Patent ID: 7686764

Claim:
An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus, comprising: a transmission unit that transmits at least one ultrasonic pulse, wherein the at least one ultrasonic pulse is transmitted from a skin surface of a subject toward a blood vessel thereof; a reception unit that receives an ultrasonic echo signal based on the at least one ultrasonic pulse and converts the same into an electric signal, wherein the ultrasonic echo signal is reflected by the blood vessel to obtain the electric signal of the ultrasonic echo signal representative of a depth direction from the skin surface; a movement detection unit that analyzes a phase of the ultrasonic echo signal, wherein the phase of the ultrasonic echo signal is representative of a direction traversing the blood vessel so that the movement detection unit calculates a movement amount in each of a plurality of parts included in a blood vessel wall constituting the blood vessel and a vicinity of the blood vessel wall; and a boundary detection unit that detects a boundary position, wherein the detected boundary position is between the blood vessel wall and a blood flow region in a lumen of the blood vessel through which blood flows based on a track indicating a variation in the calculated movement amount for each of the plurality of parts and by detecting a position where neighboring parts have tracks with different features.