Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-11-50 (2011)

Reviewer's report
Title:A pH-sensitive gel added improves the stability of microemulsion for
orientating removal of colonic ammonia in gastrointestinal tract
Version: 2Date:25 August 2010
Reviewer: Sontaya Limmatvapirat
Reviewer's report:
General Comments
The paper explained the development of pH-sensitive gel that should be possible
for reducing the ammonia in colonic area. There are some points that seem
interesting. However, the paper does not show a clear explanation and does not
add significantly to new knowledge in pharmaceutics. Therefore, I suggest you to
critically revise the manuscript again and submit your work to a more journal.
Here are some comments that may help you to improve your work.
Major compulsory revisions
Title
- The title is unclear and need to rewrite in more concise way.
Abstract
- There are a lot of mis-spelling and grammatical errors (and also in the
remaining parts), e.g. punctuation, capitalization, tense, redundancy and so on.
The manuscript should be rewritten and checked by native English speaker
before re-submiting.
Materials and methods
- Please add only the detail of specific equipments that used for your work. Some
commonly known equipments; e.g. balance, microscope, kettle; are not
necessary for including in the manuscript.
- The preparation technique of microemulsion was not clarified in the text.
- The ammonia measurement was not clearly stated.
- The pH paper is not so accurate for measuring the pH. Is it possible to measure
by more accurate pH meter?
- What is the statistic used for data analysis? ANOVA, t-test? Did you perform
any post-hoc test?
- What is the meaning of morphous?
Results and Discussion
- The figures are not clear and well arranged. Frankly, it is a very serious problem
for your manuscript.
- The manuscript did not give a sufficient result of microemulsion and its
characterization. For examples, are there any results supporting that it is true
microemulsion, what is the method for physical and chemical characterization of
microemulsion, are there any discussion related with formulation factor, and so
on….
- In fact, sodium alginate is not a real pH sensitive polymer as compared to other
enteric polymers, e.g. acrylate polymer, HPMCP, CAP. I totally agreed with the
author that the solubility might be suppressed in the gastric environment since it
is the sodium form. However, it will dissolve at the intestinal pH region. For your
case, sodium alginate is swelled and slowly degraded, hence prolonged the
transit time to large intestine.
- Could the developed dosage form apply by oral route? Or it should only be
applied by intragastric route? From my opinion, it should be better to prepare in
an enteric (or colonic) coated dosage form. The mentioned dosage form will
bypass the stomach, small intestine and directly released acetic acid in the
colonic area.
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Not suitable for publication unless extensively edited
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Declaration of competing interests:
No