Evaluation of white matter hypodensities on computed tomography in stroke patients using the Fazekas score

Purpose: To assess the reliability of the Fazekas score on brain CT in acute stroke patients. Methods: Two raters evaluated the Fazekas score in 157 CT scans from consecutive patients with acute stroke. Results: The Fazekas scores on brain CT scans showed consistent (weighted kappa, 0.73) and moderate (weighted kappa, 0.56) interobserver agreement for penventricular and deep white matter areas, respectively. Intraobserver reliability was substantial for both areas (weighted kappa, 0.85 and 0.8). Conclusion: The Fazekas score on CT can be used to reliably grade white matter changes, and can be a useful tool when MRI is not available. (C) 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.