PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To surely recognize the positional relationship and mutual proximity situation between places requiring attention such as treatment devices and surgery target parts and an endoscope, when the inside of a body cavity is observed with the endoscope inserted into the body cavity of a subject.SOLUTION: A virtual visual field determination unit 26 determines a virtual visual field for a virtual endoscope disposed at a location, in a three-dimensional medical image, corresponding to the location of the endoscope detected by an endoscope location and position detection unit 11, on the basis of the locations of structures requiring attention specified by a location-requiring-attention specification unit 24, the corresponding location and position of the endoscope, and the angle of view of the endoscope acquired by an endoscope angle-of-view acquisition unit 25, such that the locations of the structures requiring attention are included within the virtual visual field, and that it is continuous with the visual field of the endoscope. With the three-dimensional medical image formed by a three-dimensional medical image formation unit 5 as input, a virtual endoscope image generation unit 27 generates a virtual endoscope image having the determined virtual visual field, and with the corresponding location of the endoscope as a view point. A display control unit 28 displays the generated virtual endoscope image on a WS display 10.COPYRIGHT: (C)2012,JPO&INPIT
