KR20140086171A - A capsule endoscope system and a data conducting method thereo - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to a capsule endoscope system and a data processing method thereof to perform remote monitoring or remote diagnosis by a capsule endoscope, and also adjusting an amount of data or converting a characteristic of data according to whether network traffic is overloaded. The capsule endoscope system includes a receiver communicating with a capsule endoscope to receive image data; a server communicating with the receiver to transceive data with the receiver; and a client terminal provided to communicate with the server. The server performs data summarization, which adjusts the size and converts the characteristic of the data to be transmitted to the client terminal, when the traffic of the network for transceiving data is greater than or equal to a predetermined level, and then transmits the data to the client terminal.

Description

[0001] The present invention relates to a capsule endoscope system and a data processing method thereof,

The present invention relates to a capsule endoscope system and its data processing method capable of monitoring or diagnosing by a capsule endoscope remotely, and capable of adjusting data capacity or converting characteristics according to whether the network traffic is overloaded or not.

Endoscopy is an implantable medical device originally designed to observe organs that do not have direct lesions without surgery or autopsy.

However, due to the pain and discomfort of the endoscopy, many patients may avoid endoscopy and seek medical treatment instead.

Although endoscopy has been used for many diagnoses and tests, the size and rigidity of the catheter has caused various inconveniences to patients and medical staff.

Recently, capsular type endoscopes have been developed to complement various endoscopic disadvantages and have been used to diagnose various diseases in the medical field.

A capsule endoscope, that is, a capsule endoscope, is a capsule-sized, endoscopic capsule that can be taken. The endoscope is swallowed through the oral cavity of the human body to move along the peristalsis of the digestive organs, And transmits the image information to an external device via wireless communication.

Capsule endoscopy is very small and takes tens of thousands of images of the subject while moving according to the peristalsis of digestive organs in the body for 8 ~ 10 hours. The endoscope system including the capsule endoscope has a basic structure including a receiver for wirelessly receiving an image captured by a capsule endoscope, and a monitor for receiving an image received through the receiver.

An image received through a receiver, that is, an image captured by a capsule endoscope, is displayed through a monitor, and a doctor diagnoses the patient by checking an image displayed on the monitor.

In particular, the terminal is provided with software for diagnosing the patient, so that the doctor reads the image using the software and diagnoses the suspicion of the pathology and the pathology.

For a more stable and accurate diagnosis of the capsule endoscope, a real time view function is required to inform the physician or the operator of the state of the image transmitted from the capsule endoscope in real time when necessary.

By monitoring the state of the image in real time, the current position of the capsule and the progress of the procedure can be grasped and necessary measures can be taken.

The wireless real-time view function via USB or the wireless real-time view function based on Ad-hoc wireless Wi-Fi network communication enables the procedure operator to monitor the progress of the procedure next to or near the practitioner And the patient had to stay in the hospital and had to wait.

Also, after the procedure was completed, the patient had to return to the hospital to return the system, and it took a long time to obtain the results of the procedure.

It is an object of the present invention to provide a system capable of remote diagnosis and monitoring using a capsule endoscope.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a system that can adjust the size of data required when the data transmission time for remote diagnosis overlaps with the overload time in which traffic is concentrated.

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a capsule endoscope comprising: a receiver for communicating with a capsule endoscope and receiving image data; a server for communicating with the receiver and transmitting and receiving data to and from the receiver; The server performs a data summarizing function of converting the size or characteristics of data to be transmitted to the client terminal when the traffic of the network for data transmission and reception becomes a certain standard or more, And a capsule endoscope system.

The server may provide the data acquired from the capsule endoscope in real-time streaming according to a data transmission method selected from the client terminal, or transmit the recorded video to the client terminal in a download form.

The data summarizing function includes a function of transmitting at least one representative image frame among a plurality of image frames per unit time.

The server performs a function of controlling the number of transmission frames to transmit at least one image frame adjacent to the transmitted representative image frame when there is an additional image frame transmission request.

The data summarizing function includes a function of reducing a resolution of an image.

Wherein the data summarizing function provides an image having a degree of similarity to an image of a transmission object by a degree of similarity or more using a similarity technique.

The data summarizing function may include a function of selecting an image for a specific digestive organ among the entire images and transmitting the selected image.

According to still another embodiment of the present invention, there is provided a capsule endoscope comprising: a capsule endoscope and a receiver communicating; Communicating between the receiver and the server; Communicating between the server and the client terminal; Determining whether a traffic load of a network for data transmission / reception is a predetermined criterion when a data transmission request is transmitted from the client to the server; And transmitting data after performing a data summarizing function for changing a size or a characteristic of data to be transmitted from the server to the client terminal when the traffic load is equal to or higher than a certain reference level. ≪ / RTI >

Wherein the data summarizing function transmits at least one representative image frame among a plurality of image frames.

And performs a function of controlling the number of transmission frames to transmit at least one or more image frames different from the previously transmitted representative image frame when there is an additional image frame transmission request according to the fine readout requirement.

The data summarizing function includes a function of reducing a resolution of an image.

Wherein the data summarizing function provides an image having a degree of similarity to an image of a transmission object by a degree of similarity or more using a similarity technique.

The data summarizing function may include a function of selecting an image for a specific digestive organ among the entire images and transmitting the selected image.

According to the present invention as described above, it is possible to diagnose the subject remotely even when the diagnosis person and the subject are separated from each other.

In particular, since the receiver and the server can transmit and receive not only wired but also wireless communication, it is possible to diagnose the subject even without a wired network.

In addition, when the traffic load of the network increases, the size of the data changes characteristics, thereby enabling flexible data transmission according to the network traffic load.

In the case of using the data compression function, it is possible to reduce the resolution of an image, transmit a representative image among a plurality of images, select an image for a specific digestive organ, transmit the still image, There is an advantage that it can actively cope with a case where a traffic load becomes large through various methods.

1 is a schematic view of a capsule endoscope system according to the present invention.
2 is a control block diagram of the capsule endoscope system according to the present invention.
3 is a flowchart of a data packet in the capsule endoscope system according to the present invention.
4 is a flowchart of a data transmission and processing method according to the present invention.
5 is a classification table of the data summarizing function according to the present invention.
FIG. 6 is a flowchart for controlling the number of image frames to be transmitted and the representative image frames, which is one of the data summarizing functions according to the present invention.

 Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

Referring to FIG. 1, a capsule endoscope system according to an embodiment of the present invention includes a capsule endoscope 100 for capturing an inside of a living body and generating data, a receiver 200 for receiving imaging data from the capsule endoscope 100, A server 300 for receiving and storing data transmitted from the receiver 200 and a client terminal 400 communicable with the server 300 and containing a diagnostic program.

The capsule endoscope 100 has a micro capsule shape for capturing an image of the digestive organ of the human body H.

Accordingly, when the patient swallows the capsule endoscope 100, the capsule endoscope 100 moves along the path from the esophagus to the anus along the digestive organs for about 10 hours, and the inside of the digestive organs is photographed through the camera provided therein do.

The internal camera has an ultra-precise lens having a viewing angle of about 150 degrees, and captures an image through the lens.

The capsule endoscope 100 uses a human body conduction system, and a real-time moving image (stream image) can be obtained as a method of transmitting data to the outside of a body after passing a current through a human body as a conductor.

The human body conduction system converts the image information captured by the capsule endoscope 100 into digital signals of 0 and 1 in the digestive organs and then transmits minute electrical signals to the body using electric signals of the positive and negative electrodes .

These electric signals are collected by a receiver outside the body, converted into image data, and reproduced in the form of a photograph.

However, data can be acquired in other manners other than the human body conduction system, which will be described later.

The control unit of the capsule endoscope 100 receives power through a low-power battery and operates an image acquisition unit (see FIG. 2) 130 and a communication unit (see FIG. 2) And instructs the communication unit 120 to transmit the captured images.

Therefore, the endoscope 100 has a low-power communication protocol inside the main chip of the control unit and a low-power image sensor of the image acquisition unit, and operates in the body for 11 to 13 hours. 50,000 ~ 80,000 copies will be taken, and about 3 copies will be sent per second.

2) 120 transmits the image data received from the controller 110 (see FIG. 2) to the sensor 201 attached to the body as an electric signal.

The sensor 201 transmits the image data transmitted through the sensor pad 202 directly attached to the patient's skin to the receiver 200 through the cable.

That is, each time three photographs per second of the endoscope 100 are taken, these pictures are transmitted in real time to the receiver 200 through the sensor 201 as a stream image so that the receiver 200 has a minimum of 118,800 Medical image data composed of image information of a length or more (11-hour imaging reference) is generated.

The receiver 200 is wirelessly communicable with the capsule endoscope 100 and performs restoration and storage of the image data received by the capsule endoscope 100.

When the diagnoser requests transmission of data through the Wi-Fi and Ethernet network connection, it has a function of checking the connection state of the network or transmitting the stored real-time image data, various alarms, and status data to the server.

The receiver 200 and the server 300 are connected to the server 300 through a wireless AP 500 or a wired modem 600.

The server 300 can be connected to the receiver 200 and the client terminal 400 via the network at any time.

This connection enables remote diagnosis.

The server 300 monitors the network status to ensure a stable network connection so as to enable connection for the remote diagnosis and plays a role of intermediating data between the receiver 200 and the client terminal 400 do.

The server 300 is provided with a program for network connection and control and receives the data from the receiver 200 and transmits the data to the client terminal 400 again.

In addition, it implements a summary function to detect the network traffic and compress the original image when necessary, or to change the number of transmission frames, or to adjust the resolution of a frame, thereby realizing a more efficient and resilient network So that data can be transmitted through the network.

The client terminal 400 is provided with a client program for receiving and displaying data necessary for network connection with the server 300.

When data is received, a real time view or a burst download can be selected according to the operation mode of the connected receiver 200, and the interval of the image to be downloaded can be selectively selected.

It also performs a function of changing the format of received image data so that it can be used in an existing diagnostic program.

Accordingly, the diagnostician can access the server 300 to monitor the image, and request more detailed data for the suspicious section requiring detailed observation.

Also, it is possible to request the re-transmission of the corresponding section by performing the re-viewing of the past image.

The specific configuration of each component will be described with reference to FIG.

As shown in FIG. 2, the capsule endoscope 100 includes a capsule housing 150 and an optical dome 160.

The capsule housing 150 includes an illumination unit 140, an image acquisition unit 130 such as a camera, a communication unit 120 that communicates with the receiver 200 to transmit data acquired by the image acquisition unit 130, 110).

The optical dome 160 is sealed to the front surface of the capsule housing 150 by a medical adhesive.

At this time, the optical dome 160 may be formed of a transparent material, or may be formed of a transparent material so as to be divided into an illumination window transmitting the illumination light from the illumination unit 140 and a photographing window photographing the illuminated area, And may be formed of a transparent material.

The image capturing unit 130 receives the light incident through the optical dome 160, captures the inside of the subject's organ, and generates photographic data.

The image capturing unit 130 may be an image sensor such as a CCD (Charge Coupled Device) or a CMOS (Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor) or other photographing means.

For example, the image acquisition unit 130 may have a color filter array structure of a Bayer pattern.

Here, the Bayer pattern expresses the color of one of red (R), green (G), and blue (B), and interpolates the surrounding pixel values into two colors It is a way of expressing.

The communication unit 120 transmits the data generated by the image acquisition unit 130 to the receiver 200.

At this time, the communication unit 120 may transmit data using any one of a wireless communication method using a narrow band radio frequency (RF) signal or a wide band pulse signal (Ultra Wide Band Signal), a human body communication method using a human body as a communication medium, (200).

In the case of the wireless communication method, the communication unit 120 transmits data on a carrier wave of a high frequency through a wireless antenna.

In the case of the human body communication method, the communication unit 120 converts photographed data into electric signals, supplies the converted electric signals to at least two transmitting electrodes provided in the capsule housing 150 of the capsule endoscope 100, So that current flows through the human body.

2, the receiver 200 includes a data receiving unit 210, a data storing unit 220, an interface unit 230, and a receiver control unit 240 for controlling them.

The data receiving unit 210 receives the image pickup data transmitted from the capsule endoscope 100 in the wireless communication or the human body communication method and includes time information and position information corresponding to the received image pickup data in the image pickup data, 220 and supplies it to the interface unit 230.

At this time, in case of the wireless communication method, the data receiving unit 210 receives the photographing data transmitted from the data receiving unit 210 of the capsule endoscope 100 through a wireless antenna (not shown).

On the other hand, in the case of the human body communication method, the data receiving unit 210 receives the imaging data transmitted from the communication unit 1120 of the capsule endoscope 100 according to a potential difference induced between at least two receiving electrodes attached to the human body of the examinee .

To this end, in the case of the human body communication method, the data receiving unit 210 includes an analog processing unit (not shown) for amplifying a signal from receiving electrodes, filtering the noise of the amplified signal and converting the noise into a digital signal, And a digital processing unit (not shown) that demodulates the image data and generates photographed data.

The data storage unit 220 stores photographed data received through the data receiving unit 210 for each frame.

In addition, the data storage unit 220 stores the capsule identification of the capsule endoscope 100 allocated by the remote system.

Thus, the photographic data is stored in the data storage unit by the capsule identification number.

The interface 230 transmits image data (including a capsule identification number) supplied from the data receiving unit 210 to the server 300 in real time using an interface method.

At this time, the interface method may be implemented by a general-purpose serial bus (Universal Serial Bus) communication, a TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) / IP (Information Processing) communication, a wired / wireless LAN, Bluetooth, Zigbee, A wired interface or a wireless interface capable of performing wired or wireless communication such as a wired band, a wavy band, a ruby, a binary, a Wi-Fi, and the like.

When the capturing of the capsule endoscope is completed, the interface unit 230 uploads all the image data stored in the data storage unit 220 to the server 300 using a wired or wireless local area communication method.

The server 300 includes a data receiving unit 310 for receiving data from the receiver 200, a data storage unit 320 for storing data received from the data receiving unit 310, A data processing unit 330 for performing data processing such as changing the number of frames to be transmitted or reducing the resolution, a traffic sensing unit 340 for sensing traffic of the network, an interface unit 350, And a server control unit 360 for controlling operations.

The data processing unit 330 or the server control unit 360 converts the photographed data supplied from the data receiving unit into image data in real time and stores the converted image data in the data storage unit 320.

At this time, the data processing unit 330 or the server control unit 360 may perform initialization of the data storage unit 320 before storing the image data.

The image data stored in the data storage unit 320 may be delivered to the client terminal 400 in a real-time streaming format or may be transmitted to the client terminal 400 in a large- And transmitted to the terminal 400.

The interface unit 350 transmits image data to the client terminal 400 in real time using an interface method.

At this time, the interface method may be implemented by a general-purpose serial bus (Universal Serial Bus) communication, a TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) / IP (Information Processing) communication, a wired / wireless LAN, Bluetooth, Zigbee, A wired interface or a wireless interface capable of performing wired or wireless communication such as a wired band, a wavy band, a ruby, a binary, a Wi-Fi, and the like.

The client terminal 400 includes a data receiving unit 410 for receiving a video image transmitted from the server 300, a data storage unit 420 for storing received video data, A user input unit 430 for allowing the user to input data, a display unit 440 for displaying image data, and a terminal control unit 450 for controlling them.

When a user inputs predetermined information about a specific image frame through the user input unit 430, the terminal control unit 450 adds the information to the corresponding image frame as an annotation, and the image frame to which the annotation is added And may be stored in the data storage unit 420.

The data storage unit 420 may store image data.

The image data may be a moving image received by the data receiving unit 410 or at least one image frame.

Or may be time series data obtained by adding an annotation for each image frame inputted through the user input unit 450 to the image frame or image signal received by the data receiving unit 410. [

Meanwhile, the data storage unit 420 may store an interval representative image frame representative of each temporal interval in the entire time-series image frames in a separate storage area.

 In addition, it is preferable that the remaining image frames of the corresponding temporal section are stored in association with each other in a time-series manner.

The terminal control unit 450 controls a data receiving unit 410, a data storage unit 420, a display unit 440 and the user input unit 430 of the terminal 400.

That is, the terminal control unit 450 controls the data receiving unit 410 to receive data from the server 300.

A real time view or a burst download may be performed through the client terminal according to the operation mode of the receiver.

The terminal control unit controls the display of the received video signal and the generated video frame in a time series manner and in a time series manner.

In particular, the terminal control unit arranges and displays a time series image frame on a screen through display control of the display unit, and performs control such as enlarging or reducing the time series image frame and displaying the time series image frame.

The terminal control unit reads image data stored in the data storage unit and generates a plurality of time series image frames. In some cases, a thumbnail image may be further generated, and the sample image may be separately stored.

Meanwhile, the terminal control unit may analyze the image data supplied from the data receiving unit, and may detect abnormalities such as whether the capsule endoscope enters the digestive organs and whether or not the current positional hemorrhage and pathology has occurred.

Then, an alarm signal for filtering the detected abnormalities may be generated and supplied to a notification unit (not shown).

The display unit 440 arranges and displays a plurality of time series image frames generated in the terminal control unit 450 in a temporally continuous manner.

In the present invention, in particular, a map structure of the vertical traverse order is displayed on the screen.

3 is a flowchart of a data packet transmitted / received through the communication process between the receiver 200, the server 300, and the client terminal 400. FIG.

When the inspector transmits a control signal to the server 300 by operating the client terminal 400, the server 300 sends a start signal to the receiver 200 for inspection.

When the inspector makes a system information request (capsule endoscope serial number, etc.) through the client terminal 400, the server 300 requests the receiver 200 for system information related to the capsule endoscope 100 .

When receiving the system information request, the receiver 200 transmits the system information to the server 300, and the server 300 transmits the system information to the client terminal 400 after receiving the system information.

When the inspector requests the image data of the subject's digestive organs, the server 300 receives the data request and transmits the data request to the receiver 200.

The receiver 200 communicates with the capsule endoscope 100 to collect the received data and transmits it to the server 300. The server 300 converts the data into an image form, To the terminal (400).

Then, when the inspector makes a request to stop the data transmission, the request command is transmitted to the receiver 200 by the intermediation of the server 300, and the data transmission is interrupted.

The types of data shown in FIG. 3 are largely classified into control packets and data packets, which are transmitted and received through TCP (Transfer Control Protocol) and UDP (User Datagram Protocol), respectively.

4 to 6 are flowcharts of control of the capsule endoscope system according to the present invention.

As shown in FIG. 4, when the client operates the client terminal, communication between the client terminal and the server is performed (S401), and communication between the server, the receiver, and the capsule endoscope is performed (S402 and S403) .

When the diagnoser requests image data using the client terminal 400, the server 300 determines which data transmission method is selected (S405).

The data transmission method is classified into a real time transmission method and a method of downloading a recorded image.

When the real-time transmission method is selected, the image data captured by the capsule endoscope 100 is provided to the client terminal 400 through the receiver 200 and the server 300 in the form of a real-time streaming image.

When the data is provided in the form of a live streaming image in this way, the diagnostic person can view the diagnosis and diagnose the condition of the subject.

On the other hand, if the user selects the recorded image download mode, it is determined whether the traffic load on the current network is equal to or greater than a predetermined standard (S408).

The server 300 transmits the original image data received from the receiver 200 to the client terminal 400 through the client terminal 400 because the image data of the original state can be transmitted even if the traffic load is less than a predetermined standard. (S410).

If the original image data is transmitted to the client terminal 400 as described above, the diagnostic person can diagnose the condition of the subject by referring to the original image data (S411).

However, if the traffic load becomes equal to or greater than a certain standard, the data summarizing function for converting the size or form of the data is performed (S409). After completing the data summarizing function, the data is transmitted to the client terminal (S410).

FIG. 5 shows a subdivision of the data summarizing function S409.

The data summarizing function may be a function of transmitting at least one representative image frame among a plurality of image frames (S4091). In addition, a method of reducing the resolution of the image data for compression of data can be considered (S4092).

In addition, an approximate position of the capsule can be discriminated and only an image of a specific region (for example, small intestine), which is a region of interest, among the entire captured images (esophagus -> stomach -> small intestine -> large intestine) can be selected and transmitted (S4093).

On the other hand, a method of implementing a moving picture codec and converting each still image into one moving picture stream and transmitting the same is also considered (S4094).

For example, as shown in FIG. 6, a function of transmitting at least one representative image frame among a plurality of image frames is represented by a representative representative of the situation every 100 frames until a separate request is received from the client terminal In operation S40911, if there is an additional image frame transmission request due to detailed reading at the time of the detection of a suspicious part (S40912), a transmission frame number adjustment function is performed to increase the number of transmission frames so that more detailed reading is possible (S40913).

It is also possible to perform a previous state view or a rewind function (Back-roll or Rewind) when necessary to retransmit the previous region of interest.

On the other hand, a method of reducing image resolution can reduce the amount of transmitted data by, for example, reducing the resolution of 320 X 320 to 160 X 160.

In addition, by using a similarity technique, the degree of similarity with the original image is made to be equal to or higher than a certain standard, thereby doubling the compression effect of the transmission data.

Since remote arrangement between the receiver 200, the server 300, and the client terminal 400 is possible, a remote diagnosis of the subject can be performed, thereby eliminating the inconvenience due to limitations on the location due to the diagnosis.

On the other hand, when the traffic load increases, the size of the transmission data can be reduced or converted through the data summarizing function, so that the amount of data transmission can be flexibly adjusted to enable quick diagnosis even when the traffic load increases.

Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the present invention may be embodied in other specific forms without departing from the spirit or essential characteristics thereof.

Therefore, it is to be understood that the above-described embodiments are illustrative in all aspects and not restrictive.

The scope of the present invention is defined by the appended claims rather than the detailed description and all changes or modifications derived from the meaning and scope of the claims and their equivalents are to be construed as being included within the scope of the present invention do.

100: capsule endoscope 200: receiver
300: server 400: client terminal

Claims (13)

A receiver which is provided to be able to communicate with the capsule endoscope and receives image data;
A server communicable with the receiver to transmit and receive data to and from the receiver;
And a client terminal configured to communicate with the server,
Wherein the server performs a data summarizing function for converting a size or a characteristic of data to be transmitted to the client terminal when the traffic of the network for data transmission and reception becomes a certain standard or more, Endoscopic system. The method according to claim 1,
Wherein the server provides live streaming data obtained from the capsule endoscope according to a data transmission method selected from a client terminal or transmits the recorded video to a client terminal in a download form. 3. The method of claim 2,
Wherein the data summarizing function includes a function of transmitting at least one representative image frame among a plurality of image frames per unit time. The method of claim 3,
Wherein the server performs a function of controlling a number of transmission frames to transmit at least one image frame adjacent to the transmitted representative image frame when there is an additional image frame transmission request according to the detailed reading requirement. 3. The method of claim 2,
Wherein the data summarizing function includes a function of reducing a resolution of an image. 6. The method of claim 5,
Wherein the data summarizing function provides an image having a similar degree of similarity to an image of a transmission target by using a similarity technique. 3. The method of claim 2,
Wherein the data summarizing function comprises a function of selecting an image for a specific digestive organ from among the entire images and transmitting the selected image. Communicating the capsule endoscope and the receiver;
Communicating between the receiver and the server;
Communicating between the server and the client terminal;
Determining whether a traffic load of a network for data transmission / reception is a predetermined criterion when a data transmission request is transmitted from the client to the server;
And a data summarizing function for changing a size or a characteristic of data to be transmitted from the server to the client terminal when the traffic load is equal to or greater than a predetermined criterion, and then transmitting data to the capsule endoscope system Way. 9. The method of claim 8,
Wherein the data summarizing function transmits at least one representative image frame among a plurality of image frames. 10. The method of claim 9,
And performing a function of controlling the number of transmission frames to transmit at least one or more image frames different from the previously transmitted representative image frame when there is an additional image frame transmission request according to the detailed reading necessity. 10. The method of claim 9,
Wherein the data summarizing function includes a function of reducing a resolution of an image. 9. The method of claim 8,
Wherein the data summarizing function provides an image having a similar degree of similarity to an image of a transmission object by using a similarity technique. 9. The method of claim 8,
Wherein the data summarizing function includes a function of selecting an image for a specific digestive organ from among the entire captured images and transmitting the selected image to the capsule endoscopic system.

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