A shock wave and/or ultrasound therapy system includes an ultra-sound and/or shockwave source suspended on a hexapod drive and an X-ray system. A system controller configured to generate control signals for the hexapod drive to align the ultrasound and/or shockwave source with the X-ray system based on the displacement of a known object between two images taken at different tilt angles of the X-ray system.

An apparatus for generating focused shockwaves and ultrasound waves comprises a concave reflector holding a cylindrical coil at its center axis. A power generator comprising a combined shockwave and ultrasound generator device is connected to the coil for alternatingly providing an ultrasound signal and a shockwave signal to the coil such that the coil alternatingly generates ultrasound waves and shockwaves.

The present invention relates to a system for the controlled fragmentation of solids by means of acoustic beams, comprising at least one acoustic beam generation unit (100); and one feedback and control unit (200) of said generation unit (100). Advantageously, the acoustic beams generated by the system are acoustic vortex beams; and the feedback and control unit (200) further comprises a feedback subsystem (12), configured to receive the information relating to the fragmented solids and to utilize it so as to adapt the operation of the acoustic beam generation unit (100). Given that the generation of shearing stresses is more efficient using vortex beams, the amplitudes of the ultrasonic field needed to fragment the calculi are much lower than in current extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy techniques. Likewise, the system minimizes unwanted effects on soft tissues surrounding the solid.

Systems and methods for detecting and disrupting obstructions (such as clot material) within a blood vessel are disclosed herein. In some examples, the present technology comprises a system for detecting and disrupting a clot in a cerebral blood vessel of a patient, where the system comprises a treatment environment, a detection system, and an energy delivery device. The detection system may be configured to determine the presence of a blood clot within a cerebral blood vessel of a patient. In some embodiments, the detection system is configured to obtain data characterizing a position of the clot within the treatment environment. The energy delivery device can be configured to receive the data characterizing the position of the clot and, based on the data, deliver energy to the clot, thereby disrupting the clot and restoring blood flow in the affected blood vessel.

The present invention is directed to a novel target detecting device comprising an excitation transducer generating a low frequency pulses of weakly focused ultrasonic energy and a sensing transducer. The present invention also includes a method of aligning a treatment transducer to a target by mapping the target in situ by sending a low frequency ultrasound signal and receiving reflected signals from the target. These inventions provide a simpler way of determining the location of a target and aligning a treatment transducer without the need to generate and interpret an image and then translate the image back onto the target.

The present invention is directed to a novel target detecting device comprising an excitation transducer generating a low frequency pulses of weakly focused ultrasonic energy and a sensing transducer. The present invention also includes a method of aligning a treatment transducer to a target by mapping the target in situ by sending a low frequency ultrasound signal and receiving reflected signals from the target. These inventions provide a simpler way of determining the location of a target and aligning a treatment transducer without the need to generate and interpret an image and then translate the image back onto the target.

A method for displaying a passive cavitation image that shows characteristic information of a passive cavitation includes: receiving an ultrasound signal caused by the passive cavitation; generating a plurality of first passive cavitation images for the passive cavitation at predetermined respective time frame using the received ultrasound signal by a DAS beam forming; generating a plurality of second passive cavitation images in which a maximum magnitude signal region is displayed by selecting a main lobe region having a magnitude greater than or equal to a predetermined value in the respective first passive cavitation image; generating a main lobe passive cavitation image in which a main region is displayed in the respective time frame by superimposing the plurality of the second passive cavitation images obtained for the respective time frame; and generating a passive cavitation image by displaying the main lobe passive cavitation image on a background image.

The present invention provides enhanced ESWL efficacy for therapeutic and operational outcomes. Device behavior and performance data is measured in-situ and analyzed for both intra-procedure and inter-procedure breadth of regard such that both therapy optimization and maintenance optimization engines are provided an accurate and current assessment of ESWL system and device state and performance. This feedback and control provides the ability to compensate in real time for the current patient therapy and offline for future patient therapy for machine/therapy idiosyncrasies and realize continuous calibration of system/devices to the performance required for maximum ESWL patient efficacy.

An apparatus for patient-specific adjusting of ultrasound output pressure includes a controller (118) configured for adjusting, based on an estimate of thickness of a temporal bone (140) in a head of a medical treatment recipient, a pressure setting. It may also be based on treatment depth (134). Ultrasound at the adjusted pressure setting is applied. A user interface may be provided for user entry of the estimate, the user interface being further configured for user indication of the treatment depth. Both the entered estimate and the indicated treatment depth may be used in calculating ultrasound attenuation (148). The user indication can be interactive by virtue of designating, on a display, a location of a treatment target. The calculated attenuation may be a value, in decibels, that is in a range from 0.9×(2.70×0.1+16.60×T+0.87×(D−T−0.1)+3.02) to 1.1×(2.70×0.1+16.60×T+0.87×(D−T−0.1)+3.02), where T is the estimate in centimeters and D is the treatment depth in centimeters.

Described herein are systems and methods for tracking a target tissue during therapy delivery. A system for identifying an anatomical structure and tracking the motion of the anatomical structure using imaging before and during delivery of a therapy to a patient includes an imaging module and a therapy module. In some cases, the imaging module is configured to identify a region of the anatomical structure in an image, and the therapy module is configured to deliver the therapy to a target tissue. A method for imaging during delivery of a therapy includes acquiring an image, identifying a region of an anatomical structure, tracking the region of the anatomical structure, integrating the tracking, generating a unique template library, determining if a pre-existing template matches the results or if the results should be updated as a new template, and delivering the therapy to the target tissue.