N J L M

 
Subscribe Via RSS
  • Home
  • About
    Salient Features Bibliographic Information Abstracting and Indexing Specialties Covered Publisher Journal Policy
  • Issues
    Current Issue Online Ahead of Print Archive Forthcoming issue
  • Editorial
    Editorial Statements Editorial-PeerReview Process Editorial Board Publication Ethics & Malpractice Join us
  • Authors
    Submit an Article Manuscript Instructions Manuscript Assistance Publication Charges Paid Services Early Online Publication Service
  • Reviewers
    Apply as Reviewer Reviewers Acknowledgment
  • Search
    Simple Search Advanced Search
  • Member
    Register Login
  • Contact
  • Subscription
Original article / research
Year: 2016 Month: July Volume: 5 Issue: 3 Page: -

Inter-Observer Variation in Reporting of Pap Smears

 
Correspondence Ramya B Siddegowda, DivyaRani MN , Natarajan M, Dayananda S Biligi,
Dr. Ramya B S,
Assistant Professor, Department of Pathology,
Bangalore Medical College and Research Institute, Bangalore-560002, India.
E-mail: drramyashekar@gmail.com
:
Introduction: The Papanicolaou smear is one of the most important tests in preventive health care which helps to identify women at risk of developing cervical cancer. The use of the test is increasing because of more awareness. But the validity of the test has always been questioned because reporting of Pap smears is known to have interobserver and intra-observer variation, which can affect the prognosis of the patients or sometimes create legal issues too.

Aim: To assess the frequency of discordant diagnosis between the pathologists in reporting of conventional Pap smears using the Bethesda System of reporting.

Materials and Methods: A total of 200 cases of Pap smears with each case having 2 slides (ectocervix and endocervix) which were received, are labelled and stained using Papanicolaou stain. The slides are reported by a pathologist using the Bethesda System of reporting Pap smears. The reported slides are then reviewed by the second pathologist with the same level of experience and again reported following the same protocols. For those cases which had disagreement, the reports were confirmed by biopsy. If the biopsy could not be obtained, opinion was taken from the senior pathologist whose report was considered as a tie breaker. Statistical Analysis: Statistical analysis was done using Kappa statistics for all cases which had epithelial cell abnormality.

Results: Among 200 cases, 22 cases had epithelial cell abnormality. The degree of agreement between the results obtained in the first and second assessment between the observers was analysed, with the overall Kappa of 0.61, indicating a moderate agreement.

Conclusion: Inter-observer variation is a common screening error in reporting of Pap smears. It is necessary to implicate corrective actions to reduce such error which ultimately helps in detecting the cervical lesions in its earliest, which in turn affects the prognosis of the patients.
 
[ FULL TEXT ]   |   [ ]
 
Print
  • Article Utilities

    • Readers Comments (0)
    • Article in PDF
    • Citation Manager
    • Article Statistics
    • Link to PUBMED
    • Print this Article
    • Send to a Friend
    • Go To Issues

      • Current Issue
      • Past Issues
  • Search Articles

    • Simple Search
    • Advance Search
  • Authors Facilities

    • Extensive Author Support
    • Submit Manuscript
    • ONLINE First Facility
    • NJLM Pre Publishing
  • Quick Links

    • REVIEWER
    • ACCESS STATISTICS
  • Users

    • Register
    • Log in
  • Pages

    • About
    • Issues
    • Editorials
    • Authors
    • Reviewers
    • Search
    • Contacts
  • Issues Archives

  • Affiliated Websites

    • JCDR Prepublishing
    • Neonatal Database Home
    • JCDR Neonatal Database download center