Review for 10.1186/s12876-020-01229-8 (2020)

Reviewer ’s report  
 
Title: Serum amyloid A is a better predictive biomarker of mucosal healing than C -reactive 
protein in ulcerative colitis in clinical remission  
 
Version: 0 Date: 15 Jul 2019  
 
Reviewer: Mark Kindy  
 
Reviewer's report:  
 
The manuscript by Wakai et al., describes the correlation betwe en CRP and SAA in ulcerative 
colitis and the disease process.  The authors show that both CRP and SAA correlate with severity 
of disease, but SAA has a stronger correlation.  As the Mayo endoscopy score (MES) decreased 
the levels of SAA decrease more signi ficantly than did CRP.  The authors conclude that SAA is a 
more stronger predictor of disease and recovery or remission than CRP.  The study provides 
come important information on the impact of inflammation on SAA levels and the relationship to 
UC.  Some s uggestions are as follows.  
 
1) Is is possible to break out the data into tertiles of age or duration of disease?  There are some 
huge difference that may suggest age -related or disease related impact.  
 
2) Can you correlate the data to inflammation?  I.e., b ased on the data can you look at 
inflammation to correlate with SAA levels?  
 
3) How about treatment groups?  
 
Are the methods appropriate and well described?  
If not, please specify what is required in your c omments to the authors.  
 
Yes 
 
Does the work include the necessary controls?  
If not, please specify which controls are required in your comments to the authors.  
 
Yes 
 
Are the conclusions drawn adequately supported by the data shown?  
If not, please explain in yo ur comments to the authors.  
 
Yes 
 
Are you able to assess any statistics in the manus cript or would you recommend an 
additional statistical review?  
If an additional statistical review is recommended, please speci fy what aspects require further 
assessment in your comments to the editors.  
I am able to assess the statistics  
 
Quality of written English  
Please indicate the quality of language in the manuscript:  
 
Acceptable  
 
Declaration of competing interests  
Please complete a declaration of competing in terests, considering the following questions:  
 
1.  Have you in the past five years received reimbursements, f ees, funding, or salary 
from an organisation that may in any way gain or lose financially from the 
publication of this  manuscript, either now or in t he future?  
 
2.  Do you hold any stocks or shares in an organisation t hat may in any way gain or 
lose financially from the publication of this manuscript, either now or in the 
future?  
 
3.  Do you hold or are you currently applying for any patents relating to th e content 
of the manuscript?  
 
4.  Have you received reimbursements, fees, funding, or salary from an organization 
that holds or has applied for patents relating to the content of the manuscript?  
 
5.  Do you have any other financial competing interests?  
 
6.  Do y ou have any non -financial competing interests in relation to this paper?  
 
If you can answer no to all of the above, write 'I declare that I have  no competing interests' 
below. If your reply is yes to any, please give details below.  
 
None  
 
I agree to the open peer review policy of the journal. I understan d that my name wil l be included 
on my report to the authors and, if the manuscript is accepted f or publication, my named report 
including any attachments I upload will be posted on the website along with the au thors' 
responses. I agree for my report to be made available under an Open Access Creative Commons 
CC-BY license ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ ). I understand that any comments 
which I do not wish to be included in my named report can be in cluded as confidential comments 
to the editors, which will not be published.  
 
I agree to the open peer review policy of the journal