Patent ID: 7988620

Claim:
A capsule endoscope apparatus comprising: an image capturing unit for capturing an image in a body to transmit the image by radio; a receiving unit for receiving the image and a strength signal transmitted by radio from the image capturing unit and for recording the image in a memory operatively connected to the receiving unit; an estimating unit for receiving the signal transmitted by radio from the image capturing unit through each of a plurality of antennas arranged at different positions outside the body to estimate the position and orientation of the image capturing unit on the basis of the signals received through the antennas; a control unit for setting a display interval of the images recorded by the receiving unit based on information regarding the position and orientation obtained by the estimating unit, and controlling display of the images recorded by the receiving unit according to the display interval; and a display unit for displaying the images under the control of the control unit; wherein the control unit includes: a distance calculating unit for calculating a distance that the image capturing unit has traveled on the basis of a plurality of positions of the image capturing unit obtained by the estimating unit; an orientation-change calculating unit for calculating a change in orientation of the image capturing unit on the basis of a plurality of orientations obtained by the estimating unit; and a display control unit for setting the display interval of the images recorded by the receiving unit on the basis of the distance and the change in orientation.