Ch 1
Introduction
Sonography is the use of ultrasound in medical anatomic and flow imaging.
Doppler ultrasound includes the detection, quantization, and evaluation of tissue motion and blood flow by using the
Doppler effect with ultrasound.
Ultrasound is sound that is higher in pitch than the range of human hearing.
Anatomic imaging with ultrasound is accomplished with a pulse-echo technique.
The brightness of each dot corresponds to the echo strength, producing what is known as a gray-scale image.
Hi!
The pitch of a sound refers to how high or low it sounds to our ears. It is primarily
determined by the frequency of the sound wave, which is measured in Hertz (Hz).
Higher frequencies correspond to higher pitches, while lower frequencies correspond
to lower pitches. Therefore, yes, the pitch of the sound is directly proportional to the
frequency.
Regarding the comparison between men and women, generally, women tend to have
higher-pitched voices than men. This is because women usually have shorter and
thinner vocal cords compared to men, which allows them to produce higher
frequency sounds. So, you are correct in thinking that women typically have a higher
pitch sound than men.
Positional information is determined
by knowledge of the direction of the pulse when it enters the patient and by
measurement of the time it takes for each echo to return to the transducer.
The proper location to present the echo can then be determined from a starting point on the display (usually at the top).
If one pulse of ultrasound is sent into tissue, a series of dots (one line of echo information, specifically, an echo line, data
line, or scan line) is displayed.
One pulse of ultrasound generates a single scan
FIGURE 1-5
line (series of echoes) as it travels through tissue.
Echoes are presented in sequence on a scan line
while they return from tissue during pulse travel.
A, The first echo is displayed.
B, The second echo is added.
C, Three more echoes are added.
D, All the echoes from a single pulse have been
received and displayed as a completed scan line.
E, A complete scan line results from one emitted
pulse. In practice, this is accomplished in less
than one-thousandth of
a second.
If one pulse of ultrasound is sent into
F, According to the pulse-echo imaging principle, tissue, a series of dots (one line of
one pulse traveling through tissues produces a echo information, specifically, an echo
stream of echoes that become one scan line on line, data line, or scan line) is
displayed.
the display.
The echoes from one pulse appear as one scan line (see Figure 1-5, E-F). If the process is repeated, but with different
starting points for each subsequent pulse, a cross-sectional image of the anatomy is constructed (Figure 1-6)
Pulses travel in the same direction from different points and yield
vertical parallel scan lines and
a rectangular image, as shown in Figure 1-7.
These cross-sectional images are produced with
vertical parallel scan lines that are so close together they cannot
be identified individually.
The rectangular display resulting from this procedure often is called
a
• Linear Scan, or
• Linear Image, referring to the
• Linear-array Transducer
that is used to produce it.
A second approach to sending ultrasound pulses through the anatomy to be imaged is shown in Figure 1-8.
With this method,
• Each pulse originates from the same starting point, but
• Subsequent pulses go out in slightly different directions.
This approach results in a sector scan, or sector image, which has a shape similar to a slice of pie (Figure 1-9).
FIGURE 1-8
A single sector frame is progressively built up with
1 (A),
2 (B),
5 (C),
10 (D), and
100 (E) scan lines in sequence. All originate from a common origin and travel out
in different directions.
FIGURE 1-9
A, Ultrasound sent through a thin pie-slice–shaped
volume of tissue produces an image commonly called
a sector image or sector scan.
B, Sector scan of adult heart.
Figure
1-10 shows a format that is a combination of the two just described; that is,
• Pulses (and scan lines) originate from different starting points (as in a linear image), but
• Each pulse (and scan line) travels in a slightly different direction from that of the previous one (as in a sector image).
In this example, the starting points form a curved line across the top of the scan, rather than a straight line, as in the linear
scans shown in Figure 1-7.
The resulting cross-sectional image is composed of many (typically 96 to 256) of these scan lines.
The scan format determines the starting points and paths for individual scan lines, according to the starting point and path for
each pulse used to generate each scan line.
Rapid scanning and processing of Doppler data enable
• Color-coded 2D and
• 3D presentations
of Doppler information (color-Doppler displays)
to be superimposed on gray-scale anatomic images (Figure 1-13).
The spectral-Doppler operation includes
anatomic imaging
to determine the location(s) from which the spectral information is acquired.
