@article{ref1,
title="Inter-rater agreement in defining chemical incidents at the National Poisons Information Service, London",
journal="Journal of epidemiology and community health",
year="2004",
author="Abubakar, I. and Leonardi, G. S. and Edwards, Nancy and Herriott, N.",
volume="58",
number="8",
pages="718-722",
abstract="BACKGROUND: National surveillance for chemical incidents is being developed in the UK. It is important to improve the quality of information collected, standardise techniques, and train personnel. OBJECTIVE: To define the extent to which eight National Poison Information Service specialists in poison information agree on the classification of calls received as &quot;chemical incidents&quot; based on the national definition. DESIGN: Blinded, inter-rater reliability measured using the kappa statistic for multiple raters. SETTING: National Poison Information Service and Chemical Incident Response Service, Guy's and St Thomas's NHS Trust, London. PARTICIPANTS: Eight specialists in poison information who are trained and experienced in handling poisons information calls and have been involved in extracting information for surveillance. RESULTS: The overall level of agreement observed was at least 69% greater than expected by chance (kappa statistic). Fire and incidents where chemicals were released within a property had a very good level of agreement with kappa statistic of 83% and 80% respectively. The lowest level of agreement was observed when no one or only one person was exposed to a chemical (33%) and when the chemical was released into the air (48%). CONCLUSION: High levels of agreement were observed. There is a need for more training and improvement in consistency of the data collected by all organisations.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="0143-005X",
doi="10.1136/jech.2002.006650",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/jech.2002.006650"
}