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

Objectives: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).Design:Observational cohort study.Material and methods:Nineteen patients with chronic venous insufficiency (CVI) were examined clinically, by hand-held cw-Doppler ultrasound in combination with tourniquet compression and CDS.Results:The low accuracy of 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.Conclusions:In patients with CVI, clinical and cw-Doppler cannot accurately diagnose ICPV when compared to CDS