US 12,376,821 B2
Method and apparatus for generating a combined three-dimensional ultrasound image
Robert Bauer, Unterhaching (DE); and Mina Hany Hanna Sedra, Munich (DE)
Assigned to PIUR IMAGING GMBH, Vienna (AT)
Appl. No. 17/910,554
Filed by PIUR IMAGING GMBH, Vienna (AT)
PCT Filed Mar. 9, 2021, PCT No. PCT/EP2021/055908
§ 371(c)(1), (2) Date Sep. 9, 2022,
PCT Pub. No. WO2021/180715, PCT Pub. Date Sep. 16, 2021.
Claims priority of application No. 20162140 (EP), filed on Mar. 10, 2020.
Prior Publication US 2023/0135757 A1, May 4, 2023
Int. Cl. A61B 8/08 (2006.01); A61B 8/00 (2006.01)
CPC A61B 8/085 (2013.01) [A61B 8/4245 (2013.01); A61B 8/483 (2013.01)] 26 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A method for generating a combined three-dimensional ultrasound image of a body portion, the method comprising:
performing a first ultrasound scan of a first volume of the body portion using an ultrasound probe, whereby the ultrasound probe generates first ultrasound image data, and whereby a relative tracking system generates first relative displacement data by monitoring the relative displacement of the ultrasound probe;
generating a first partial volume image from the first ultrasound image data and from the first relative displacement data;
performing a second ultrasound scan of a second volume of the body portion using the ultrasound probe, whereby the ultrasound probe generates second ultrasound image data, and whereby the relative tracking system generates second relative displacement data by monitoring the relative displacement of the ultrasound probe,
generating a second partial volume image from the second ultrasound image data and from the second relative displacement data,
wherein the first and second volumes have an overlapping volume containing a predetermined anatomical structure of the body portion;
identifying first anatomical structure position data indicative of the position of the predetermined anatomical structure in the first partial volume image by image segmentation;
identifying second anatomical structure position data indicative of the position of the predetermined anatomical structure in the second partial volume image by image segmentation; and
establishing an initial spatial relationship between the first and second partial volume images in a common volume, based on the identified first and second anatomical structure position data;
adjusting the spatial relationship by a fine registration algorithm using the initial spatial relationship as an initial guess; and
combining the first and second partial volume images in the common volume using the adjusted spatial relationship,
wherein the relative tracking system is an inertial tracking system using at least one from a group comprising an accelerometer and a gyroscope, and
wherein segmentation of the first partial volume image and the second partial image volume comprises classifying voxels of the first partial volume image and the second partial image volume as one of multiple classes, either by probability maps or by a class label for each voxel, and outputs a three-dimensional classification output.