As the first step in cancer examination, the method to detect the lesion by perceiving information of local area stiffness from body surface, in other word, the palpation is widely practiced. However, in case the lesion is too small or it is located too deep, the palpation is difficult, and also, its diagnosis largely depends on the experience and subjectivity of each examiner. The authors have been developing the tissue elasticity imaging technology utilizing ultrasound as a means to overcome

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... he limitation of palpation and to make objectively apparent the information obtained through palpation. This technology offers, as a new diagnostic information, the stiffness of tissue as the tissue characterization, and it is suggesting the possibility for even less experienced examiner to give discriminative diagnosis with high accuracy rate. The authors named this technology "Real-time Tissue Elastography" and have incorporated this technology as a function into a high-end diagnostic digital ultrasound system HITACHI EUB-8500, the first system realized in the world market. This paper reports on the background of this development and the image-visualization technology, leaving the details of its clinical usefulness to be described in other reports