Apparatus for diagnosing vascular systems in organism

An apparatus for diagnosing a vascular system of an organism having a lumen in which an inner wall is formed therein, the vascular system including a blood vessel, the apparatus comprising:

• means for fluorographing the vascular system to be diagnosed by X-rays, said X-rays being transmitted through the organism and converted into electrical image signals;
• means for obtaining, in response to a synchronization signal, fluoroscopic two-dimensional image data in accordance with the image signals supplied by the X-ray fluorographing means;
• means for probing the vascular system using ultrasonic signals, the ultrasonic probing means having an ultrasonic probe transferrably inserted into the lumen of the vascular system via a catheter incorporating the ultrasonic probe, the ultrasonic probe being able to obtain ultrasonic echoes representing ultrasonic tomographic images of the vascular system, and the ultrasonic echoes being converted to electrical image signals;
• means for obtaining, in response to the synchronization signal, tomographic two-dimensional image data in accordance with the image signals supplied by the ultrasonic probing means;
• means for determining a structure of the vascular system in accordance with the fluoroscopic two-dimensional image data and the tomographic two-dimensional image data;
• first display means for displaying the structure of the vascular system;
• first storage means for storing X-ray fluoroscopic image data representing the vascular system, the image data being prepared with contrast medium in accordance with the image signals supplied by the X-ray fluorographing means;
• second display means for displaying an X-ray fluoroscopic image as a reference image in accordance with the image data stored in the first storage means;
• means for pointing to a desired position along the vascular system shown in the reference image displayed by the second display means;
• second storage means for storing transferred positions of the ultrasonic probe, the transferred positions being determined for each sampling period;
• means for selecting a tomographic two-dimensional image data value from the tomographic two-dimensional image data values according to the position indicated by the pointing means;
• and
• third display means for displaying the tomographic two-dimensional image data selected by the selecting means.

An apparatus for diagnosing a vascular system of an organism having a lumen in which an inner wall is formed therein, the vascular system including a blood vessel, the apparatus comprising:

• means for fluorographing the vascular system to be diagnosed by X-rays, said X-rays being transmitted through the organism and converted to electrical image signals;
• means for obtaining, in response to a synchronization signal, fluoroscopic two-dimensional image data in accordance with the image signals supplied by the X-ray fluorographing means;
• means for probing the vascular system using ultrasonic signals, the ultrasonic probing means comprising an ultrasonic probe transferrably inserted into the lumen of the vascular system via a catheter incorporating the ultrasonic probe, the ultrasonic probe being able to obtain ultrasonic echoes representing ultrasonic tomographic images of the vascular system, and the ultrasonic echoes being converted into electrical image signals;
• means for obtaining, in response to the synchronization signal, tomographic two-dimensional image data in accordance with the image signals supplied by the ultrasonic probing means;
• means for determining a structure of the vascular system in accordance with the fluoroscopic two-dimensional image data and the tomographic two-dimensional image data;
• and
• means for displaying the structure of the vascular system.

An apparatus for diagnosing a vascular system of an organism having a lumen in which an inner wall is formed therein, the vascular system including a blood vessel, the apparatus comprising:

• means for fluorographing the vascular system to be diagnosed by X-rays, said X-rays being transmitted through the organism and converted into electrical image signals;
• means for obtaining, in response to a synchronization signal, fluoroscopic two-dimensional image data in accordance with the image signals supplied by the X-ray fluorographing means;
• means for probing the vascular system using ultrasonic signals, the ultrasonic probing means having an ultrasonic probe transferrably inserted into the lumen of the vascular system via a catheter incorporating the ultrasonic probe, the ultrasonic probe being able to obtain ultrasonic echoes representing ultrasonic tomographic images of the vascular system, and the ultrasonic echoes being converted into electrical image signals;
• means for obtaining, in response to the synchronization signal, tomographic two-dimensional image data in accordance with the image signals supplied by the ultrasonic probing means;
• means for determining a structure of the vascular system in accordance with the fluoroscopic two-dimensional image data and the tomographic two-dimensional image data;
• means for designating a diameter of the ultrasonic probe;
• means for calculating an absolute cross-sectional area of the lumen and an absolute diameter of the lumen in accordance with data corresponding to the structure of the vascular system and the diameter of the ultrasonic probe;
• and
• means for displaying the structure of the vascular system together with the absolute cross-sectional area of the lumen and the absolute diameter of the lumen.