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US 9,364,196 B2Granted
Method and apparatus for ultrasonic measurement of volume of bodily structures
AssigneeSignostics Limited
InventorsEssa El-Aklouk, John Brydon
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A method and apparatus for determining the volume of a bodily structure including the steps of acquiring at least two ultrasound images, estimating the location of the perimeter of a structure of interest as viewed in cross section in each said ultrasound image, calculating the cross sectional area of such structure as so viewed, and combining the perimeter and area information from the at least two images to calculate the volume of the structure.
Claims9
A method for determining the volume of a fluid filled bodily structure including the steps of:
- a. acquiring image data for at least two ultrasound images of the bodily structure, each of the ultrasound images including speckle artifacts and random noise;
- b. applying an anisotropic median filter to the image data of each of the ultrasound images to generate and display a corresponding filtered image for each of the ultrasound images, wherein the anisotropic median filter:
- (1) uses a filter window defined by a rectangle which is wider in a direction perpendicular to the approximate path of a scanline which produced the area of the image being filtered relative to the width of the rectangle in a direction parallel to the approximate path of the scanline, and
- (2) is configured to reduce, in each of the filtered images, display artifacts due to the random noise to a greater extent than the speckle artifacts to form, in each filtered image, an image delineation of a perimeter of the bodily structure, the image delineation including a pattern of speckle artifacts preserved in each filtered image;
- c. estimating, using the image delineation in each displayed filtered image, the location of the perimeter of the bodily structure as viewed in cross section in each filtered ultrasound image;
- d. calculating, from each displayed filtered image, the cross sectional area of the bodily structure as so viewed using the estimated perimeter location;
- and
- e. combining the perimeter and area information calculated from the displayed filtered images to calculate the volume of the bodily structure.
5 more elements
A hand held portable ultrasound apparatus including:
- a. an ultrasound transducer;
- b. control electronics for controlling the transducer to transmit pulsed ultrasonic signals into a target body and to receive returned echoes from the target body;
- c. image acquisition electronics to produce, from returned echoes, image data for at least two ultrasound images;
- and
- d. a processor configured to:
- (1) apply an anisotropic median filter able to act on the image data of each of the ultrasound images, the images including speckle artifacts and random noise, to generate and display a corresponding filtered image for each of the ultrasound images, wherein the anisotropic median filter:
- (i.) uses a filter window including a rectangle which is wider perpendicular to the approximate path of a scanline which produced the area of the image being filtered relative to the width of the rectangle in a direction parallel to the approximate path of the scanline, and
- (ii.) reduces, in each of the filtered images, display artifacts due to the random noise to a greater extent than the speckle artifacts to form, in each filtered image, an image delineation of a perimeter of the bodily structure, the image delineation having a pattern of speckle artifacts preserved in each filtered image;
- (2) determine, from each displayed filtered image, the location of the perimeter of the bodily structure as viewed in cross section;
- and
- (3) calculate the values of the perimeter and the area of the bodily structure as shown in each of the displayed filtered images to calculate from these values a volume of the bodily structure, and
- (4) display the calculated volume to a user.
9 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.