Patent Document ID: 8834371
Application ID: 11278075
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. An ultrasound diagnostic apparatus which acquires an ultrasound image by ultrasound-scanning a breast, comprising: an ultrasound probe and a transmission/reception circuit configured to transmit ultrasound waves to the breast, receive the ultrasound waves from the breast and generate echo signals corresponding to a plurality of frames of substantially a same region at different times on the basis of the received ultrasound waves in a same scan sequence; an image processor configured to (1) generate first images corresponding to the plurality of frames by performing signal processing, the signal processing reducing a speckle pattern component included in each of the echo signals corresponding to the plurality of frames, wherein the signal processing of reducing the speckle pattern components is CFAR (Contrast False Alarm Rate) processing, and the signal processing of reducing the speckle pattern components uses a kernel pattern having an arrangement to acquire more echo signals in a plurality of positions in a horizontal direction than echo signals in a plurality of positions in a vertical direction, wherein the vertical direction corresponds to a direction of transmitting the ultrasound waves, (2) extract a component due to micro calcification occurring in breast tissue as a symptom of breast cancer, and (3) generate second images by performing maximum value projection processing or maximum value holding processing among values of the echo signals at spatially corresponding positions of the first images, which correspond to the different times; and a display which displays the generated second images.