A bed leveling system for a surgical table, which incorporates a platform adapted for a patient to lie down upon, includes an energy emitting device and a first spacer. The energy emitting device is configured and dimensioned to be positioned on a platform of a surgical table. The first spacer is configured to be positioned on a platform of a surgical table to support a portion of a patient's body. The first spacer has a thickness such that a top surface of the first spacer is substantially flush with a top surface of the energy emitting device when disposed adjacent the energy emitting device on a platform of a surgical table.

A method is disclosed for generating sinograms by sampling a plurality of transducers acoustically coupled with the surface of a volume of tissue over a period of time after a light pulse at one wavelength, and after another light pulse at a different wavelength, and for processing those sinograms, reconstructing at least two optoacoustic images from the two sinograms, processing the two optoacoustic images to generate two envelope images and generating a parametric map from information in the two envelope images. In an embodiment, motion and tracking are determined to align the envelope images. In an embodiment, at least a second parametric map is produced from information in the same two envelope images. In an embodiment an ultrasound image is also acquired, and the parametric map is coregistered with and overlayed upon the ultrasound image, and then displayed.

An extraction period specification unit specifies an extraction period (extraction section) for an M-mode image. A model expansion/contraction unit establishes a contour model (initial configuration) in relation to the specified extraction period while expanding/contracting the contour model in the direction of the time axis so as to conform with the extraction period. A node position change unit performs, for each node forming a plurality of node strings included in the established contour model, an edge (contour) search while successively changing the positions of the nodes, resulting in the formation of a revised contour model comprising a plurality of nodes at an edge detection position. A trace unit carries out interpolation on a plurality of node strings included in the revised contour model, thereby generating a plurality of trace lines simulating a plurality of contour lines.

A system and method of ultrasound imaging, the system including a laparoscopic surgical instrument including at least one ultrasound transducer, and a processor adapted to receive acoustic data from the ultrasound transducer and process the acoustic data from the ultrasound transducer to produce a graphical representation of the acoustic data, the graphical representation depicting echoic attributes of tissue substantially axially aligned with a transmission path of the at least one ultrasound transducer, and the distance of at least one tissue type having different echoic attributes from surrounding tissue form a distal tip of the laparoscopic surgical instrument.

An ultrasound image evaluation apparatus includes: an image obtaining section that obtains a first ultrasound image generated based on ultrasounds, and a second ultrasound image generated before the first ultrasound image; an evaluation section that evaluates a distribution of motions at a part in the first ultrasound image, and a corresponding part of tissue in the second ultrasound image; and an output control section that performs control of outputting an evaluation result of the evaluation section.

A control system for controlling an ultrasonic probe includes a module for assigning address parameters respectively to ultrasonic transducers of the probe according to a physical position order of the ultrasonic transducers, a module for arranging the address parameters in an activation sequence, and a module for generating activating signals each corresponding to a respective address parameter. Sequential two address parameters in the activation sequence correspond to two ultrasonic transducers that are non-sequential to each other in the physical position order. Each activating signal is transmitted to a respective ultrasonic transducer that is assigned with the address parameter to which the activating signal corresponds.

Apparatus and methods of use are provided for complex flow imaging and analysis that is non-invasive, accurate, and time-resolved. It is particularly useful in imaging of vascular flow with spatiotemporal fluctuations. This apparatus is an ultrasound-based framework called vector projectile imaging (VPI) that can dynamically render complex flow patterns over an imaging view at millisecond time resolution. The VPI apparatus and methods comprise: (i) high-frame-rate broad-view data acquisition (based on steered plane wave firings); (ii) flow vector estimation derived from multi-angle Doppler analysis (coupled with data regularization and least-squares fitting); and (iii) dynamic visualization of color-encoded vector projectiles (with flow speckles displayed as adjunct).

Provided is a method of displaying location information of a bursa, which includes: obtaining shoulder ultrasound image data; detecting a fat layer located between a deltoid muscle and a tendon, based on information about an intensity of an echo signal contained in the shoulder ultrasound image data; detecting the bursa located between the fat layer and the tendon by using a location of the fat layer; and displaying the location information of the bursa on a shoulder ultrasound image generated based on the shoulder ultrasound image data.

A method and a device for acquiring biomechanical parameters based on an ultrasonic elastomyogram are provided, wherein the method includes: synchronously collecting a dynamic myodynamics image sequence and a dynamic elasticity image sequence of a single skeletal muscle under continuous stretching; acquiring a myodynamics parameter corresponding to each myodynamics image in the dynamic myodynamics image sequence and an elasticity modulus value corresponding to each elasticity image in the dynamic elasticity image sequence respectively; and generating an ultrasonic elastomyogram curve with the myodynamics parameter as the abscissa and the synchronized elasticity modulus value as the ordinate, and estimating a muscle biomechanical parameter based on the ultrasonic elastomyogram curve. Dynamically changing biomechanical parameters can be obtained, and the obtained muscle biomechanical parameters have relatively high accuracy.

The present invention relates to an ultrasound diagnosis apparatus (10), in particular for analyzing a fetus (62). An ultrasound data interface (66) is configured to receive 3D (three dimensional) ultrasound data from an object (12). The ultrasound diagnosis apparatus further comprises a measurement unit (70) for measuring anatomical structures of the object based on the segmentation data and a calculation unit (72) configured to calculate at least one biometric parameter based on the 3D ultrasound data.