Patent ID: 8905933

Claim:
An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus comprising: an ultrasonic probe including plural ultrasonic transducers for transmitting ultrasonic waves toward an object to be inspected and receiving ultrasonic echoes reflected within the object to output reception signals, respectively; a first movement information calculating part for calculating a Doppler shift frequency in a sound ray direction within the object based on the reception signals respectively outputted from said plural ultrasonic transducers, and calculating first movement information on movement of a mobile element in the sound ray direction based on the Doppler shift frequency; a signal calculating part for calculating plural azimuth direction component signals having components of ultrasonic echoes in an azimuth direction orthogonal to the sound ray direction at plural different times, each of said plural azimuth direction component signals being obtained by sampling the reception signals respectively outputted from said plural ultrasonic transducers arranged in the azimuth direction and representing a reception waveform according to a position of the mobile element in the azimuth direction; a second movement information calculating part for performing correlation processing on the plural azimuth direction component signals calculated by said signal calculating part to calculate second movement information on movement of the mobile element in the azimuth direction within the object; and a two-dimensional velocity calculating part for calculating two-dimensional velocity information of the mobile element moving within the object based on the first and second movement information respectively calculated by said first and second movement information calculating parts.