Reproducibility and repeatability of radiographic measurement of the cardiac silhouette in poodles

Abstract The potential of reproducibility and repeatability of a semi-automatic system of radiographic measurement was evaluated. For this purpose, the vertebral heart score (VHS) and normalized cardiac area (NCA) were evaluated in radiographs of healthy poodles and of patients with mitral regurgitation. Considering the subjective aspect of the cardiac silhouette analysis by different observers, it is believed that even with a semi-automatic system this evaluation could be affected by the previous experience of the observer in radiodiagnosis. Fifty seven thoracic images were analyzed by two groups of observers with different levels of experience in radiology: (A) without experience (n = 2) and (B) with experience (n = 2). Regardless of radiodiagnostic experience it was observed good repeatability and reproducibility for VHS, and also for ACN in observers with experience in radiodiagnostics and previous familiarity with the software.