Review for 10.1186/s12876-019-1060-7 (2019)

Reviewer ’s report  
 
Title: Current role of colonoscopy in infants and young children: a multicenter study  
 
Version: 0 Date: 01 Apr 2019  
 
Reviewer: Hidetoshi Takedatsu  
 
Reviewer's report:  
The authors evaluated the role of colonoscopy in infants and children and examined the 
distribution of diseases that require colonoscopy in this age group. However, the results were not 
suffic ient to prove the role of colonoscopy in infants and young children. I have several concerns 
to be addressed.  
 
1. The authors should summarize the characteristics of pediatric patients such as age, 
gender, indications, diagnosis etc. in Table 1.  
2. Why did you divide pediatric patients into two groups; 0 -1 and 2 -5 years old in Table 3? 
The authors should showed the characteristic of patients in each age.  
3. The authors just showed only the disease names and the number of follow -up 
colonoscopy in Table 4. What is new finding can be considered from Table 4? It is 
necessary to show how effective the follow -up colonoscopy was.  
4. The authors should show the type of anesthesia, the type of bowel cleansing preparation, 
the procedure time, and the safe ty in the data you have to prove the role of colonoscopy 
for pediatric patients. I think that it is better to refer the previous study. (Yoshioka, S et 
al. World J Gastroenterol 2017, 23(31): 5773 -5779)  
5. This study is for 0 -5 years old. It is not necess ary to present the number of colonoscopy 
up to 18 years of age. If the authors would like to show this data, the authors should 
compare the data between 0 -5 years and 6 -18 years. One patient who received the 
treatment should be deleted or stated in the abs tract, because it may confuse the numbers 
of colonoscopy.  
Are the methods appropriate and well described?  
If not, please specify what is required in your comments to the authors.  
 
Yes 
 
Does the work include the necessary controls?  
If not, please specify whic h 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 your comments to the authors.  
 
No 
 
Are you able to assess any statistics in the manuscript or would you r ecommend 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 indi cate the quality of language in the manuscript:  
 
Acceptable  
 
Declaration of competing interests  
Please complete a declaration of competing interests, 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 financial ly from the publication of this 
manuscript, either now or in the 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 the content of the 
manuscript?  
 
4. Have you recei ved 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 you 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.  
 
I declare that I have no competing interests.  
 
I agree to the open peer review policy of the journal. I understan d that my name will 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 authors ' 
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 included as confidential comments 
to the editors, which will not be published.  
 
I agree to the open peer review policy of the journal