Medical diagnostic ultrasonic transducer probe and imaging system for use with a position and orientation sensor

A position and orientation sensor, such as a magnetic position and orientation sensor, can be attached to a transducer probe to determine the position and orientation of the sensor with respect to a transmitter. To correlate the location of the sensor to the location of an image plane produced by the probe, it is often required to calibrate the position and orientation of the sensor with the position and orientation of the image plane. The calibration step can be difficult to perform, especially for sonographers who are unfamiliar with position and orientation sensor technology. The preferred embodiments described herein provide a medical diagnostic ultrasonic transducer probe and imaging system for use with a position and orientation sensor. In one preferred embodiment, an ultrasonic transducer probe comprises a position and orientation sensor and a memory device comprising calibration data for the position and orientation sensor. The memory device is adapted to provide the calibration data to a medical diagnostic ultrasound imaging system coupled with the ultrasonic transducer probe. In another preferred embodiment, a medical diagnostic ultrasound imaging system comprises a memory device comprising a plurality of position and orientation sensor calibration data. Each of the plurality of position and orientation sensor calibration data is associated with a respective ultrasonic transducer probe family. In operation, identification of a probe family of an ultrasonic transducer probe is provided to the ultrasound system. The ultrasound system then selects the position and orientation sensor calibration data corresponding to the identified probe family.