Interexaminer agreement in the measurement of periodontal disease

Six variables of periodontal pathology were independently measured by two periodontists in a study of healthy male adult participants from the VA Dental Longitudinal Study. Two examination sets containing a total of 50 volunteers were compared to establish interexaminer agreement. Measures of gingival recession, tooth mobility, calculus accumulation, and plaque accumulation exhibited high interexaminer correlation. The measures of periodontal pocket depth and gingival health also showed good levels of agreement, but reflected the examination order; the second examiner consistently scored more severe disease because of the invasive nature of these measures. Establishment of the reproducibility of periodontal pathology measurements is essential for studies which involve more than one examiner. This investigation demonstrated a high confidence level of reproducibility for the six measures utilized and showed that recalibration enhanced the initial training procedure and increased examiner agreement above the initial level.