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Telepathology in the diagnosis of routine dermatopathologic entities
Michael B Morgan1, Myron Tannenbaum, Bruce R Smoller
1Departments of Pathology, University of South Florida College of Medicine and the Bay Pines, James Haley Veterans Hospitals, Tampa, FL, USA.
Background:
Telepathology involves the use of video technology to facilitate remote-site diagnosis. To our knowledge, no studies have compared the reproducibility of real-time telepathology between dermatopathologists with that of traditional 2-headed microscopy in the diagnoses of routine dermatopathologic entities.
Observations:
The kappa statistic for both techniques was favorable: 0.76 (telepathology) vs 0.93 (conventional 2-headed microscopy); P =.04. The time taken per case was 42 seconds (telepathology) vs19 seconds (conventional 2 -headed microscopy); P =.003.
Conclusions:
Telepathology between 2 remote diagnostic centers offers a feasible means of facilitating the remote-site diagnosis of routine dermatopathologic entities. Although diagnostic accuracy and time taken per case were acceptable with video-assisted diagnosis, conventional microscopy had significantly higher accuracy and shorter time per diagnosis.