Reliability of the ABC/2 method in determining acute infarct volume.

Background And Purpose: Infarct volume is used as a surrogate outcome measure in clinical trials of therapies for acute ischemic stroke. ABC/2 is a fast volumetric method, but its accuracy remains to be determined. We aimed to study the accuracy and reproducibility of ABC/2 in determining acute infarct volume with diffusion-weighted imaging.

Methods: We studied 86 consecutive patients with acute ischemic stroke. Three blinded observers determined volume with the ABC/2 method, and the results were compared with those of the manual planimetric method.

Results: The ABC/2 technique overestimated infarct volume by a median false increase (variable ABC/2 volume minus planimetric volume) of 7.33 cm(3) (1.29, 22.170, representing a 162.56% increase over the value of the gold standard (variable ABC/2 volume over planimetric volume) (121.70, 248.52). In each method, the interrater reliability was excellent: the intraclass correlations were .992 and .985 for the ABC/2 technique and planimetric method, respectively.

Conclusions: ABC/2 is volumetric method with clinical value but it consistently overestimates the real infarct volume.