Citation

Abubakar I, Leonardi GS, Edwards N, Herriott N. J. Epidemiol. Community Health 2004; 58(8): 718-722.

Affiliation

Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre Eastern, Institute of Public Health, Cambridge, UK. ibrahim.abubakar@hpa.org.uk

Copyright

(Copyright © 2004, BMJ Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1136/jech.2002.006650

PMID

15252079

PMCID

PMC1732864

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 "chemical incidents" 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.

Language: en