JPH08238237A - X-ray equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] [Object] To provide an X-ray imaging apparatus capable of automatically detecting the size of the subject A and selecting the phototimer light receiving unit 3 arranged at an optimum position. [Structure] Three photo timer light receiving portions 3a to 3c are arranged side by side, a touch panel 9 is attached to the lower surface of the compression plate 7, and one of the photo timer light receiving portions is received based on a pressing position signal output from the touch panel 9. It comprises a light receiving section selecting section 11 for selecting the section 3, and a selector 4 for sending only the X-ray receiving signal output from the selected photo timer light receiving section 3 to the exposure control section 5.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an X-ray imaging apparatus for performing X-ray imaging of a breast for examining breast cancer and the like.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art FIG. 4 shows a conventional X-ray imaging apparatus for performing X-ray imaging of a breast. A cassette 1 containing an X-ray film is installed on the imaging table 2. Then, the subject A, which is the breast of the subject, is placed on the cassette 1 and pressed by the compression plate 7 from above so that the breast has a uniform thickness. X
The X-rays emitted from the X-ray tube device 6 through the tube 12 pass through the subject A and expose the X-ray film in the cassette 1. The tube 12 is a diaphragm device that collimates the X-rays emitted from the X-ray tube device 6 and irradiates the subject A as parallel radiation.

The X-rays pass through the cassette 1 and are also incident on the phototimer light receiving portion 3 disposed inside the photographing table 2 below the cassette 1. The phototimer light-receiving unit 3 is an X-ray composed of a scintillator that emits fluorescence near the visible light region when receiving X-rays, and a photoelectric converter such as a photomultiplier tube or a photodiode that converts the light emitted by the scintillator into an electric signal. It is a detector and outputs an X-ray reception signal according to the incident intensity of X-rays. The X-ray received light signal output from the phototimer light receiver 3 is sent to the exposure controller 5. The exposure control unit 5 is X
The line light receiving signal is integrated and compared with a reference value, and when the integrated value reaches this reference value, an X-ray cutoff signal is sent to the X-ray high voltage generator 16 to cut off the X-ray irradiation. Here, when the X-ray reception signal corresponding to the X-ray incident intensity is integrated, the X-ray incident amount accumulated over time can be measured. If the reference value is set to an appropriate value in advance, it can be determined that the X-ray film has also reached the optimum exposure amount when the incident amount reaches this reference value. Therefore, the X-ray high voltage generator 16
Automatic X-ray exposure control will be performed.

By the way, since the size of the breast, which is the subject A, greatly differs depending on the subject, this subject A
It is necessary to adjust the position of the phototimer light receiving unit 3 according to the size of the. That is, for example, in the case of the subject A shown in FIG. 5, since the position of the phototimer light receiving unit 3 is too close to the front, the position must be moved to the back side in the direction of arrow D. Therefore, in the conventional X-ray imaging apparatus, as shown in FIG. 4, the phototimer light receiving unit 3 is arranged so as to be slidable between the double-headed arrows E, and the position setting knob interlocking with the phototimer light receiving unit 3 is arranged. 13 is provided and this position setting knob 1
The position of the photo-timer light receiving portion 3 can be adjusted by sliding 3. Further, the position of the photo timer light receiving portion 3 can be confirmed by the photo timer light receiving portion position pointer 14.

Further, in another conventional X-ray imaging apparatus, as shown in FIG.
As shown in FIG. 3, for example, three photo timer light receiving portions 3a to 3c are arranged side by side in the imaging table 2, and any one of the X-ray light receiving signals detected by these three photo timer light receiving portions 3a to 3c is operated. Some of them are provided with a selection switch 15 which is selected by the above and sent to the exposure control section 5. In this case, according to the size of the subject A, the one at the most suitable position is selected from the three phototimer light receiving units 3a to 3c by operating the selection switch 15. That is, for example, in the case of the object A of the intermediate size shown in FIG. 6, the central photo timer light receiving portion 3b is selected by the selection switch 15, and only the X-ray light receiving signal output from this photo timer light receiving portion 3b is subjected to the exposure control. Optimal exposure control can be performed by sending to the unit 5.

[0006]

However, in the conventional X-ray imaging apparatus in which the phototimer light receiving unit 3 is moved, the subject A is pressed by the compression plate 7 so that the breast has a uniform thickness, and then the subject A is pressed. It is necessary to operate the position setting knob 13 in accordance with the size of A and adjust the position of the photo timer light receiving portion 3 while confirming it with the photo timer light receiving portion position pointer 14, and this adjustment work performed every X-ray imaging is troublesome. There was a problem that was. Moreover, since the position adjustment work by such a mechanical structure tends to be performed easily and easily, there is a problem that the reliability may be insufficient.

Further, the conventional X-ray radiographing apparatus for selecting the phototimer light receiving portions 3a to 3c is improved in reliability because the selection is surely performed by the switch operation of the selection switch 15, but the object A of the subject A is visually observed. Since it is necessary to confirm the size and determine the optimum positions of the phototimer light receiving portions 3a to 3c before making the selection, there is a problem that the complexity of performing the selection work each time X-ray imaging is not solved.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and provides an X-ray imaging apparatus capable of automatically detecting the size of the breast and selecting the phototimer light receiving portion arranged at the optimum position. The purpose is to do.

[0009]

That is, in order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present invention places the breast of the subject on the front side of the X-ray film by compressing it with a compression plate, and further from the front of the X-ray film. In an X-ray imaging apparatus for irradiating X-rays with X-rays, a plurality of phototimer light receiving units are arranged at different positions on the back side of the X-ray film, and the breast is pressed against the compression surface of the compression plate. A position detection panel that detects a pressing position or a contact position that contacts the breast is arranged, and a light receiving unit that selects any one of a plurality of phototimer light receiving units based on the pressing position or the contact position detected by the position detecting panel. A part selection means and an exposure control means for controlling the irradiation amount of X-rays according to the amount of received X-rays detected by the phototimer light-receiving unit selected by the light-receiving unit selection unit are provided. To.

[0010]

According to the above means, when the breast is compressed by the compression plate, the position detection panel detects the shape and size of the breast, and based on this, the light receiving section selecting means selects one of the plurality of photo timer light receiving sections. Since the one arranged at the optimum position is selected from among, it is possible to automatically select the optimum phototimer light receiving unit according to the size of each breast every X-ray imaging. For this reason, the X-ray imaging apparatus of the present invention does not require the work of visually confirming the size of the breast and adjusting or selecting the position of the phototimer light receiving unit as in the related art. Moreover,
Since the optimum phototimer light receiving unit is reliably selected with high reliability, the exposure control unit can always perform accurate exposure control.

[0011]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Specific embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIGS. 1 to 3 show an embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 1 is a partial side view showing an essential part of an X-ray imaging apparatus, and FIG. 2 is a compression plate for a large object. FIG. 3 is a plan view of the subject under compression, and FIG. 3 is a plan view of the subject having a small size compressed by the compression plate. The constituent elements having the same functions as those of the conventional example shown in FIG.

As shown in FIG. 1, the X-ray imaging apparatus of this embodiment has three photo timer light receiving portions 3a to 3c arranged in an imaging table 2 in which a cassette 1 is installed. These phototimer light receiving units 3a to 3c are arranged in a line from the front side to the back side, which is the insertion direction of the subject A. Each of the phototimer light receiving units 3a to 3c is an X including a scintillator and a photomultiplier tube or a photoelectric converter such as a photodiode.
It is a line detector and is adapted to output the intensity of X-rays incident on the light-receiving surface as an X-ray reception signal.

The X-ray reception signals output from the photo timer light receiving sections 3a to 3c are input to the selector 4, respectively. The selector 4 is a circuit that selects only one of the X-ray light reception signals from the phototimer light reception units 3a to 3c according to a selection signal described later and sends it to the exposure control unit 5. The exposure control unit 5 sends the X-ray cutoff signal to the X-ray high voltage generator 16 to cut off the X-ray irradiation when the integrated value of the X-ray received signal reaches the reference value as in the conventional case. This is a circuit that performs automatic exposure control of X-rays.

The compression plate 7 is a flat plate that transmits X-rays for compressing the subject A placed on the cassette 1 from above, and is supported by the main body 8 of the X-ray imaging apparatus to support the imaging table. It is designed to move up and down above 2. A touch panel 9 is attached to the entire lower surface, which is the compression surface of the compression plate 7. The touch panel 9 is a position detection panel that detects a pressed position by using, for example, a resin whose electric resistance changes according to pressure. That is, the touch panel 9 divides the panel surface into a large number of matrix areas and sequentially scans these areas by the touch panel driver 10 to output a pressing position signal indicating whether or not pressure is applied to each area. To do. Therefore, when the subject A is pressed by the compression plate 7, it is possible to detect which region of the touch panel 9 the subject A is in contact with and pressing. For example, when the subject A having a large size is pressed as shown in FIG.
When it is detected that pressure is applied to each region within a wide range as shown in Fig. 3 and the small object A is compressed as shown in Fig. 3, within a narrow range as shown by the hatched portion C. It is detected that the pressure is applied to each area of.

The pressed position signal output from the touch panel 9 via the touch panel driver 10 is input to the light receiving section selecting section 11. The light receiving section selecting section 11 is a circuit for selecting any of the photo timer light receiving sections 3a to 3c according to the pressed position signal. That is, this light receiving unit selection unit 11
First, for each of the photo timer light receiving portions 3a to 3c, it is inspected whether or not all the areas on the touch panel 9 corresponding to the positions where the light receiving surfaces are arranged are pressed, and the photo timer light receiving portions 3a in which all these areas are pressed. Of 3c, the one located at the innermost side is selected. Therefore, for example, when the pressed position signal of the subject A having a large size is input as shown in FIG. 2, the photo timer light receiving portion 3c located at the innermost side within the range indicated by the hatched portion B is selected, and When the pressing position signal of the subject A having a small size is input as shown in FIG. 3, the photo timer light receiving portion 3a located at the innermost side within the range indicated by the hatched portion C, that is, the photo timer light receiving portion arranged at the most front side is received. The part 3a is selected.
Then, when any one of the phototimer light receiving units 3a to 3c is selected in this manner, only the X-ray light receiving signal from the selected phototimer light receiving unit 3 is sent by sending a selection signal corresponding thereto to the selector 4. It is sent to the exposure control unit 5. Note that, here, the phototimer light receiving unit 3 indicates any one of the three phototimer light receiving units 3a to 3c.

In the X-ray imaging apparatus having the above-mentioned structure, for example, when performing X-ray imaging of a large subject A as shown in FIG. 2, when the subject A is pressed by the compression plate 7, a hatching portion is formed. Since the touched position signal indicating that a wide area indicated by B is pressed is output from the touch panel 9,
The light receiving unit selecting unit 11 selects the photo timer light receiving unit 3c arranged at the innermost side, and the X from the photo timer light receiving unit 3c is selected.
Only the line reception signal is sent to the exposure control unit 5 via the selector 4. Therefore, in the case of the subject A having such a large size, the phototimer light receiving unit 3c disposed on the innermost side is provided.
Accurate automatic exposure control is performed according to the incident amount of X-rays incident on. In addition, as shown in FIG. 3, when performing X-ray imaging of the subject A having a small size, when the subject A is pressed by the compression plate 7, a region within a narrow range indicated by the hatched portion C is pressed. Since the pressed position signal indicating that the photo timer is received from the touch panel 9, the light receiving section selecting section 11 selects the photo timer light receiving section 3a arranged closest to the front side, and only the X-ray light receiving signal from the photo timer light receiving section 3a is selected. It is sent to the exposure control unit 5 via the selector 4. Therefore, in the case of the subject A having such a small size, accurate automatic exposure control is performed according to the incident amount of X-rays incident on the phototimer light receiving unit 3a arranged on the frontmost side. Even in the case of the subject A of intermediate size, accurate automatic exposure control is performed in accordance with the amount of X-rays incident on the phototimer light receiving unit 3b arranged in the center in the same manner.

As a result, according to the X-ray imaging apparatus of the present embodiment, when the subject A is compressed by the compression plate 7, the photo timer light receiving unit automatically arranged at the optimum position for the size of the subject A is received. Since the unit 3 is selected, it is not necessary to adjust the position of the phototimer light receiving unit 3 or perform a selection operation according to each subject A every X-ray imaging.

Incidentally, the light receiving section selecting section 11 in this embodiment.
The selection processing of the phototimer light receiving units 3a to 3c by the above is not limited to the above method, and for example, the area of the pressed region indicated by the pressed position signal or the position of the innermost position of the pressed region. Subject A by detecting
Can be classified into three sizes, and any one of the photo timer light receiving units 3 can be selected according to the classified size. It is also possible to perform various image processing such as feature extraction based on the pressed position signal, and select an optimum phototimer light receiving unit 3 by an appropriate algorithm based on the processing result.

Further, in the present embodiment, the case where the three phototimer light receiving portions 3a to 3c are arranged is shown, but a plurality of other phototimer light receiving portions may be arranged. In addition, in the present embodiment, the touch panel 9 that detects the pressed position is used as the position detection panel, but instead of this, a position detection panel that detects the contact position of the subject A can also be used.

[0021]

As is clear from the above description, according to the X-ray imaging apparatus of the present invention, the size of the breast can be automatically detected and the optimum phototimer light receiving portion can be surely selected. The work of adjusting or selecting the position of the phototimer light receiving unit is unnecessary, and the workability of X-ray imaging can be improved.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a partial side view showing an essential part of an X-ray imaging apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 shows an embodiment of the present invention, and is a plan view when a large-sized subject is compressed by a compression plate.

FIG. 3 shows an embodiment of the present invention, and is a plan view when a subject having a small size is compressed by a compression plate.

FIG. 4 shows a conventional example and is a side view of an entire X-ray imaging apparatus.

FIG. 5 is a plan view showing a conventional example and showing a positional relationship between an object to be inspected on a cassette and a photo timer light receiving section.

FIG. 6 is a plan view showing another conventional example and showing the vicinity of the subject on the cassette in the X-ray imaging apparatus.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 cassette 3a, 3b, 3c photo timer light receiving unit 4 selector 5 exposure control unit 7 compression plate 9 touch panel 11 light receiving unit selection unit A subject

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. An X-ray imaging apparatus for arranging a subject's breast on the front side of the X-ray film by compressing it with a compression plate, and further irradiating X-rays from the front side thereof to perform X-ray imaging of the breast , A plurality of phototimer light receiving parts are arranged at different positions on the back side of the X-ray film, and a position detection panel for detecting a pressing position for pressing the breast or a contact position for contacting the breast is provided on the pressing surface of the pressing plate. A photoreceptor selecting unit that is arranged and selects any one of a plurality of phototimer photoreceptive units based on a pressing position or a contact position detected by the position detection panel, and a phototimer photoreceptive unit selected by the photoreceptor selecting unit. An X-ray imaging apparatus comprising: an exposure control unit that controls the irradiation amount of X-rays according to the amount of received X-rays.