The two protocols (DC/W/3C and CP/NL/3C) for which the intra-examiner reproducibility was classified as, at least,good (ICC ≥ 0.71) for all examiners were selected for the inter-examiner analysis.
Using a white background when taking measurements with a caliper resulted in an ICC = 0.894 and using a natural light background on a computer resulted in an ICC = 0.899, both classified as good reproducibility,with the lower 95% CI limits also included in this classification (0.753–0.953 and 0.754–0.956, respectively).
This analysis was repeated without including the E4 data, since the results of this examiner presented the lowest intra-examiner reliability. By removing E4,
it was possible to estimate the reproducibility of four protocols,
those whose measurements were carried out with triplicate colonies.
The results are presented in Table 1.
Although the four protocols resulted in ICC values classified as good,only the rotocol CP/NL/3C presented the lower limit of the 95% CI exceeding 0.71