Review for 10.1186/s12876-020-01576-6 (2021)

Reviewer’s report
Title: 
A noninvasive model to predict liver histology for antiviral therapy
decision in chronic hepatitis B with alanine aminotransferase2 upper limit of
normal
Version: 
0 
Date: 
18 Oct 2020
Reviewer's report:
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General.
1. Statement "liver biopsy is currently the gold standard to evaluate liver
histology" is not true because international guidelines nowadays recommend
non-invasive methods such as TE for diagnosis and evaluation of staging of liver
fibrosis. Please rephrase this statement throughout the manuscript.
2. Replace the word "obvious fibrosis" with "significant fibrosis"
Specific. 
1. Abstract section.
Results: replace the word "estimation" with "training" to be the same throughout
the manuscript. 
2. Materials and methods section.
1- Replace: "CHB who received liver biopsy" into "CHB who underwent liver
biopsy"
2- 
It is important that the author should mention which level of HBV DNA
included in this study as it is well known that any elevation of HBV DNA is
associated with changes in liver histology and if there was a high viral load I
think it should be included as a variable of antiviral treatment decision-making in
logistic regression analysis.
3- The statement "compensatory or decompensated cirrhosis" does the author
mean that compensated cirrhosis is excluded from the study however in table (1)
author mentioned no. of S4 were 33 and 24 in training and validation set
respectively. Please explain.
4- ULN of ALT should be mentioned.
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Is the study design appropriate to answer the research question (including the use
of appropriate controls), and are the conclusions supported by the evidence
presented?
Yes
Are the methods sufficiently described to allow the study to be repeated?
Yes
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Yes
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from apparent manipulation?
Yes