Diagnostic Techniques

• Diagnostic techniques involve measurements

to help in detection of some malfunction of
the system of the body.
• These diagnostic techniques does not involve
getting inside the body physically and so these
are called non-invasive diagnostic techniques.
Principles of ultrasonic measurement
• Ultrasound is a sonic energy at frequencies
above the audible range greater than 20 KHz.
• Ultrasound exists as a sequence of alternate
compressions and rarefactions of a suitable
medium i.e in air, water, tissue, bone etc.
• It is propagated through the medium with
some velocity.
• It is frequency & medium density dependant.
Ultrasound reflection and refraction
 Contd..
• Ultrasound obeys laws of reflection and
refraction.
• The reflected energy is dependant on the
difference of densities between the two
media and the angle at which the transmitted
beam hits the medium.
• Higher the difference in the media higher the
reflection.
 Ultrasonic characteristics of some
selected materials
Material Temp Density(g/c Velocity(m/s
m3) ec)
Water 40 0.992 1529
Brain 37 1.030 1510
Muscle 37 1.070 1570
Fat 37 0.97 1440
Bone 37 1.77 3360
 Contd..
• The velocity of sound propagation through a
medium is dependant on density of the
medium, its elastic properties and the
temperature.
• The depth of penetration of ultrasound energy
for different materials is different.
 Ultrasound Absorption
Type of material Frequency Half value
layer(cm)
Blood 1.0 35.0
Muscle 0.8 2.1
Fat 0.8 3.3
Bone 0.8 0.23
 Contd..
• An important property of ultrasound
frequency used in biomedical instrumentation
is Doppler effect.
• Frequency increases if the interface moves
towards the transducer and decreases when
moves away.
• Ultrasound is transmitted in various forms.
 Forms of Ultrasound
• Pulsed ultrasound
• Continuous Doppler
• Pulsed Doppler
• Range gated pulsed Doppler
 Ultrasonic Imaging
• Ultrasonic imaging refers to imaging of
internal organs or structures of the body on
the basis of ultrasound principle.
• This gives information regarding size, location,
displacement or velocity of a given organ
without any surgery or harmful radiation.
• Tumors can be easily identified.
• Imaging systems uses pulsed ultrasound and
pulsed doppler.
 Display modes
• The received information is amplified and
displayed in one of the several display modes.
• A-scan display: Transmitted pulses trigger the
sweep of the oscilloscope . And the
transmitted pulses and echoes are displayed
as vertical deflections on the trace.
• M-scan display: Txd pulses trigger the
oscilloscope sweep but the rxd pulses are
used to increase the brightness of the trace.
 Contd..
• B-scan display: It gives the two dimensional
image of a stationary organ or body structure.
The brightness of the oscilloscope is controlled
by the returning echoes.