TY - GEN
T1 - Development of a poly (vinyl alcohol) hydrogel phantom to allow physical measurement in ultrasonographic conditions
T2 - 2017 IEEE International Conference on Cyborg and Bionic Systems, CBS 2017
AU - Takahashi, Ren
AU - Tamura, Kazuki
AU - Yamaguchi, Tadashi
AU - Shimizu, Yasutomo
AU - Ohta, Makoto
N1 - Funding Information:
ACKNOWLEDGMENT This study was supported by ImPACT Program of Council for Science, Technology and innovation (Cabinet Office, Government of Japan).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 IEEE.
PY - 2017/7/2
Y1 - 2017/7/2
N2 - Phantoms for ultrasonography have been widely used to evaluate new medical devices and improve skills of new physicians. Several kinds of phantoms for ultrasonography have already been developed to keep pace with the progress of developments in ultrasonography. However, few reports exist regarding the establishment of physical measurement conditions such as size and density of scatterers. The purpose of this study was to develop a method for the construction of a phantom with scatterers in a single flat layer for use in ultrasonography. Firstly, a policy for the phantom with scatterers was developed. The scatterers should be a thin and flat layer in a transparent body. We selected a poly (vinyl alcohol) hydrogel (PVA-H) phantom as the body and glass beads as the scatterer material, based on this policy. A parabolic region at the top of the phantom may decrease the detectability of scatterers. For this reason, a surfactant was included in the PVA-H phantom. Phantoms including surfactants had better detectability of scatterers and fewer parabolic regions when compared with phantoms without surfactants. The phantom-based process was further improved by the use of an 'upside down' method. In addition, the number of particles per area correlated with the weight of beads that were spread on the PVA-H surface using our fabrication method. In conclusion, a phantom constructed by the upside down process satisfies the developed policy.
AB - Phantoms for ultrasonography have been widely used to evaluate new medical devices and improve skills of new physicians. Several kinds of phantoms for ultrasonography have already been developed to keep pace with the progress of developments in ultrasonography. However, few reports exist regarding the establishment of physical measurement conditions such as size and density of scatterers. The purpose of this study was to develop a method for the construction of a phantom with scatterers in a single flat layer for use in ultrasonography. Firstly, a policy for the phantom with scatterers was developed. The scatterers should be a thin and flat layer in a transparent body. We selected a poly (vinyl alcohol) hydrogel (PVA-H) phantom as the body and glass beads as the scatterer material, based on this policy. A parabolic region at the top of the phantom may decrease the detectability of scatterers. For this reason, a surfactant was included in the PVA-H phantom. Phantoms including surfactants had better detectability of scatterers and fewer parabolic regions when compared with phantoms without surfactants. The phantom-based process was further improved by the use of an 'upside down' method. In addition, the number of particles per area correlated with the weight of beads that were spread on the PVA-H surface using our fabrication method. In conclusion, a phantom constructed by the upside down process satisfies the developed policy.
KW - Poly (vinyl alcohol)
KW - glass beads
KW - phantom
KW - scatterer
KW - surfactant
KW - ultrasonography
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U2 - 10.1109/CBS.2017.8266087
DO - 10.1109/CBS.2017.8266087
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:85050479596
T3 - 2017 IEEE International Conference on Cyborg and Bionic Systems, CBS 2017
SP - 150
EP - 153
BT - 2017 IEEE International Conference on Cyborg and Bionic Systems, CBS 2017
PB - Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.
Y2 - 17 October 2017 through 19 October 2017
ER -