Interreader Variability in Semantic Annotation of Microvascular Invasion in Hepatocellular Carcinoma on Contrast-enhanced Triphasic CT Images.

Purpose: To evaluate interreader agreement in annotating semantic features on preoperative CT images to predict microvascular invasion (MVI) in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).

Materials And Methods: Preoperative, contrast material-enhanced triphasic CT studies from 89 patients (median age, 64 years; age range, 36-85 years; 70 men) who underwent hepatic resection between 2008 and 2017 for a solitary HCC were reviewed. Three radiologists annotated CT images obtained during the arterial and portal venous phases, independently and in consensus, with features associated with MVI reported by other investigators. The assessed factors were the presence or absence of discrete internal arteries, hypoattenuating halo, tumor-liver difference, peritumoral enhancement, and tumor margin. Testing also included previously proposed MVI signatures: radiogenomic venous invasion (RVI) and two-trait predictor of venous invasion (TTPVI), using single-reader and consensus annotations. Cohen (two-reader) and Fleiss (three-reader) κ and the bootstrap method were used to analyze interreader agreement and differences in model performance, respectively.

Results: Of HCCs assessed, 32.6% (29 of 89) had MVI at histopathologic findings. Two-reader agreement, as assessed by pairwise Cohen κ statistics, varied as a function of feature and imaging phase, ranging from 0.02 to 0.6; three-reader Fleiss κ varied from -0.17 to 0.56. For RVI and TTPVI, the best single-reader performance had sensitivity and specificity of 52% and 77% and 67% and 74%, respectively. In consensus, the sensitivity and specificity for the RVI and TTPVI signatures were 59% and 67% and 70% and 62%, respectively.

Conclusion: Interreader variability in semantic feature annotation remains a challenge and affects the reproducibility of predictive models for preoperative detection of MVI in HCC.© RSNA, 2020.