Comparison between clinical examination, cw-Doppler ultrasound and colour-duplex sonography in the diagnosis of incompetent perforating veins.

Schultheiss, R; Billeter, M; Bollinger, A; Franzeck, U K · Eur J Vasc Endovasc Surg · 1997

cross_sectional · Level IV

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Abstract

This study was conducted to investigate the accuracy and agreement between clinical examination, continuous wave (cw)-Doppler ultrasound and colour-duplex sonography (CDS) in diagnosing incompetent perforating veins (ICPV). Observational cohort study. Nineteen patients with chronic venous insufficiency (CVI) were examined clinically, by hand-held cw-Doppler ultrasound in combination with tourniquet compression and CDS. The low accuracy of the clinical examination and the diagnosis of ICPV by cw-Doppler were surprising. The specificity was 15% and sensitivity 29%, when CDS was taken as the "gold standard". Furthermore the results show clearly that the application of a tourniquet cannot provide reliable results. In patients with CVI, clinical and cw-Doppler cannot accurately diagnose ICPV when compared to CDS.

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