the ultrasonic probe 1 is increased. In this case, the diaphragm 11 is attached to the attachment/detachment port (1:) at the tip of the horn 7 as in the first embodiment, but the diaphragm 11 is
3 is separate from the vibrator 11 and is detachably attached to the tip of the cover 15 via an attachment ring 26. Therefore, the pouch 13 is integrated with the attachment ring 26, and is attached to the cover 15! 11 is the attachment/detachment mark.

Further, the diameter of the diaphragm 11 of this embodiment is large as described above, and moreover, it is larger than the inner diameter of the cover 15. Therefore, the cover 15 cannot be removed while the diaphragm 11 is attached to the tip of the horn 7. However, the pouch 13 and the ring 26 can be removed first, and then the cover 15 can be taken out.

Furthermore, the second embodiment is constructed so that the diaphragm 11 can be replaced with one of any size.

The one with the same diameter as the diaphragm 11 of the first embodiment described above, and the one with the same diameter as the diaphragm 11 of the third embodiment described later.
The diaphragm 11 can be arbitrarily replaced with one having a different diameter.

The radius of the diaphragm 11 attached to the ultrasonic probe 1 configured in this way is, for example, 1/1/1 of the wavelength of the excited ultrasonic wave.
In the case of about 2, the half-value angle of the intensity of the radiated ultrasonic wave becomes about 40' from the center axis of the diaphragm 11, so that it can be treated as a plane wave. Depending on the purpose, the degree of directivity can be changed by changing the diameter of the diaphragm 1. Then, irradiation of ultrasonic waves with appropriate directivity can be selected.

Further, even without setting the ultrasonic probe 1 in a precise position, it is possible to irradiate ultrasonic waves with some degree of directivity to a relatively limited area.

FIG. 4 shows an ultrasonic treatment apparatus according to a third embodiment of the present invention.

In this embodiment, an inner hole 31 is formed that passes through the diaphragm fixing screw 12 that passes through the diaphragm 11, the horn 7, and the bolt 9. Further, this inner hole 31 is connected to a supply eyepiece 32 that is attached to the rear end of the bolt 9 and penetrates through the wall of the exterior case 2.
2 is connected to a water pump, also not shown, through a water pipe, not shown.

Further, the peripheral wall of the cover 15 is provided with a discharge cap 33 that communicates with the inside thereof. A suction tube (not shown) is connected to this discharge mouthpiece 33, and this suction tube is connected to a suction pump (also not shown).

Furthermore, in this embodiment, there is one closed space 3 that communicates from the inside of the cover 15 covering the horn 7 to the inside of the pouch 13.
In this closed space 35, a horn 7,
A diaphragm 11 attached to the tip of the horn 7 is arranged.

Therefore, the ultrasonic probe 1 configured in this way
When using this, the water sent out from the water pump is passed through the water supply tube, the supply mouthpiece 32, the bolt 9, and the inner hole 31 of the horn 7 to the closed space 35. send it inside. The introduced water then fills the open space 35 and surrounds the diaphragm 11 as an ultrasonic temporary transport medium. After filling the closed space 35, the water is sucked from the discharge cap 33 through a suction tube (not shown) to a suction pump (also not shown). In this way, when the ultrasonic probe 1 is at least in operation, the water 't? RF flow is performed.

Such a 'du ifE effect of water has the effect of cooling the Langevin oscillator 3 during operation.

Furthermore, since the pouch 13 of the ultrasingle-wave probe 1 cools the patient's body surface that comes into contact with it, the powerful ultrasonic wave j1. ．． (The effect of being able to prevent the temperature rise near the surface of the contact body due to radiation is H.

In the above description, water was used as the flow medium, but if water is used as the drug and the pouch 13 that comes into contact with the human body is formed of a permeable membrane, transdermal drug administration using ultrasonic vibration becomes possible.

As a drug, for example, insulin Cus Li disease)
Examples include nitroglycerin (angina pectoris) and indomethacin (myalgia)5. In this way, by simply using the ultra-high frequency wave propagation medium as a drug and the pouch 13 as a permeable membrane, transcutaneous ultrasonic drug delivery that quickly injects the drug from the surface area of the human body into the interior can be achieved! In this case, an ultrasonic treatment device having a completely different function is constructed, which has an extremely negative effect.

Note that the present invention is not limited to the above embodiments. Various examples of feminine forms are possible without changing the gist of the word.

[Effects of the Invention] As explained above, according to the present invention, it is not necessarily necessary to accurately adjust the α position for the firing of the gun, and moreover, powerful ultrasonic waves are emitted from a small radiation surface. Therefore, there is no need to increase the contact area with the human body surface. It is possible to provide an extremely simple ultrasonic treatment device that is small and lightweight, has excellent treatment efficiency and imaging performance, and is inexpensive.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a side sectional view of an ultrasonic probe showing a first embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of use of the ultrasonic probe shown in the first embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 3 is a side sectional view of an ultrasound probe showing a second embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 4 is a side sectional view of an ultrasound probe showing a third embodiment of the invention. , 14... Ultrasonic propagation medium, 20... Drive device, 21... 114 capsule, 22
... Stone, 23... Chemical solution supply/discharge device.

Claims (1)

[Claims] An ultrasonic treatment device that irradiates ultrasonic waves from outside the body to an affected area within a living body includes an ultrasonic transducer that generates ultrasonic waves, a horn that amplifies the ultrasonic vibrations generated by this ultrasonic transducer, and the tip of this horn. a diaphragm attached to the diaphragm; and ultrasonic propagation means provided in front of the diaphragm for transmitting ultrasonic waves emitted from the diaphragm between the diaphragm and the body wall. An ultrasonic treatment device characterized by: