Hand-held imaging devices with position and/or orientation sensors for complete examination of tissue

A scan completeness auditing system for use with an ultrasound imaging console in screening a volume of tissue comprising:

• a location tracking system comprising:
• at least one combination position and orientation sensor adapted to couple to an imaging probe to provide data corresponding to the position and orientation of the imaging probe;
• and
• a receiver comprising a controller configured to receive the position and orientation data from the location tracking system and to electronically receive and record a first scan sequence comprising a first set of scanned images representing cross-sections of the tissue from the imaging probe, wherein the controller is further configured to assign a replay dwell time to each image in the first scan sequence, wherein the dwell time for each image is based on a relative spacing for that image in the first scan sequence computed from the position and orientation data.

A scan completeness auditing system for use with an ultrasound imaging console in screening a volume of tissue comprising:

• a location tracking system configured to track and record the position and orientation of a manual imaging probe, the location tracking system comprising:
• a plurality of sensors adapted to couple to the manual imaging probe, the plurality of sensors configured to provide position and orientation data for the manual imaging probe;
• and
• a receiver comprising a controller, the controller configured to electronically receive position and orientation data for the manual imaging probe from the location tracking system and to electronically receive and record a first scan sequence comprising a first set of scanned images representing cross-sections of the tissue from the manual imaging probe, wherein the controller is further configured to assign a replay dwell time to each image in the first scan sequence, wherein the dwell time for each image is based on a relative spacing for that image in the first scan sequence computed from the position and orientation data.

A method for screening tissue, comprising:

• scanning the tissue with a manual imaging probe of an ultrasound imaging console along a first scanning path on the tissue;
• generating a first scan sequence comprising a first set of discrete digital images representing cross-sections of the scanned tissue along the first scanning path;
• electronically transmitting the first scan sequence to a controller;
• electronically communicating position and orientation data for the manual imaging probe to the controller, wherein the position and orientation data is collected from at least one combination position and orientation sensor;
• and
• assigning a display dwell time to each image based on a relative spacing for that image in the first scan sequence.

A method for screening a defined volume of tissue with an image scanning device, comprising:

• scanning tissue using a manual imaging probe to generate a scan sequence comprising a set of discrete images of the scanned tissue;
• electronically receiving a set of discrete images from the image scanning device;
• electronically receiving position and orientation data for each image in the set of discrete images from a location tracking system comprising one or more position sensors and one or more orientation sensors attached to the manual imaging probe;
• measuring an image-to-image spacing between successive images in the scan sequence;
• determining whether the image-to-image spacing exceeds a maximum limit;
• and
• alerting an operator if the image-to-image spacing exceeds the maximum limit.