angiography: Appropriateness criteria

InCirculation.net - cardiovascular medicine resources, cardiology information, news, guidelines:
"Appropriateness criteria could identify patients who will benefit from angiography
29 August 2008
MedWire News: Experts have developed a set of patient-specific appropriateness criteria which they say can be used to identify angina patients likely to benefit from coronary angiography. "Appropriateness scores help pinpoint areas where judgments diverge and are a promising tool for making guidelines more effective," says the team, led by Harry Hemingway (University College London, UK).
In the study, two independent panels of experts scored 2400 patient-specific indications for coronary angiography as inappropriate, uncertain, or appropriate. The physicians judged appropriateness of angiography on a 9-point scale, on which scores 1-3 denoted inappropriate use, 4-6 uncertainty about use, and 7-9 appropriate use. /.../