Diagnostic agreement between radiologists, dentists and dental students for radiographic detection of approximal caries.

Abstract

Aim: To assess intraobserver and interobserver agreement for radiographic detection of approximal caries among radiologists, dentists and senior dental students. Materials and methods: 75 standardized bitewing radiographs were examined by four maxillofacial radiologists, four dentists and four senior dental students. Iinterobserver agreement was calculated using a weighted Kappa Cohen test. Two weeks later, the examiners re-evaluated 10% of the sample under the same conditions and intraobserver agreement weighted Kappa Cohen test was calculated. Results: The interobserver Kappa value was 0.68 (good) for the dentist-student pair, 0.51 (moderate) for the student-radiologist and 0.62 (good) for the dentist-radiologist pair. All these differences were significant. The intraobserver agreement Kappa values obtained were 0.56 (moderate) for students (p=0.46), 0.46 (moderate) for dentists (p<0.05) and 0.68 (good) for radiologists. Conclusion: The agreement for proximal caries detection by dental students, dentists and radiologists was moderate to good.

Keywords

• Radiography
• Dental caries
• Diagnosis
• Observer variation.