Citation

Finch CF, Orchard JW, Twomey DM, Saad Saleem M, Ekegren CL, Lloyd DG, Elliott BC. Br. J. Sports Med. 2014; 48(7): 552-556.

Affiliation

Australian Centre for Research into Sports Injury and its Prevention (ACRISP), Monash Injury Research Institute (MIRI), Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2014, BMJ Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1136/bjsports-2012-091219

PMID

22919021

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To compare Orchard Sports Injury Classification System (OSICS-10) sports medicine diagnoses assigned by a clinical and non-clinical coder. DESIGN: Assessment of intercoder agreement. SETTING: Community Australian football. PARTICIPANTS: 1082 standardised injury surveillance records. MAIN OUTCOME MEASUREMENTS: Direct comparison of the four-character hierarchical OSICS-10 codes assigned by two independent coders (a sports physician and an epidemiologist). Adjudication by a third coder (biomechanist). RESULTS: The coders agreed on the first character 95% of the time and on the first two characters 86% of the time. They assigned the same four-digit OSICS-10 code for only 46% of the 1082 injuries. The majority of disagreements occurred for the third character; 85% were because one coder assigned a non-specific 'X' code. The sports physician code was deemed correct in 53% of cases and the epidemiologist in 44%. Reasons for disagreement included the physician not using all of the collected information and the epidemiologist lacking specific anatomical knowledge. CONCLUSIONS: Sports injury research requires accurate identification and classification of specific injuries and this study found an overall high level of agreement in coding according to OSICS-10. The fact that the majority of the disagreements occurred for the third OSICS character highlights the fact that increasing complexity and diagnostic specificity in injury coding can result in a loss of reliability and demands a high level of anatomical knowledge. Injury report form details need to reflect this level of complexity and data management teams need to include a broad range of expertise.

Language: en