Is visual radiological evaluation of liver tumour burden in patients with neuroendocrine tumours reproducible?

摘要

Background Visual semi-quantitative assessment of liver tumour burden for neuroendocrine tumour liver metastases is often used in patient management and outcome. However, published data on the reproducibility of these evaluations are lacking. Objective The aim of this study was to evaluate the interobserver and intraobserver agreement of a visual semi-quantitative assessment of liver tumour burden using CT scan. Methods Fifty consecutive patients (24 men and 26 women, mean aged 54 years) were retrospectively reviewed by four readers (two senior radiologists, one junior radiologist and one gastroenterologist) who assessed the liver tumour burden based on a visual semi-quantitative method with four classes (0–10, 11–25, 26–50 and ≥50%). Interobserver and intraobserver agreement were assessed by weighted kappa coefficient and percentage of agreement. The intraclass correlation was calculated. Results Agreement among the four observers for the evaluation of liver tumour burden was substantial, ranging from 0.62 to 0.73 (P?