ULTRASOUND DIAGNOSTIC APPARATUS AND DATA PROCESSING METHOD

摘要

There is provided an ultrasound diagnostic apparatus capable of outputting an appropriate ultrasound image with no distortion regardless of a sound velocity distribution in a subject. In the ultrasound diagnostic apparatus, sound velocities are calculated at two or more points in a subject, and coordinate transformation of a generated ultrasound image is performed based on the calculated sound velocities.

主权项

1. An ultrasound diagnostic apparatus, comprising:
an ultrasound probe having ultrasound transducers each adapted to transmit an ultrasonic wave, receive an ultrasonic echo reflected by a subject and output an analog reception signal in accordance with the ultrasonic echo as received; an analog-to-digital converter adapted to analog-to-digital convert the analog reception signal output by each of the ultrasound transducers into a digital reception signal; a storage adapted to store the digital reception signal; a sound velocity determiner adapted to determine a sound velocity at each of plural points in the subject by using the digital reception signal converted from the analog reception signal by the analog-to-digital converter or the digital reception signal read out from the storage; a signal processor adapted to generate a brightness image of the subject by at least performing reception focusing processing on the digital reception signal converted from the analog reception signal by the analog-to-digital converter or the digital reception signal read out from the storage; and a coordinate transformer adapted to perform coordinate transformation on the brightness image generated by the signal processor based on the sound velocity determined by the sound velocity determiner.