Agreement between two successive transvaginal salpingosonography assessments of tubal patency

To evaluate the agreement between repeat transvaginal sonographic assessments of tubal patency using a combination of air and saline.

Twenty-nine patients were examined twice by the same investigator (H.S.). There was a three-month interval between the observations, and the investigator was blinded to the results of the first examination. Each patient was evaluated using three categories classified as: 1) bilateral patency, 2) unilateral patency and 3) bilateral occlusion. In addition, the pooled data from individual tubes was examined with respect to the detection of patency or occlusion. Data from the right and left tubes were analyzed separately as well. Agreement between the two examinations was subsequently determined using Cohen's kappa coefficient (kappa). When there were more than two categories, a weighted kappa coefficient was used.

There was good (kappa = 0.61) agreement between the two examinations when each patient was evaluated individually. For the pooled data of all tubes (n = 46), the kappa coefficient was 0.53, but increased to 0.66 after correction for prevalence. There was no systematic bias between the successive examinations of tubes. There was more consistency between repeated observations in the right (kappa = 0.70) than in the left (kappa = 0.37) tubes. The prevalence of occlusion was higher in the left tubes.

Transvaginal salpingosonography was shown to be a reliable method for the assessment of tubal patency.