Patent ID: 11911210
Assignee: BK MEDICAL APS
Field: Medical technology (Instruments)
Classification: CPC A  G | IPC A  G

Claim 0:
1. A system, comprising:
a probe, including:
a transducer array configured to acquire three-dimensional data of a vasculature; and
a tracking device configured to produce a first tracking signal indicative of a first spatial location of the probe;

a beamformer configured to beamform the acquired data;
an image processor configured to produce B-mode images from the beamformed data;
a flow processor configured to produce flow images from the beamformed data and to produce a tissue-flow mask from the beamformed data, wherein the tissue flow-mask consists of values from 0 to 1, indicating a probability that a given pixel of the flow image is blood flow, where a value of 1 indicates a voxel is blood flow, a value of 0 indicates the voxel is not blood flow, and a value between 0 and 1 indicates whether the voxel more likely is not blood or is blood;
a segmentation processor configured to:
map the flow images to create a volume;
identify voxels of the volume belonging to a vessel based on the tissue-flow mask; and
extract a surface of a wall of the blood vessel to create a three-dimensional model of the blood vessel;

an image guidance system, including:
a memory with computer executable instructions;
a processor configured to execute the computer executable instructions, which causes the processor to:
receive the three-dimensional model of vasculature from the ultrasound imaging system;
receive a real-time optical feed of an interior of a cavity from an optical camera-based guidance system;
receive the first tracking signal;
receive a second tracking signal indicative of a second spatial location of the optical camera-based guidance system; and
overlay the optical feed with the three-dimensional model based on the first and second spatial locations; and

a display configured to visually present the optical feed with the three-dimensional model overlaid thereover,
wherein the three-dimensional model is a static model that outlines average contours of the vasculature.