COMPARISON OF DEGREES OF CORONARY ARTERIAL LUMINAL NARROWING DETERMINED BY VISUAL INSPECTION OF HISTOLOGIC SECTIONS UNDER MAGNIFICATION AMONG 3 INDEPENDENT OBSERVERS AND COMPARISON TO THAT OBTAINED BY VIDEO PLANIMETRY - AN ANALYSIS OF 559 5-MILLIMETER SEGMENTS OF 61 CORONARY-ARTERIES FROM 11 PATIENTCA

Abstract

The accuracy of determining degrees of luminal narrowing of 559 histologic sections from 61 human coronary arteries was evaluated by visual inspection under magnification (light microscopy) by 3 independent observers, and the results were compared to those obtained by video planimetry. With the percent of cross-sectional area narrowing divided into 4 categories (0-25, 26-50, 51-75 and 76-100), both the extent of agreement between each independent observer and video planimetry, i.e., the accuracy of visual inspection under magnification and the extent of agreement among the independent observers, interobserver agreement, evaluated by the Kappa (K) statistic, were excellent. With a K value of 50% indicating reasonably good agreement and values of .gtoreq. 70% indicating strong agreement, the K values between the results of light microscopy and video planimetry by 3 observers were 61, 67 and 75%, respectively, and the extent of interobserver agreement was 72%. [Coronary narrowing occurs in coronary heart disease.].