Improved inter-observer agreement of an expert review panel in an oncology treatment trial--Insights from a structured interventional process.

2015

Abstract Purpose Oncologic imaging is a key for successful cancer treatment. While the quality assurance (QA) of image acquisition protocols has already been focussed, QA of reading and reporting offers still room for improvement. The latter was addressed in the context of a prospective multicentre trial on fluoro-deoxyglucose (FDG)–positron-emission tomography (PET)/CT-based chemoradiotherapy for locally advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Material and methods An expert panel was prospectively installed performing blinded reviews of mediastinal NSCLC involvement in FDG–PET/CT. Due to a high initial reporting inter-observer disagreement, the independent data monitoring committee (I…