Table 1. Agreement by readers on the detection results of Candida species cultured on three media plates that were obtained at 24, 48 or 72 h of incubation of the plates.
| Candida organisms grown in mono- or dual-species cultures | Culture media plates read at the indicated times | N. of overall detections | N. of detections found to be in agreement and scored as | Kappa coefficient (95% CI) | Level of inter-reader agreement | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Correct | Over | Under | ||||||
| All species (n = 18) | BCG | 24 h | 171 | 108 | 1 | 18 | 0.53 (0.41–0.64) | Moderate |
| CHROM | 171 | 59 | 0 | 52 | 0.55 (0.47–0.64) | Moderate | ||
| SDA | 171 | 87 | 0 | 26 | 0.47 (0.37–0.58) | Moderate | ||
| BCG | 48 h | 171 | 120 | 1 | 4 | 0.29 (0.15–0.43) | Fair | |
| CHROM | 171 | 99 | 1 | 19 | 0.47 (0.36–0.59) | Moderate | ||
| SDA | 171 | 113 | 1 | 7 | 0.34 (0.22–0.48) | Fair | ||
| BCG | 72 h | 171 | 126 | 2 | 0 | 0.25 (0.13–0.38) | Fair | |
| CHROM | 171 | 109 | 1 | 7 | 0.30 (0.18–0.44) | Fair | ||
| SDA | 171 | 119 | 1 | 3 | 0.31 (0.19–0.43) | Fair | ||
| Common species only (n = 5) | BCG | 24 h | 15 | 12 | 1 | 0 | 0.59 (-0.04–1.30) | Moderate |
| CHROM | 15 | 7 | 0 | 5 | 0.75 (0.48–1.04) | Substantial | ||
| SDA | 15 | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0.20 (-0.29–0.86) | Fair | ||
| BCG | 48 h | 15 | 9 | 1 | 0 | 0.28 (-0.43–1.16) | Fair | |
| CHROM | 15 | 12 | 0 | 1 | 0.68 (0.18–1.27) | Substantial | ||
| SDA | 15 | 13 | 1 | 0 | 0.72 (-0.41–2.76) | Substantial | ||
| BCG | 72 h | 15 | 10 | 1 | 0 | 0.36 (-0.41–1.37) | Fair | |
| CHROM | 15 | 12 | 0 | 1 | 0.63 (-0.03–1.52) | Substantial | ||
| SDA | 15 | 13 | 1 | 0 | 0.72 (-0.41–2.76) | Substantial | ||
| Uncommon species only (n = 13) | BCG | 24 h | 91 | 53 | 0 | 15 | 0.59 (0.45–0.74) | Moderate |
| CHROM | 91 | 26 | 0 | 28 | 0.49 (0.37–0.61) | Moderate | ||
| SDA | 91 | 40 | 0 | 20 | 0.52 (0.39–0.66) | Moderate | ||
| BCG | 48 h | 91 | 67 | 0 | 4 | 0.39 (0.18–0.62) | Fair | |
| CHROM | 91 | 47 | 1 | 15 | 0.54 (0.40–0.68) | Substantial | ||
| SDA | 91 | 56 | 0 | 4 | 0.28 (0.11–0.46) | Fair | ||
| BCG | 72 h | 91 | 71 | 1 | 0 | 0.33 (0.17–0.51) | Fair | |
| CHROM | 91 | 54 | 1 | 5 | 0.35 (0.19–0.53) | Fair | ||
| SDA | 91 | 57 | 0 | 2 | 0.23 (0.08–0.38) | Fair | ||
Mycological media used for mono- or dual-species cultures of all, common or uncommon species of Candida were BCG (Candida bromcresol green), CHROM (chromogenic medium, i.e. Brilliance Candida agar) and SDA (Sabouraud dextrose agar). We calculated the kappa coefficient with 95% confidence interval (95% CI) for the comparison among the rates of correct, over or under detections (according to the definitions specified in the text). With regard to the agreement by readers, we used values greater than zero to indicate none to slight (0.01–0.20), fair (0.21–0.40), moderate (0.41–0.60), substantial (0.61–0.80) or almost perfect (0.81–1.00) levels of agreement, and values lower than/equal to zero to indicate the absence of agreement