Evaluation of interobserver reliability of Nugent score for diagnosis of bacterial vaginosis

Vaginal discharge is the commonly narrated compliant of the female attendees of sexually transmitted infection clinic, among which bacterial vaginosis (BV) is responsible for one-third of the visits. BV is often diagnosed clinically which warrants laboratory confirmation.

The study aims to detect the reliability of the Nugent scoring system between observers for the diagnosis of BV.

This is a prospective study including 177 high vaginal swabs. The gram-stained smears were examined by three independent microbiologists, and the Nugent scoring was performed. Statistical analysis was performed using IBM-SPSS version-22 statistical package for kappa value.

Concordant results were seen in 64.03% of smears, discordant results were given in 4.51% of smears, and partial agreement was observed in 31.63% of smears.

Interobserver reliability is good for the Nugent score. The Nugent score is a simple and reliable method for the diagnosis of BV that can be adapted even in the resource poor settings.