The impact of a pathologist's personality on the interobserver variability and diagnostic accuracy of predictive PD-L1 immunohistochemistry in lung cancer

Rogier Butter, Liesbeth M. Hondelink, Lisette van Elswijk, Johannes L. G. Blaauwgeers, Elisabeth Bloemena, Rieneke Britstra, Nicole Bulkmans, Anna Lena van Gulik, Kim Monkhorst, Mathilda J. de Rooij, Ivana Slavujevic-Letic, Vincent T. H. B. M. Smit, Ernst-Jan M. Speel, Erik Thunnissen, Jan H. von der Thüsen, Wim Timens, Marc J. van de Vijver, David C. Y. Yick, Aeilko H. Zwinderman, Danielle CohenNils A. 't Hart, Teodora Radonic

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Abstract

Objectives: Programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) is the only approved predictive biomarker for immunotherapy in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). However, predictive PD-L1 immunohistochemistry is subject to interobserver variability. We hypothesized that a pathologist's personality influences the interobserver variability and diagnostic accuracy of PD-L1 immunoscoring. Materials and Methods: Seventeen pathologists performed PD-L1 immunoscoring on 50 resected NSCLC tumors in three categories (<1%;1–49%;≥50%). Also, the pathologists completed a certified personality test (NEO-PI-r), assessing five personality traits: neuroticism, extraversion, openness, altruism and conscientiousness. Results: The overall agreement among pathologists for a series of 47 tumors was substantial (kappa = 0.63). Of these, 23/47 (49%) tumors were entirely negative or largely positive, resulting in a kappa value of 0.93. The remaining 24/47 (51%) tumors had a PD-L1 score around the cutoff value, generating a kappa value of 0.32. Pathologists with high scores for conscientiousness (careful, diligent) had the least interobserver variability (r = 0.6, p = 0.009). Also, they showed a trend towards higher sensitivity (74% vs. 68%, p = 0.4), specificity (86% vs. 82%, p = 0.3) and percent agreement (83% vs. 79%, p = 0.3), although not significant. In contrast, pathologists with high scores for neuroticism (sensitive, anxious) had significantly lower specificity (80% vs. 87%, p = 0.03) and percent agreement (78% vs. 85%, p = 0.03). Also, a trend towards high interobserver variability (r = -0.3, p = 0.2) and lower sensitivity (68% vs. 74%, p = 0.3) was observed, although not significant. Pathologists with relatively high scores for conscientiousness scored fewer tumors PD-L1 positive at the ≥ 1% cut-off (r = −0.5, p = 0.03). In contrast, pathologists with relatively high scores for neuroticism score more tumors PD-L1 positive at ≥ 1% (r = 0.6, p = 0.017) and ≥ 50% cut-offs (r = 0.6, p = 0.009). Conclusions: This study is the first to demonstrate the impact of a pathologist's personality on the interobserver variability and diagnostic accuracy of immunostaining, in the context of PD-L1 in NSCLC. Larger studies are needed for validation of these findings.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)143-149
Number of pages7
JournalLung cancer (Amsterdam, Netherlands)
Volume166
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Apr 2022

Keywords

  • Diagnostic reliability
  • Immunohistochemistry
  • Interobserver variability
  • Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC)
  • programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1)

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