MEDICAL ULTRASOUND EXCITED THERMOGRAPHY APPARATUS AND MEDICAL ULTRASOUND EXCITED THERMOGRAPHY INSPECTION METHOD

摘要

A medical ultrasound excited thermography apparatus (10) for thermal inspecting of a portion (32) of a skin over a bone (36) of a subject (12) is disclosed. The medical apparatus comprises an ultrasound transducer (14) including a plurality of transducer elements adapted to emit ultrasound waves (30) to the portion of the subject to be imaged. An infrared camera (18) is adapted to provide infrared image data of the portion of the subject, and a frequency filter (24) is adapted to filter the infrared image data on the basis of a modulation frequency. Further, a modulator (16) is connected to the ultrasound transducer and the modulator is adapted to modulate the ultrasound waves emitted by the ultrasound transducer at the modulation frequency, and wherein the frequency filter is adapted to filter the infrared image data at the modulation frequency.