Ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus

Patent 5301670 Issued on April 12, 1994. Estimated Expiration Date:

April 17, 2012. Estimated Expiration Date is calculated based on simple USPTO term provisions. It does not account for terminal disclaimers, term adjustments, failure to pay maintenance fees, or other factors which might affect the term of a patent.

Abstract Claims Description Full Text

Patent References

Ultrasonic imaging apparatus
Patent #: 4991589
Issued on: 02/12/1991
Inventor: Hongo, et al.

Steered linear color doppler imaging
Patent #: 5014710
Issued on: 05/14/1991
Inventor: Maslak, et al.

Method and system for controlling ultrasound scan sequence in Doppler signal detection
Patent #: 5083567
Issued on: 01/28/1992
Inventor: Uchibori

Ultrasonic diagnosing apparatus Patent #: 5144954
Issued on: 09/08/1992
Inventor: Satake

Inventors

Application

No. 870595 filed on 04/17/1992

US Classes:

600/441, Having B-scan and Doppler600/455Pulse Doppler

Examiners

Primary: Jaworski, Francis J.

Attorney, Agent or Firm

Oblon, Spivak, McClelland, Maier & Neustadt

International Class

A61B 008/00

Foreign Application Priority Data

1991-04-17 JP

Abstract

The present invention relates to an ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus for radiating ultrasonic waves in a cross section of a subject by color Doppler scan, detecting the intensity of reflected echo, and brightness-modulating the intensity of the reflected echo, thereby obtaining a tomogram of the subject, and also for detecting a frequency-deviation (Doppler shift) of the reflected echo and detecting the direction and flow velocity of a blood flow in the subject, thereby displaying the blood flow two-dimensionally by coloring the blood flow portion in the tomogram in accordance with the detected flow velocity and direction. The apparatus of the present invention has a control means for controlling the scan-timings for B-mode scanning and CFM scanning independently, and thus, the frame rate for B-mode scanning and that for CFM scanning are controlled independently. The B-mode scanning frame rate can be controlled to be higher than CFM scanning frame rate. Therefore, the realtime following ability for displaying B-mode image is improved compared to the conventional color Doppler scan.