Patent ID: 7819806

Claim:
A method for processing ultrasonic imaging information of a region-of-interest within a subject derived from signals of ultrasound echoes captured by an ultrasonic transceiver placed against a surface location of the patient, the method comprising: presenting a Cartesian or X-axis stretched polar image of the cavity on a display in proportion to the strength of signals derived from fundamental or harmonic ultrasound echoes; enhancing the Cartesian or X-axis stretched polar image; selecting within the enhanced Cartesian or X-axis stretched polar image pixel candidate sets occupying regions near a cavity-tissue interface utilizing either a fast marching live wire algorithm or a level set active contour algorithm; and determining a boundary contour between the cavity-tissue interface based upon extracting positional information from a cost function analysis of pixels in the image pixel candidate sets when selection of the pixel candidate sets is by the fast marching live wire algorithm or by the deformation of the boundary contour presented by the pixel candidate sets when selection is made by the level set active contour algorithm; and displaying the enhanced Cartesian or X-axis stretched polar image.