Inter-Rater Variability in the Evaluation of Lung Ultrasound in Videos Acquired from COVID-19 Patients

Lung ultrasound (LUS) allows for the detection of a series manifestations COVID-19, such as B-lines and consolidations. The objective this work was to study inter-rater reliability (IRR) when detecting signs associated with COVID-19 in LUS, well performance test longitudinal or transverse orientation. Thirty-three physicians advanced experience LUS independently evaluated videos previously acquired using ULTRACOV system on 20 patients confirmed COVID-19. For each patient, 24 3 s were (using 12 positions probe orientations). had no information about other previous evaluations. score assigned acquisition followed convention applied studies. A substantial IRR found cases normal (κ = 0.74), only fair presence individual 0.36) confluent occupying < 50% 0.26) moderate consolidations > 0.50). No statistically significant differences between scans found. may benefit from more standardized clinical protocols.