Patent ID: 6616611
Filing Date: 2003-09-09
Classification: A61B,G01S

Abstract:
A Doppler ultrasound system for providing blood flow information of a subject, the sytem comprising:an ultrasound transducer from which ultrasound signals are emitted into the subject along an ultrasound beam axis; an ultrasound receiver detecting echo signals resulting from the ultrasound signals emitted into the subject; an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) circuit coupled to the ultrasound receiver to quantize the echo signals received by the ultrasound receiver into digital sample values; a digital signal processor coupled to the ADC circuit for processing the digital sample values to calculate blood flow velocity data and detected Doppler signal power data as functions of time for a plurality of locations along the ultrasound beam axis; a graphical display; and a display controller coupled to the digital signal processor and the graphical display for controlling the graphical display to display blood flow velocity data and detected Doppler signal power data as a graphical image representative of blood flow detected along the ultrasound beam axis as a function of time, the graphical image having a color at each of the locations along the ultrasound beam axis for which data is displayed based on the blood flow velocity data and the color having a color property that varies based on the detected Doppler signal power data.