Abdominal ultrasound examination

An abdominal ultrasound uses high-frequency, inaudible ultrasound waves to examine morphological abnormalities in various deep-seated organs of the body. In comprehensive medical check-ups (ningen dock), it is primarily used to screen upper abdominal organs such as the liver, gallbladder, pancreas, kidneys, and spleen, and is widely adopted in health check-ups in Japan.

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Ultrasound examinations allow us to view detailed internal structures of various organs. Regarding cancer screening, early-stage liver cancer and gallbladder cancer, for example, are almost never detected through blood tests alone. Ultrasound imaging can detect liver cancers as small as about 1 centimeter in diameter and even smaller gallbladder cancers. Furthermore, pancreatic cancer is often asymptomatic in its early stages, and by the time symptoms such as pain appear, the condition is frequently too late to treat. To discover such early-stage cancers, health check-ups utilizing diagnostic tools like ultrasound while patients are still asymptomatic are extremely effective.

In addition to cancer screening, ultrasounds can detect liver diseases such as fatty liver and hemangiomas, gallbladder diseases like gallstones and polyps, kidney conditions such as stones and cysts, enlarged spleens, and adrenal tumors.

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At our center, we use GE's Logiq E ultrasound system. In addition to standard B-mode cross-sectional imaging, we also evaluate blood flow using Doppler mode. For instance, if a small tumor-like image is found within the liver, combining it with Doppler mode allows us to visualize the blood flow entering the tumor, enabling a diagnosis—such as a high probability of a benign hemangioma.

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During an ultrasound, a small device called a transducer (probe) is simply placed against the body's surface using a gel, meaning there is zero pain or discomfort. Patients can observe the real-time images together while listening to the doctor's explanations on an external monitor.