Structured Reporting of Rectal Cancer Staging and Restaging: A Consensus Proposal

Area of Science:

• Oncologic Imaging
• Radiology
• Medical Informatics

Background:

• Structured reporting (SR) is increasingly recognized in oncologic imaging by major scientific societies.
• Accurate staging and restaging of rectal cancer (RC) are crucial for effective patient management.
• Current reporting methods may lack standardization, potentially impacting clinical decision-making.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop MRI-based structured reports for rectal cancer (RC) staging and restaging.
• To ensure comprehensive information delivery to clinicians for improved patient care.
• To establish a standardized framework for reporting RC MRI findings.

Main Methods:

• A modified Delphi process involving a panel of expert abdominal radiologists from the Italian Society of Medical and Interventional Radiology.
• Assessment of inter-rater agreement using Cronbach's alpha (Cα) for internal consistency and intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) for reliability.
• Iterative refinement of the structured report based on expert consensus.

Main Results:

• High agreement levels were achieved after the second Delphi round for both SR RC staging (scores 3.8) and restaging (scores 3.7).
• Excellent internal consistency was demonstrated with Cα coefficients of 0.79 for staging and 0.81 for restaging.
• High reliability was confirmed with ICCs of 0.78 (p < 0.01) for staging and 0.82 (p < 0.01) for restaging.
• The final SR included 53 items for RC staging and 50 items for RC restaging.

Conclusions:

• The developed MRI-based structured reports for RC staging and restaging are a valuable tool for clinicians.
• These structured reports consolidate essential patient data, clinical evaluations, and key findings for rectal cancer.
• Facilitation of clinical decision-making in the management of rectal cancer patients is a key benefit.