Evidence map›Paper›PMID 39406318›Full record

ArticleThe Journal of heart and lung transplantation : the official publication of the International Society for Heart Transplantation2025

Diagnostic alignment to optimize inter-rater reliability among lung transplant pathologists.

Elizabeth N Pavlisko, Megan L Neely, Kathryn A Wikenheiser-Brokamp, Gregory A Fishbein, Leslie Litzky, Carol F Farver, Prodipto Pal, Mai He, Peter B Illei, Charuhas Deshpande and 8 more

Abstract readMulticenter Study
In one paragraph

Article in The Journal of heart and lung transplantation : the official publication of the International Society for Heart Transplantation, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
1citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

1 citing paper in PubMed.

  1. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

18 authors.

Elizabeth N PavliskoDepartment of Pathology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina. Electronic address: elizabeth.pavlisko@duke.edu.
Megan L NeelyDuke Clinical Research Institute, Durham, North Carolina; Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, North Carolina.
Kathryn A Wikenheiser-BrokampDivision of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Division of Pulmonary Medicine, and The Perinatal Institute Division of Pulmonary Biology, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, Ohio; Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio.
Gregory A FishbeinDepartment of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California.
Leslie LitzkyDepartment of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Carol F FarverDepartment of Pathology, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio.
Prodipto PalDepartment of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology, Toronto General Hospital, University Health Network, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Mai HeDepartment of Pathology and Immunology, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri.
Peter B IlleiDepartment of Pathology, John Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland.
Charuhas DeshpandeDepartment of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Mark A RobienNational Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Bethesda, Maryland.
Jerry KirchnerDuke Clinical Research Institute, Durham, North Carolina.
Courtney W FrankelDepartment of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina.
Jason E LangDuke Clinical Research Institute, Durham, North Carolina; Department of Pediatrics, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina.
John A BelperioDivision of Pulmonary, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine, Department of Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Los Angeles, California.
Scott M PalmerDuke Clinical Research Institute, Durham, North Carolina; Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina.
Stuart C SweetDivision of Allergy and Pulmonary Medicine, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri.
Clinical Trials and Organ Transplantation (CTOT)-47 consortium

Funding

Lung Transplant Clinical Trial Network (LT-CTN)U01AI163099 · NIAID · DUKE UNIVERSITY · PI JOHN A BELPERIO, Scott M Palmer · 2021 to 2026
$17.8M
The Lung Transplant Clinical Trials Network (LT-CTN)U01AI113315 · NIAID · DUKE UNIVERSITY · PI PALMER, SCOTT M · 2014 to 2018
$12.9M
NIAID NIH HHS U01 AI113315NIAID NIH HHS U01 AI163099
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

backgroundPoor agreement among lung transplant (LTx) pathologists has been reported in the assessment of rejection. In addition to acute rejection (AR) and lymphocytic bronchiolitis (LB), acute lung injury (ALI) and organizing pneumonia (OP) were recently identified as histopathologic risk factors for chronic lung allograft dysfunction (CLAD). Therefore, maximizing inter-rater reliability (IRR) for identifying these histopathologic risk factors is important to guide individual patient care and to support incorporating them in inclusion criteria for clinical trials in lung transplantation.

methodsNine pathologists across 8 North American LTx centers were surveyed for practices in the assessment of LTx transbronchial biopsies. We conducted 7 diagnostic alignment sessions with pathologists discussing histomorphologic features of CLAD high-risk histopathology. Then, each pathologist blindly scored 75 digitized slides. Fleiss' kappa, accounting for agreement across numerous observers, was used to determine IRR across all raters for the presence of any high-risk finding and each individual entity.

resultsIRR (95% confidence intervals) and % agreement for any high-risk finding (AR, LB, ALI, and/or OP) and each individual finding is as follows: Any Finding, k = 0.578 (0.487, 0.668), 78.9%; AR, k = 0.582 (0.481, 0.651), 79.1%; LB, k = 0.683 (0.585, 0.764), 83.5%; ALI, k = 0.418 (0.312, 0.494), 70.9%; and OP, k = 0.621 (0.560, 0.714), 81.0%.

conclusionsAfter prestudy diagnostic alignment sessions, a multicenter group of LTx pathologists seeking to identify histopathology high-risk for CLAD achieved good IRR.

Indexed as

Graft RejectionLung TransplantationPathologistsBiopsyHumansObserver VariationReproducibility of Resultsacute lung injurylung transplantationorganizing pneumoniapathologyrejection

Identifiers

PMID39406318
PMCPMC11808823

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.