JPS6357038A - Ultrasonic image display apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Abstract] This bulletin contains application data before electronic filing, so abstract data is not recorded.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Object of the Invention] (Industrial Field of Application) The present invention relates to an ultrasonic image display device, and more specifically, the present invention relates to an ultrasonic image display device, and more specifically, to a change in magnification and a change in display position when continuously displaying ultrasonic images. The present invention relates to an improvement in an ultrasonic image display device that can accommodate the above.

(Prior Art) Traditionally, echo data obtained by ultrasonic scanning is processed using a digital scan converter (hereinafter referred to as D).
(abbreviated as SC), the image is converted into a format corresponding to the scanning direction of the TV, stored in a frame memory, and displayed on the TV in real time.

Here, when continuously displaying ultrasound images in real time, images are sequentially written in the same format at the position T1 in the frame memory shown in FIG. 5 without erasing the previous images. New data only needs to be written to the address where the data value has changed. However, there was a request to move the display position or change the display magnification, and the stage where data is written by moving from position T1 to position T2 in the frame memory shown in Fig. 5, and the stage where data is enlarged and written as shown at T3 in the frame memory. needs to be executed after erasing the previous image written at position T1.

(Problem to be solved by the invention) In principle, one cycle of ultrasound scanning is required to construct one frame of ultrasound image, but as mentioned above, the contents of the memory can be erased in advance when writing to the memory. When necessary, it takes time to construct one frame of an ultrasound image after erasing, and this effect becomes a serious problem, especially in a stage where the ultrasound scan cycle is slow.

In particular, in recent years, in order to improve the resolution, combination scans that scan the same line several times with different focuses have been introduced.
Focusing or multi-stage scanning is performed in one step, and the period of ultrasonic scanning is often slow.

In this way, when real-time continuous display is performed with the ultrasonic scan cycle set to be slow, and the magnification is changed and the position is moved at will during the display, the following problems specifically occur.

■As shown in Figures 6(a) and (b), when the magnification and position are changed in synchronization with the ultrasound scan (OF),
Since the image update speed of →■→■ is the same as scan synchronization, the stage cannot follow this operation when the position is changed using a trackball, for example, and the response is extremely poor.

■In order to improve responsiveness, if the ultrasound scan is terminated when a position change of 1 magnification is requested, as shown in Figure 7 (a)
, (b), the image is displayed with a missing part in response to the abort of the scan, resulting in an unsightly display.

Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to have good responsiveness to a request for changing the position of a magnification of 1, even on a stage where continuous display is performed under conditions of slow-cycle ultrasonic scanning, and to provide a seamless process at the time of receiving this request. An object of the present invention is to provide an ultrasonic image display device capable of appropriately displaying images of.

[Structure of the Invention] (Means for Solving the Problems) According to the present invention, when there is an input to change the display magnification 9 display position, the ultrasonic scan currently being executed at the time of the change input is aborted and a high-speed scan is executed. and controls the memory control circuit to erase the contents of the frame memory currently being written at the time of a change input and write the data obtained by the high-speed scan in response to the change request. The ultrasonic image display device is configured by providing a control section for controlling the ultrasonic image display device.

(Function) On the stage where there is an input to change the magnification 2 position, the current ultrasonic scan is canceled and a high-speed scan is executed, and the data obtained from this high-speed scan is loaded into the frame memory in accordance with the change request. This improves responsiveness compared to systems that accept change requests using regular ultrasound scans. Moreover, even though the ultrasound scan is interrupted midway, data is collected by high-speed scanning afterward, so that unsightly image display such as half-broken images does not occur.

(Example) Hereinafter, one embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

In the figure, the ultrasonic probe scans the subject with ultrasonic waves and receives the echoes. The transmitting/receiving circuit 2 drives the ultrasonic probe for transmitting and receiving, and is capable of focusing the transmitting and receiving signals for deflection and multi-stage focusing. This transmitting/receiving circuit 2 is configured to perform transmitting/receiving driving under the control of a transmitting/receiving control circuit 10, which will be described later. The A/D converter 3 converts the echo signal received by the ultrasonic probe 1 and input via the transmitting/receiving circuit 2 into a digital value and outputs the digital value.

Further, in this embodiment, the image data for each ultrasonic scan sequentially output from the A/D converter 3 is alternately outputted from the first . Data is written in the second frame memory 5.6, and while data is being written in one frame memory, data is read out from the other frame memory and presented for display.

Therefore, the first step is to select the frame memory to write to.
The first switching circuit 4 and the second switching circuit 7 for selecting the frame memory to be read are connected to the first switching circuit 4. They are connected before and after the second frame memories 5 and 6, respectively. Furthermore, the first
．． Switching of the second switching circuit 4.7 is performed based on the output of a transmission/reception control circuit 10, which will be described later. In addition, the above-mentioned No. 1.
A memory control circuit 11 is provided to control read, write, and erase operations in the second frame memory 5.6, and to generate addresses for read and write operations.

On the other hand, the ultrasound image data read out via the second switching circuit 7 is converted into an analog signal by a D/A converter 8 and displayed on a TV monitor 9.

The CPU 12 controls the system, sets predetermined scan conditions for the transmission/reception control circuit 10, and
The memory control circuit 11 is controlled. Furthermore, an input device such as a trackball 13 for inputting a change in the magnification 1 position is connected to the CPU 12, and control is performed in accordance with this request. That is, this stage CPU 12 performs the following various controls.

- The interrupt for the first magnification 2 position change is accepted even during the ultrasound scan, and at that point the transmission/reception control circuit 10 is controlled to abort the scan in progress, and
The memory control circuit 11 is controlled to erase the contents of the frame memory being written.

(2) Next, the transmission/reception control circuit 10 is commanded to start a new scan, and only the first scan is made to perform a fast ultrasonic scan.

For example, instead of the normal 4-step focus,
Set the focus to 250 or set the raster water count to 250.
Make settings such as changing from wood to 125 water.

■Memory control circuit 1 so that the data collected by the above-mentioned high-speed scan is inserted into the erased frame memory at a magnification or position according to the interrupt request.
Control 1.

(2) During high-speed scanning, no operation is performed for the next interrupt; that is, the first interrupt is executed with priority, and the next interrupt is dealt with after that.

■After completing one frame of high-speed scanning, return to normal scanning unless there is another interrupt. This is to minimize the number of such displays, since images obtained by high-speed scanning inevitably suffer from deterioration in image quality.

Next, the operation of the ultrasonic image display device having the above configuration will be explained.

In the following explanation, the normal scanning operation is assumed to be a four-stage combination focus (that is, one raster data is obtained by transmitting and receiving the same line four times with different focus), and the number of raster lines is 250 or more. The repetition period of the sound waves is assumed to be 250 AIs. Therefore, the scan period is 250×4×250 μs=0.255.

Here, the 1st magnification when performing real-time display with 4-stage focus without changing the magnification 1 position. The timing of reading and writing to the second frame memory 5.6 is as shown in FIG. 2, and reading and writing are performed alternately every 0 and 25 seconds, which is the scan period.

The operator operates the trackball 13 to move from the original display position A to 8. as shown in FIG. The stage where C and the image are moved (that is, the stage where two interruptions occur consecutively, A→B and B→C) will be explained with reference to the timing chart of FIG.

As shown in the figure, while image A is being read from the first frame memory 5 and the next image A' is being written to the second frame memory 6, the first interrupt (display position When a request for change is received, this interrupt is accepted during the scan, the scan is aborted, and the image A' in the first frame memory 6 that is currently being written is erased.

Then, the first scan after the interrupt is performed at high speed, and the image B obtained by the high speed scan is placed in the position corresponding to the position change request in the erased second frame memory 6.
Write. Therefore, at this time, no exchange of read and write is performed, and the image A in the first frame memory 5 is displayed.

As for the above-mentioned high-speed scanning, each scrap is set to one stage, and the number of raster lines is 125. Therefore, the scan period is 1×125×250 IJs=31.25 m5, which is eight times the normal scan speed. and,
During this high-speed scan, new interrupts are executed without being accepted, and if the next interrupt is on the stage during the high-speed scan, it is accepted after waiting for this high-speed scan.

According to FIG. 4, since there is a second interrupt (wJ request to move from B to C) immediately after the high-speed scan ends, this interrupt is accepted immediately. At this time, since the scanning of image B has been completed, reading and writing of the frame memory is being exchanged, and reading of image B, which was scanned at high speed and written to the second frame memory 6, is executed. The operator can observe the image at the moved display position. On the other hand, the above interrupt causes the image A in the first frame memory 5 to be raised, and the image C scanned at high speed in the same manner as above is written.

After completing such a high-speed scan, normal operation returns to the stage where no interrupt occurs, and the first. Display continues by alternately reading and writing to the second frame memories 5 and 6.

In this way, according to this embodiment, when the 1st magnification position is changed, the scan being executed by Kawaishi is aborted, the subsequent first scan is performed at high speed, and the image is displayed at the 1st magnification position according to the request. By writing, responsiveness to change requests is improved, and since the image is scanned at high speed, the image immediately after the request is accepted can be appropriately displayed without half of the image being cut off. Note that reading is performed using two frame memories as in this embodiment.

Since writing is performed alternately, the erased contents (
The present invention can be implemented more effectively without displaying a completely black image.

Note that the present invention is not limited to the above embodiments, and various modifications can be made within the scope of the gist of the present invention. The present invention is not necessarily applicable to a display device in which two frame memories are read and written alternately, but can also be applied to a display device in which reading and writing are performed in one frame memory. This stage,
The erased content is displayed for a moment, but the image collected by high-speed scanning is displayed immediately after that, so there is no problem if the human eye is used as a guide.

[Effects of the Invention] As explained above, according to the present invention, changes in the magnification 1 position can be responsively accepted and displayed as changed during real-time display of an ultrasound image, and furthermore, when the change is displayed, It is possible to provide an ultrasonic image display device that does not display an unsightly image with half of the image missing.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Fig. 1 is a block diagram of an ultrasonic image display device according to the present invention, Fig. 2 is a timing chart showing frame memory read and write timing in normal scan mode in the same device, and Fig. 3 is an example of image display movement. FIG. 4 is a timing chart showing read and write timings of the frame memory of a stage where change inputs have been made continuously. FIG. 5 is a schematic explanatory diagram showing movement of display position and change of display magnification. , Figure 6 (a>, (b) and Figure 7 (a)
) and (b) respectively explain the conventional method of moving the display position, and FIG. 6(a). Figure 7(a) shows ultrasonic scan-o-synchronization, and Figure 6(a) shows ultrasonic scan-o-synchronization.
b), FIG. 7(b) shows a display image corresponding to the period. 1... Ultrasonic probe, 2... Transmission/reception circuit, 5.6
...Frame memory, 9...Display device, 10...
Transmission/reception control circuit, 11...Memory control circuit, 12...
- Control unit, 13... input device. ←” Lt Figure 3

Claims (5)

[Claims] (1) An ultrasound probe that transmits and receives ultrasound waves to and from a subject, a transmission and reception circuit that drives the ultrasound probe to transmit and receive, a transmission and reception control circuit that sets and controls transmission and reception conditions in this transmission and reception circuit, and the transmission and reception circuit. A frame memory that converts and stores data obtained via the display system format, a memory control circuit that controls reading and writing of this frame memory, and a display device that displays ultrasound images based on the output of this frame memory. an input device for inputting changes to the display magnification, display position, etc.; and the transmission/reception control circuit for aborting the currently running ultrasonic scan and performing a high-speed scan when inputting the changes. and a control unit that controls the memory control circuit to erase the contents of the frame memory currently being written at the time of inputting a change and write the data obtained by the high-speed scan according to the change information. An ultrasonic image display device comprising: (2) The ultrasonic image display device according to claim 1, wherein the control unit receives and controls the next change input after the high-speed scan is completed when the next change input is made during the high-speed scan. (3) The frame memory consists of two memories that are alternately switched and read and written every ultrasound scan.
The ultrasonic image display device according to claim 1 or 2, wherein data obtained by high-speed scanning is written without switching frame memories. (4) The ultrasonic image according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the control unit executes and controls high-speed scanning by reducing either or both of the number of focus stages and the number of rasters. Display device. (5) Any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the control unit executes the high-speed scan for only one cycle after inputting a change, and controls execution of subsequent scans in a normal mode unless there is a next input of a change. The ultrasonic image display device according to item 1.