Patent ID: 8366621

Claim:
An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus comprising: an ultrasonic probe which transmits and receives ultrasonic waves; a transmission and reception unit which repeatedly scans a three-dimensional scanning area including a specific part of a patient with an ultrasonic beam via the ultrasonic probe; a volume data set generation unit which generates a plurality of volume data sets whose scanning times differ from one another based on an output from the transmission and reception unit; a section image generation unit which respectively generates data of a plurality of short axis images concerning a short axis section of the specific part based on said plurality of the volume data sets; and a display unit which displays said plurality of section images in a display area by changing the position of each of said plurality of short axis images within the display area in accordance with the variation of the position of the specific part on said plurality of short axis images, wherein the transmission and reception unit extracts an outer wall profile of the specific part from each of the displayed short axis section images, sets, as a three-dimensional high-density scanning area, a three-dimensional local area included in the three-dimensional scanning area and determined from the outer wall profile, and scans the three-dimensional high-density scanning area using an ultrasonic beam emitted by the ultrasonic probe.