You need to have a structured approach to obtain your best image on screen. You should be guided through the setting up of the ultrasound machine by one of your friendly sonographers.

Ring Down Time : This is the interval of time between initiation of wave and complete cessation of vibrations.

Lateral Resolutions : Describes the ability to resolve two objects adjacent to each other that is perpendicular to the beam axis. It also describes the ability of ultrasound beam to detect single small object across the width of beam.

CHARACTERISTICS OF AN ULTRASOUND BEAM
The major factors that limits the ultrasound imaging is the blurring associated with the diameter which is also width of ultrasound beam. This is an important characteristic of an ultrasound pulse. A second major factor is the number of line of sight per field of view.

Basic Ultrasound Instrumentation: Understanding ultrasound image requires knowledge of sound propagation, production and interaction characteristics. Images are created using pulse echo mode format of ultrasound production and detection.

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Note that artefact may occur in your image due to equipment problems, tissue effects and poor technique.

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Friends ultrasound is a noninvasive, relatively inexpensive and most rewarding imaging modality which carries no radiation burden.

Tissue effects: These occur due to the type of tissue example: bone causing shadow, excessive abdominal wall fat causing weakness of the transmission pulses or the interface between tissues e.g. enhancement due to the ultrasound beam not being attenuated as it passes through fluid causing brightness distal to the fluid. Other types of recognised artefact are reverberation, mirror, comet effect, split image and slice thickness.
LETS DEFINE THEM ONE AFTER THE OTHER.

Thanks Mums care and Olasmith10

Artefacts: Defined as any structure in an ultrasound image that does not have a corresponding anatomic tissue structure. ( artefacts are common occurrence in an ultrasound display since they are often the result of the physical properties of ultrasound itself). Please, recognizing artefacts is essential to proper ultrasound interpretation because its non- identification as it were may lead to unwarranted clinical concern or intervention.

While we are defining the types of artefacts we may come across in our ultrasound adventure, it is good for us to know that our image quality can be improved by scanning from a different angle and adjusting the overall gain and time gain compensation.

Many of the imaging artefacts occur in obese patients due to weakening of the transmission pulses. A feature to be found in recent ultrasound machines is Tissue harmonic imaging. This reduces artefact and gives improved lateral resolution in deeper structures further from the probe.

Reverberations are a type of image degradation. They are secondary reflections that occur along the path of a sound pulse and are a result of the ultrasound bouncing in between the structure and another reflecting surface.
Multiple echoes are more likely to be produced when surfaces are close together and when intervening tissue is a low- attenuation medium for example fluid. This is because of the fact that path lengths of multiple echoes being longer they are projected deeper and consequently get weaker and weaker.

Reverberations appear as parallel yet irregular lines extending form the object away from the transducer. They occur when either the near side of the object, a second object or the transducer itself functions as another reflecting surface. More commonly reverberations are merged together and appear as a solid line directed away from the transducer.

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Often times it is not possible to avoid reverberations, however try changing the view angle. Echoes that have a non-anatomic appearance or that cross anatomic planes may clearly be recognized as reverberation artefacts.

An example of repeat echo is the mirror image artefact....Mirror images can be detected by noting the placement of an identical image distal to another at twice the distance from the transducer as the original image. They can sometimes be discerned by altering the imaging plane, the depth or the transducer frequency.

OPERATOR TECHNIQUE
If you are fortunate to have a choice of transducer, you may choose the wrong one resulting in the focal zone and frequency being set on the superficial structures. Noise on the screen will result if your gain is too high and banding will occur with the wrong time gain compensation settings. Finally, too much pressure can distort the image and, in addition, cause discomfort for the patient.

In addition, Noise can also degrade the quality of an image. Noise has many etiologies, including excessive gain and other changes in settings, but in the operating room arena it is most commonly from electrical interference such as electrocautery. Noise appears as very small amplitude echoes on the scan. It is most likely to affect low-level echolucent areas rather than bright echogenic areas.

Let's talk about safety: High levels of ultrasound cause heating, cavitation and streaming of fluid. Diagnostic ultrasound has been used for several decades now with no proven deleterious effects to the developing embryo. With the introduction of new techniques, continual vigilance is required. You should be aware that pulsed Doppler at maximum machine outputs and colour flow imaging with small colour boxes have the greatest potential for biological effects. Therefore, careful control of output levels and exposure times is required when using pulsed or colour Doppler. Routine examination with Doppler ultrasound of the first trimester embryo is considered inadvisable. As the fetus develops, and bone becomes mineralised, the possibility of heating increases and this should be remembered when examining the head and brain.

It is only relatively recently that manufacturers have had to display safety indices on-screen to assist in the monitoring of acoustic outputs. These are the Thermal index (TI) and Mechanical index (MI). You should monitor the TI and MI on screen and avoid unnecessary high values and prolonged exposure times. The TI should be less than 0.3 and the MI less than 0. 5. In obstetrics scans, the soft tissue thermal index (TIS) should be monitored in the first 8 weeks and the bone thermal index (TIB) thereafter.

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Ultrasound images are captured in real time, thence they can show the structure and movement of the body's internal organs, as well as blood flowing through the blood vessels.

Conventional ultrasound displays the images in thin, flat sections of the body. Advancements in ultrasound technology include three-dimensional (3D) ultrasound and also even the four-dimensional (4-D) ultrasound.
It is important to make it clear that 3D and 4D ultrasound is exactly the same technology as the conventional 2D ultrasound that everybody is familiar with. Conventional or standard ultrasound gives an image in two dimensions. 3D ultrasound, as the name implies gives a three-dimensional image. However, as is the convention, 3D describes a static image. With this technological development or improvement, You can see the baby in 3D and see the motion as well. It is the motion that is described as the fourth dimension hence the term 4D.

I have used the 2D ultrasound.... the 3D ultrasound..... And the 4D ULTRASOUND.... pals, I will say this to you that ultrasound is operator dependent. If you are proficient then you are..... if you are good then you are and if you are well skilled my bro and sis then you are. THE LARGEST ROOM IS THAT OF IMPROVEMENT.

Ultrasound examinations can help to diagnose a variety of conditions and to assess organ damage following illness. Ultrasound is used to help physicians evaluate symptoms such as : pain
swelling
infection
Ultrasound is a useful way of examining many of the body's internal organs, including but not limited to the :
¤ heart and blood vessels, including the abdominal aorta and it's major branches
¤ liver
¤gall bladder
¤ spleen
¤ pancreas
¤ kidneys
¤ bladder
¤ uterus, ovaries and unborn child (fetus) in pregnant women
¤ eyes
¤ thyroid and parathyroid glands
¤ scrotum (testicles )
¤ brain in infants.

Ultrasound is also used to :
* guide procedures such as needle biopsies, in which needles are used to sample cells from an abnormal area for laboratory testing.
* image the breasts and guide biopsy for breast cancer.
* diagnose a variety of heart conditions, including valve problems and congestive heart failure, and to assess damage after a heart attack. Ultrasound of the heart is commonly called an 'echocardiogram or echo for short.

Do you know that the physical relationship between you and your machine is important. If you adopt a good posture and position, your risk of repetitive strain injury will be significantly reduced.