JerMa88/BMC_Gastroenterology_Peer_Reviews huggingface dataset:
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-136 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:The postoperative bleeding rate and its risk factors in patients on
antithrombotic therapy who undergo gastric endoscopic submucosal dissection
Version: 6Date:23 July 2013
Reviewer: Osamu Goto
Reviewer's report:
Well revised.
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-135 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Guanylate Cyclase C Limits Systemic Dissemination of a Murine Enteric
Pathogen
Version: 1Date:11 June 2013
Reviewer: Silvia Melgar
Reviewer's report:
The authors have succesfully responded to my queries.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
'I declare that I have no competing interests'
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-135 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Guanylate Cyclase C Limits Systemic Dissemination of a Murine Enteric
Pathogen
Version: 1Date:17 June 2013
Reviewer: Neil Gerard Docherty
Reviewer's report:
The authors have addressed the revisions suggested in review 1 satisfactorily
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-134 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Improvement of long-term outcomes in pancreatic cancer within the
gemcitabine era: A collaborative retrospective multicenter clinical review of 1,082
patients
Version: 1Date:7 May 2013
Reviewer: David Chang
Reviewer's report:
Kuroda et al reported a retrospective review of the outcomes of a cohort of 1,082
patients with PC treated in the gemcitabine era. The clinical characteristics were
identified and concluded GEM based chemotherapy has improved long-term
outcomes.
The reviewer would like to congratulate the authors for bring together a large well
curated cohort with PC and their outcome. The reviewer hopes the authors could
address a few comments below:
Major:
The authors concluded that Group B had better outcome than Group A due to
GEM based chemo. This was made based on the findings that higher proportion
of Group B had chemotherapy and less best supportive care, and also that
adjuvant chemotherapy is not a prognostic factor in either overall or individual
period groups. However, the overall prognostic effect of chemotherapy as a
therapy modality was not demonstrated either in a univariate or multivariate
analysis to demonstrate that the GEM based chemo was the true driver of better
prognosis in the group B as compared to group A. while Group B had better
overall prognosis than Group A (Fig 3A), it is likely that this effect is additive with
various treatment modality (Fig 3b and 3C). It is likely that the authors will arrive
at the same conclusion when such analysis is performed, however in review’s
view, this is an important analysis to show to arrive at such conclusions.
Minor:
1. It is likely that not all readers of BMC Gastroenterology is familiar with JPS
TNM Classification, would the authors consider inserting a sentence or two to
explain the major difference between JPS and AJCC/UICC classification to
prevent confusion?
2. Do the authors have an explanation of the difference in the number of patients
between group A and B? was it truly an increase in incidence in pancreatic
cancer in Japan, or was it a change in the referral pattern? If it is the later, how
has it influenced the differences that are observed and in terms of how the
conclusion was drawn?
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, and I have assessed the statistics in my report.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-134 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Improvement of long-term outcomes in pancreatic cancer within the
gemcitabine era: A collaborative retrospective multicenter clinical review of 1,082
patients
Version: 2Date:28 June 2013
Reviewer: david goldstein
Reviewer's report:
I think the authors have tried hard to respond to all of my issues and indeed
those of the other reviewers.
I still feel quite strongly that lumping locally advanced stage IVa and stage 1-111
as a single surgical group is inappropriate and can only mask any benefit form
adjuvant chemotherapy.
I believe despite the small numbers that the only valid analysis is one where the
outcomes for stage 1-111 with and without chemotherapy are compared
separately and stage IVa with and without chemotherapy.
I think there is a real chance of showing some benefit form adjuvant
chemotherapy when stage IVa are excluded and their data will be more
comparable to non japanese surgical and adjuvant data when this analysis is
done
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-134 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Improvement of long-term outcomes in pancreatic cancer within the
gemcitabine era: A collaborative retrospective multicenter clinical review of 1,082
patients
Version: 2Date:10 July 2013
Reviewer: Lorraine chantrill
Reviewer's report:
Minor Discretionary revisions
General comment
Thank you for the changes you have made - these have improved the paper. I
have a small number of suggestions for further improvement.
1. The demographics described in the results section could be presented in table
format
Minor Essential revisions
1.In Materials and Methods you state:
“After an extensive chart review, the final diagnosis was intraductal papillary
mucinous neoplasm.......serous adenocarcinoma(n=1), and undifferentiated
carcinoma (n=1). Patients with missing data (n=135) were excluded from the
analysis."
I would like to see something clearer such as;
X% of cases were confirmed by histopathology or cytology, Y% were diagnosed
on radiological grounds. Of those n=? with a pathological diagnosis, n=? were
adenocarcinoma, n=22 were intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasm etc. List
them all and then describe if they were evenly distributed between groups A and
B. This could be tabulated if you prefer.
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-134 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Improvement of long-term outcomes in pancreatic cancer within the
gemcitabine era: A collaborative retrospective multicenter clinical review of 1,082
patients
Version: 2Date:19 July 2013
Reviewer: David Chang
Reviewer's report:
Kuroda et al revision 1
The reviewer would like to thank the authors for performing a re-analysis for the
study.
Major comments:
Despite the re-analysis, the reviewer fails to understand how the conclusion of
“GEM-based chemotherapy has improved long-term outcomes in pancreatic
cancer even within the GEM era…..”. there is no doubt in the unresected group, if
patient received GEM, the prognosis is better. However, the authors have not
shown that receiving GEM in different study time group has led to statistically
different prognosis which is the conclusion that the authors have made. Despite a
better MST in Gp B than A (P=0.0063) and more patients underwent chemo and
less had BSC, it is still statistically weak to arrive at the conclusion unless a
multivariate analysis is performed including (1) study period, (2) chemo and (3)
an interaction variable “study period X chemo”. It is only if the interaction variable
is statistically significant when a conclusion of receiving GEM in different study
time group has led to different survival seen here. The reviewer would suggest
the authors to re-think the hypothesis/aim, is the study designed to show that
chemo is better BSC or is the chemo effect different in the 2 study time period?
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Needs some language corrections before being
published
Statistical review: Yes, and I have assessed the statistics in my report.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-133 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Protective effects of N-acetylcysteine on acetic acid-induced colitis in a
porcine model
Version: 1Date:15 May 2013
Reviewer: Pedram Ghafourifar
Reviewer's report:
The manuscript “Protective effects of N-acetylcysteine on acetic acid-induced
colitis in a porcine model” by Wang et al provides useful information. The
experiments are relatively well designed and data is relevant. However, several
editorial overlooks are disturbing. Authors should be consistent throughout the
article. Its either number space C (for centigrade) or number no-space C. Use of
different fonts and font sizes is also unacceptable.
Figure 1 should be presented larger and in higher quality. Authors should discuss
clearly the level of significance, if any, in Fig 2 between AA and NAC and explain
the reasons for significance or lack of significant different.
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Needs some language corrections before being
published
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-133 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Protective effects of N-acetylcysteine on acetic acid-induced colitis in a
porcine model
Version: 2Date:22 July 2013
Reviewer: Pedram Ghafourifar
Reviewer's report:
The authors have adequately addressed the concerns raised by this reviewer.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-133 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Protective effects of N-acetylcysteine on acetic acid-induced colitis in a
porcine model
Version: 2Date:22 August 2013
Reviewer: Francois FB Blachier
Reviewer's report:
The authors have correctly answered all my comments and have improved the
quality of their manuscript accordingly.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare I have no competing interest.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-132 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Gastro-oesophageal reflux disease in type 2 diabetics: Symptom load and
pathophysiologic aspects - a retro-pro study
Version: 1Date:2 July 2013
Reviewer: Heinz Wykypiel
Reviewer's report:
Thank you for the privilege to review this manuscript!
The question posed by the authors is well defined. the methods are approproiate
and described in detail. the data are sound. the discussion is well balanced. title
and abstract are appropriate. writing is acceptable, some absolutely minor
linguistic improvements could be made (e.g. buffer instead of puffer...). the paper
provides new insights to define a subgroup of GERD-patients more in detail.
I suggest to accept this paper for publication.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-132 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Gastro-oesophageal reflux disease in type 2 diabetics: Symptom load and
pathophysiologic aspects - a retro-pro study
Version: 1Date:9 July 2013
Reviewer: Fernando Fornari
Reviewer's report:
Major Compulsory Revision
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-132 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Gastro-oesophageal reflux disease in type 2 diabetics: Symptom load and
pathophysiologic aspects - a retro-pro study
Version: 2Date:10 August 2013
Reviewer: Fernando Fornari
Reviewer's report:
The authors should be congratulated. The paper is ready for publication after
revision of table 2 (the OR of dysphagia needs to be checked: 95%CI crosses 1
with a p value = 0.001).
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-131 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Association of Gut Microbiota with Post-operative Clinical Course in
Crohn's Disease
Version: 2Date:11 April 2013
Reviewer: arsun swaminath
Reviewer's report:
Dr Dey et al. have provided pilot data to characterize changes to the microbiome
in a small groups of patients with Crohn’s disease who have undergone surgery.
Minor Comments:
1) If these patients were not specifically recruited for this study, was the tissue
obtained from a tissue bank? Was each colonoscopy done at 6mo post op or
was there
2) Page 3 states that colonoscopy was done for “check up.” This should be
worked to explain study was done per standard clinical protocol to assess
disease recurrence at a specific time point post operatively.
3) A significant different in the types of species identified is found on pg 13, but
refers to a supplemental figure, which refers back to fig 1c#maybe more useful to
integrate fig S2 into Fig 1.
Major Comments:
1) No table of clinical information is provided. If there are a limited number of
patients, it would be useful to give the reader an idea of how heterogenous the
studied population is given all the variables that can affect the microbiome
-include duration of disease,disease phenotype, distribution, pre-op meds and
post-op meds (esp if antibiotics were part of the post op regimen), time of post-op
colonoscopy
2) If the same biopsy forcep is used through the same colonoscopy channel to
biopsy different sites within the same patients, does that allow you to answer the
question you’re interested in? Are you actually able to distinguish between
inflamed and uninflamed sites within the same patient? This information is not
included in fig 1b # inflamed vs noninflamed within patient.
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-131 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Association of Gut Microbiota with Post-operative Clinical Course in
Crohn's Disease
Version: 2Date:22 April 2013
Reviewer: Sonia Michail
Reviewer's report:
This work reflects important translational knowedge in gut microbiome in Crohn's
disease.
1. Provide more description of the clinical cohort of patients with Crohn's, e.g
disease location, type, therapies prior to sampling, diet, etc... as these may be
important variables that may impact the gut microbiome
2. Some of the figures may be difficult to follow by clinician readers. Would
suggest simplifying some of the figures and consolidating.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-130 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Treatment of Children and Adolescents with Ulcerative Colitis by
Adsorptive Depletion of Myeloid Lineage Leucocytes as Monotherapy or in
Combination with Low Dose Prednisolone After Failure of First-line Medications
Version: 2Date:28 May 2013
Reviewer: Anastasia Konidari
Reviewer's report:
Please note uploaded document
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:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-130 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Treatment of children and adolescents with ulcerative colitis by adsorptive
depletion of myeloid lineage leucocytes as monotherapy or in combination with
low dose prednisolone after failure of first-line medications
Version: 3Date:10 July 2013
Reviewer: Anastasia Konidari
Reviewer's report:
Minor essential reviews
Version 2 is much improved.
More emphasis however needs to be given to the limitations of this review due to
the small and highly selected sample size, which does not allow for
generalisation of conclusions, unless further double blinded randomised
controlled trials can be conducted.
Furthermore,it would be essential to have a fourth group of patients who have
had corticosteroids for induction of remission, so as to directly assess superiority
of GMA over a recognised first line treatment for induction of remission.
As no such comparison has been carried out, the superiority of induction of
remission with GMA treatment must not be inferred and will remain doubtful. The
last sentence in the conclusions section of the abstract needs therefore to be
amended and this change should be reflected within the body of the manuscript.
Clearly a number of patients with higher CAI score required adjunct therapy with
corticosteroids to go into remission; how long is it ethical to wait until adding
corticosteroids to GMA treatment, in case of suboptimal response to this
treatment or increased disease activity? How was the time point, at which
corticosteroid treatment was added to one of the three groups in the study,
decided? Compared groups had differences in disease severity, therefore validity
of conclusions drawn about superiority of GMA over pharmacotherapy may be
weak unless further research is conducted.
Finally, although the maintenance of remission was not the objective of this
study, it is of high clinical importance to assess how GMA treatment for induction
of remission may affect disease course in short to medium term at least.
Please note last sentence in 'subgroup analyses' section;it should read 'score'
not 'core'.
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-130 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Treatment of children and adolescents with ulcerative colitis by adsorptive
depletion of myeloid lineage leucocytes as monotherapy or in combination with
low dose prednisolone after failure of first-line medications
Version: 3Date:16 July 2013
Reviewer: Jennifer deBruyn
Reviewer's report:
Thank you for the opportunity to review the revised manuscript by Tanaka et al.
The authors have adequately addressed the majority of comments.
I also suggest future use of more widely-used disease activity and endoscopic
indices, such as the PUCAI and Mayo endoscopic score.
Minor essential revisions:
1. There is a discrepancy in enrolment period. The abstract states that subjects
participated between 2010 and 2012 whereas the methods section indicates the
trial period between 2000 and 2012. Please clarify.
2. All acronyms should be defined prior to their use. What is CE? (Methods: GMA
procedures)
3. Correct grammar and spelling errors in ‘Treatment safety, feasibility, and
patients’ compliance”
4. Categorize Table 1 by patient response (to salicylates alone, GMA alone, or
GMA and prednisolone). This helps the reader identify the baseline
demographics of each class of patients. Alternatively, the data can also be
presented differently in Table 1 to improve it’s readability: Ie, Column titles:
Salicylate alone, GMA alone, GMA and prednisolone. Rows would read: Gender
(M/F) n (%), Age (mean or median with standard deviation or range), weight
(mean or median with standard deviation or range), baseline medication (mean
or median with standard deviation or range), location of UC, n (%), duration of
UC (mean or median with standard deviation or range), CAI (mean or median
with standard deviation or range), DAI (mean or median with standard deviation
or range).
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Needs some language corrections before being
published
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
'I declare that I have no competing interests'
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-129 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Morphological change of a laterally spreading rectal tumor over a short
period
Version: 1Date:3 January 2013
Reviewer: Cord Langner
Reviewer's report:
The case report by Miyamoto and eight (!) co-workers reports on the evolution of
a LST over a period of three months. The manuscript includes very nice images,
but the significance of the report is unclear.
Major Compulsory Revisions
For a “Western” gastrointestinal pathologist this is a clear cut tubular adenoma,
low grade dysplasia (intraepithelial neoplasia) according to WHO, both in the flat
parts (please do not say “very flat”, flat is flat) and in the elevated parts. Tumors
are heterogeneous. Thus, no wonder that some parts appear "more normal" (the
flat parts) than others. But, in 2000, the WHO made, for good reasons, i.e. to
reduce interobserver variation, all this low grade dysplasia (intraepithelial
neoplasia). If you want to publish outside Japan, please be so kind and adhere
adhere to this terminology.
It is important to realize, that there is not evidence of SSA, neither
macroscopically nor (more important) microscopically, this is a simple low grade
tubular adenoma. It can, therefore, not be recommended to move the discussion
into the direction of SSA and non-Lynch MSI sporadic colorectal cancer. Your
lesion is for sure not evolving into this type of malignancy.
In addition, if (for a case report) molecular analysis is needed (I guess you would
like to go for KRAS, BRAF and MSI) you should go for it and submit the
manuscript having done this analysis – this analysis takes at maximum two days!
Most probably, however, the lesion will be negative for BRAF mutation,
microsatellite stabile and regarding KRAS both options (mutated or wild type) are
possible. But does that really help us?
Thus, we have a LST, which on histology proved to be a low grade tubular
adenoma, which is seen twice within three months (we have endoscopy with NBI
twice, histology only from the resection) and which shows some changes in
shape (not in size) and in pit pattern, which upon histology are largely irrelevant.
Thus, what is the message? If a LST shows some changes in shape and pit
pattern, do not worry? Please explain.
Level of interest: An article of limited interest
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-129 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Morphological change of a laterally spreading rectal tumor over a short
period
Version: 1Date:19 May 2013
Reviewer: Wei Gong
Reviewer's report:
The authors of this manuscript presesnted a unique and suggestive which
showed morphological change of a LST-Gs at the very early stage. At this stage,
the dilated round pits progressed to a IIIL pit pattern. It is interesting because it
revealed the progressional process of LST-G. However, Minor revisions should
be done for the mansucript.
1) In the case presentation part, it will be better if the author define the Pit pattern
of the dilated round pits at the first colonoscopy. In the discussion part, the author
mentioned that they" diagnosed it as a variation of a dilated type I or type II pit
which suggested a non-neoplastic lesion" . However, judging from the
stereomicroscopic image(Fig3a, Fig3b), some parts of the flat area also looks like
type IIIs according to Kudo's classification, wihch is neoplastic and is confirmed
by pathological examination(Fig4c).So whether the Pit pattern of the flat areas is
type I, type II or Type IIIs is a little bit confusing.
2) In Fig1. the Pit pttern of the flat areas at the first colonoscopy is not so clear. it
will be better if the author present a more magnified images.
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests!
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-128 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Accuracy of endoscopic diagnosis of Helicobacter pylori infection according
to level of endoscopic experience and the effect of training.
Version: 1Date:19 May 2013
Reviewer: Fadi Rzouq
Reviewer's report:
The study is well designed and performed. However, major compulsory revisions
need to be considered by the authors:
1. The authors excluded patient s with renal and heart failure but we don’t know
how they defined that. Is it any patient with elevated creatinine more than normal
(even stage 1 CKD) or any patient with less than normal EF was excluded or that
was based on electronic problem list? If this is the former (abnormal creatinine or
ejection fraction), this excluded a great deal of patients undergoing endoscopy
and if this is the later (electronic problem list), this represents a limitation that
needs to be mentioned in the limitation section in discussion (as these problem
lists could be inaccurate).
2. The authors classified patients based on serology, histology, and UBT into
three categories: infected, uninfected, and eradicated. We need to know what the
protocol was for that. In other words, if patient had a +ve UBT and a –ve
histologic examination, was that considered infected or not or vise versa? We
need to know the test results in the 28 patients who were infected and the other
categories too? That will be of paramount importance for the audience.
3. We don’t know that status or proton pump inhibitor use among all categories?
This is important because this affects test results (increase the false negativity for
UBT and possibly histology) and could also affect the endoscopic findings. I think
that should be reported in a table and mentioned in the discussion if the authors
have this. If they don’t have the data, this should be part mentioned in the
limitations and discussed there.
4. What is the clinical significance of the study? The authors should state what
they suggest clinically in the discussion part. Do they suggest that biopsies are
not needed when endoscopic findings suggest uninfected status? Are they not
able to make this conclusion pending more data accumulation and universal
acceptance of the endoscopic findings and this is just an interim study to improve
our knowledge about endoscopic diagnosis of H pylori infection? If that is the
case, they should state that as is.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Declaration of competing interests:
No competing interests at all.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-128 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Accuracy of endoscopic diagnosis of Helicobacter pylori infection according
to level of endoscopic experience and the effect of training.
Version: 2Date:26 June 2013
Reviewer: Masaaki Kobayashi
Reviewer's report:
Acceptable without revision
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-128 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Accuracy of endoscopic diagnosis of Helicobacter pylori infection according
to level of endoscopic experience and the effect of training.
Version: 2Date:9 July 2013
Reviewer: Fadi Rzouq
Reviewer's report:
The study is well designed and performed.
The exclusion criteria are well defined now and seem appropriate
Also, the definitions of active and eradicated infection are clear
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Declaration of competing interests:
Nothing to declare
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-127 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Percutaneous Transhepatic Biliary Drainage Assisted by Real-Time Virtual
Sonography
Version: 2Date:23 April 2013
Reviewer: Malay Sharma
Reviewer's report:
The concept is good and the utility of real time virtual sonography should be
explored in difficult to do PTBD patients. Results are encouraging, considering its
efficacy and safety .However, certain limitations are there as patient selection
was not appropriate.The number of patients are less and most had dilated ducts
(mean diameter was 4.9 mm).Right duct attempt which is technically more
challenging was done only in 9 out of 37 .
It is difficult to suggest any revision as this is a retrospective study and all the
available data has been put forward.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests'
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-127 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Percutaneous Transhepatic Biliary Drainage Assisted by Real-Time Virtual
Sonography
Version: 2Date:24 May 2013
Reviewer: Andreas Weber
Reviewer's report:
The study demonstrated that accurate puncture of targeted bile ducts can be
achieved by performing RVS-assisted PTBD. Major limitations of the study are
the small number of patients and its retrospective nature.
Major Compulsory Revisions
The title should be clearly stated that this is a retrospective study
Minor Essential Revisions
It would be favourable to compare these data with a control group (conventional
procedure).Do you have these data?
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Needs some language corrections before being
published
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Declaration of competing interests:
'I declare that I have no competing interests'
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-125 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Interventionally implanted port catheter systems for hepatic arterial infusion
of chemotherapy in patients with primary liver cancer: A phase II-study.
Version: 1Date:5 February 2013
Reviewer: Giammaria Fiorentini
Reviewer's report:
Interventionally implanted port catheter systems for hepatic arterial infusion of
chemotherapy in patients with primary liver cancer: A phase II-study.
Marianne Sinn, Annett Nicolaou, Jens Ricke, Pjotr Podrabsky, Daniel Seehofer,
Bernhard Gebauer, Maciej Pech, Bernd Dorken, Hanno Riess and Bert
Hildebrandt BMC Gastroenterology Research article
Is the question posed by the authors well defined? YES,
concerning IIPCS implantation
2. Are the methods appropriate and well described? YES,
concerning IIPCS implantation. It is unclear the schedule of therapy, probably
used in liver metastases from colorectal cancer but unknown for primary liver
cancer. In biliary tract tumours the most used drugs are oxaliplatin and
gemcitabine (GEMOX), Fluorouracil is rarely considered.
3. Are the data sound? YES for the implantation of the device, but not sound for
chemotherapy 4. Does the manuscript adhere to the relevant standards for
reporting and data deposition? Substantially YES 5. Are the discussion and
conclusions well balanced and adequately supported by the data? No because in
the field of HCC, HAI is rarely considered and substantially non accepted. No
randomized trials exist.
6. Are limitations of the work clearly stated? YES, the Authors stated their
limitations and confirm doubts about the real utility of this approach (HAI in HCC)
even if implantation of the device is well done.
7. Do the authors clearly acknowledge any work upon which they are building,
both published and unpublished? No, forgotten Arai's data 8. Do the title and
abstract accurately convey what has been found? No because the phase II study
is devoted to observe response rate and efficacy of any treatment. Here the
chemotherapy is not effective and quite toxic ( hemorrhage, bone marrow
toxicity) and substantially there is any indication to move from TACE to IIPCS
9. Is the writing acceptable NO, A MAJOR REVISION IS REQUIRED
THERE ARE SOME POINT TO DISCUSS:
1) HAI is not routinely applied in HCC, the vast majority of experiences are in
colorectal liver mets.
2) HAI is rarely used in ICC, even if in this tumors - orfan drug- does not exist any
active strategy
3) the chemotherapy schedule is unknown. Data on oxaliplatin activity in HCC
are pour. The toxic effects reported are significant, and substantially more
important that we observe after TACE, gastrointestinal hemorrhage is related to
tip position ( wrong perfusion) and to drug damage. Did the patients receive IPP?
Others questions for Authors:
The tip of catheters are fixed or floating free?
The port infection is the first cause of complications. Did authors try to save it
using antibiotics. Did they explant the port?
How is rotary motion of the limb where is placed the IIPCS Do the authors
implant the Port always in the groin? Do thy consider that this is a place easier to
be infected?
How many patients have chirrosis?
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-125 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Interventionally implanted port catheter systems for hepatic arterial infusion
of chemotherapy in patients with primary liver cancer: A phase II-study.
Version: 2Date:21 July 2013
Reviewer: Giammaria Fiorentini
Reviewer's report:
is still open the debate if is better surgical or IR placed port. The surgeons
abandoned the port placement in the last decade , so the field is open for IRS
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-124 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:The association between cecal insertion time and colorectal neoplasm
detection
Version: 1Date:31 March 2013
Reviewer: Christian Stock
Reviewer's report:
The authors aimed to determine the association between cecal insertion time and
colorectal neoplasm detection rate in colonoscopy screening. They conducted a
cross-sectional analysis of 12,679 colonoscopies performed by 23
gastroenterologists in a single center and concluded that shorter insertion times
are associated with increased rates of detection of small adenomas <5 mm.
The topic of the study is timely and of interest to BMC Gastroenterology. Study
population and procedures are well described in the manuscript, which is
generally well written. Important limitations are addressed.
Major Compulsory Revisions
1. My main concern is with the statistical approach. Odds ratios and confidence
intervals for the presence of any adenoma for the 3 highest quartiles of insertion
time vs. the lowest quartile of insertion time were calculated using conditional
logistic regression. It is unclear why insertion time was dichotomized and not
treated as a categorical variable with 1 category for each quartile (an 1 reference
category) or as a continuous variable. Moreover, also other explanatory variables
were dichotomized (withdrawal time and BMI, i.e. dummy variable coding).
Thereby a lot of information is lost and it seems somewhat problematic to
conclude that there is an inverse association between insertion time and
detection of small adenomas based on a comparison of only 2 categories. The
authors might justify and discuss their approach in more detail and/ or present
results from sensitivity analyses treating "insertion time" (and perhaps also
"withdrawal time") differently.
2. The authors state that multiple imputation was used. Information on the portion
of the data that was missing and a complete case analysis should be provided.
Minor Essential Revisions
3. Is reference #1 correct? Its title does not suggest that it is related to the first
sentence.
4. The authors might briefly indicate already in the background section why
insertion time was investigated and why it could potentially be a quality indicator
for colonoscopy. Currently they state only that information is limited.
5. Page 17, 2nd paragraph: replace "body index" by "BMI".
6. The authors might comment on the generalizability of their findings.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, and I have assessed the statistics in my report.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-124 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:The association between cecal insertion time and colorectal neoplasm
detection
Version: 1Date:3 April 2013
Reviewer: Aijaz AS Sofi
Reviewer's report:
Minor revision-
Sung et. al have retrospectively examined the relation between adenoma
detection rate and cecal insertion time. The findings in this paper are interesting.
This paper highlights the importance of more careful examination of colon in
patients who have longer cecal insertion time (CIT), which is an indirect measure
of difficult colonoscopy.
Comments- Although patient or colonic related factors, as mentioned by the
authors in the conclusion section, could be contributing to higher adenoma miss
rate in patients with longer CIT. However, the higher adenoma miss rate in the
patients with difficult colonoscopy (and thus longer CIT) could also be related to
endoscopist exhaustion from difficult colonoscopy and the stress from scheduling
and therefore endoscopist could miss smaller adenomas in relatively difficult to
visualize areas in colon- this might also contribute to higher miss rate of small
adenomas only (<5 mm in this study).
Level of interest: An article of outstanding merit and interest in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, and I have assessed the statistics in my report.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-124 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:The association between cecal insertion time and colorectal neoplasm
detection
Version: 1Date:6 April 2013
Reviewer: Tom Moreels
Reviewer's report:
The authors present a study on the effect of insertion time on adenoma detection
rate in +12,000 screening colonoscopies performed by 23 well-trained (female)
endoscopists. They nicely show the inverse relation between colonic insertion
time and the detection of adenomatous polyps.
Minor Essential Revisions:
1. There are several grammatical errors throughout the manuscript.
2. It is unclear whether polyps were detected during insertion or withdrawal of the
colonoscope. It is generally adviced to remove diminutive polyps during insertion
because of the risk of not finding them back during withdrawal. This should be
clarified.
3. Table 2 shows that multiple and advanced adenomas are also more often
found in colonoscopies with shorter insertion time (p=0.019), as is the case for
diminutive polyps. However, this inverse relationship disappears after adjustment
for confounding factors. The authors should discuss which factors might implicate
this finding.
4. The authors hypotesize that longer insertion times may lead to shorter
withdrawal times and thus resulting in decreased adenoma detection rates. The
authors should further elucidate this by studying the relation between insertion
and withdrawal times in their cohort.
5. Not all references are according to the journal's editorial requirements.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Needs some language corrections before being
published
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-124 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:The association between cecal insertion time and colorectal neoplasm
detection
Version: 2Date:24 June 2013
Reviewer: Christian Stock
Reviewer's report:
Major Compulsory Revisions
None.
Minor Essential Revisions
None.
Discretionary Revisions
None.
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-124 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:The association between cecal insertion time and colorectal neoplasm
detection
Version: 2Date:1 July 2013
Reviewer: Tom Moreels
Reviewer's report:
The authors have sufficiently adapted the manuscript according to the reviewers'
comments and suggestions, and therefore, it is suitable for publication in BMC
gastroenterology.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-121 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Detection and treatment of an aneurysma spurium of the arteria hepatica
dextra after laparoscopic cholecystectomy
Version: 1Date:5 April 2013
Reviewer: Michael R&uuml;nzi
Reviewer's report:
Major compulsory Revisions:
Interesting case ! However, please explain why patient was not sent to
gastroscopy 2nd time he was admitted to the hospital. This would have probably
shown signs of blood in the duodenal or jejunal lumina. Further, why didn't
capsule endoscopy reveal the source of bleeding ?
In the case presentation section of the ms. the communication of the aneurysm
with the small bowel is not stated, please explain and correct. There is only a hint
later in the conclusion section.
Minor essential revisions
In the Conclusion section is stated that lap liver resection is a treatment option,
the wording should be "partial liver resection"
Disctretionary revisions
Obviously the interventional radiologist sealed the case and stopped the
bleeding. One should give him credit in an aknowledgement or as co-author.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-121 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:Detection and treatment of an aneurysma spurium of the arteria hepatica
dextra after laparoscopic cholecystectomy
Version: 1Date:22 May 2013
Reviewer: Nigel Bird
Reviewer's report:
An interesting and unusual complication of surgery, but one that is known.
However, this report is worthy of publication provided that the English is attended
to. Some careful editing is also required; notably the authors use 'arteria hepatica
dexter' in several places, when they really mean arteria hepatica dextra.
Level of interest: An article of limited interest
Quality of written English: Needs some language corrections before being
published
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests.
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-120 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:The FLS (Fatty liver Shionogi) mouse reveals local expressions of
lipocalin-2, CXCL1 and CXCL9 in the liver with non-alcoholic steatohepatitis
Version: 2Date:3 May 2013
Reviewer: Manlio Vinciguerra
Reviewer's report:
The study from Semba et al. aims at identifying differential markers of NASH, not
espressed in steatosis, using the Fatty liver Shionogi mouse model. Microarray
analysis is used to identify 3 molecules, adipokines/chemokines that correlate
well with inflammatory properties as determined by WB and IHC. The authors
propose that these 3 markers, and in particolar LCN2, could play significant roles
in the progression from steatosis to NASH. The study is linear, well designed and
the data are of good quality.
I have though several comments:
It would be better to introduce, starting from the abstract, the concept of non
alcoholic fatty liver diseases (NAFLD), which includes the spectrum ranging from
simple steatosis, to NASH, to HCC. Within NAFLD this study aims to elucidate
the differences between steatosis and NASH etc etc
Methods (abstract): Immunohistochemistry can not be used to detect gene
expression, rephrase
Results (abstract): DNA microarray analyses can not reveal proteins, rephrase
DS and FLS, apart the citations of references, are not adequately described.
What is the mutation inducing NASH phenotype? What makes the “sister” strain
DS developing steatosis but not NASH? How they originate from each other?
A more detailed analysis of microarray analysis, cut off criteria should be
described in the text, not in supplemental, as well as Table III, so that scientists
can try to analyse the GEO data with the same criteria.
Discussion: the two-hit hypothesis is now considered obsolete, considering the
role of the gut microbiota and the new mechanisms discovered (Podrini C, Curr
Pharm Des 2013). The authors should re-formulate this paragraph. Adipokines
and citokines should be discussed in the modern frame of knowledge.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-120 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:The FLS (Fatty liver Shionogi) mouse reveals local expressions of
lipocalin-2, CXCL1 and CXCL9 in the liver with non-alcoholic steatohepatitis
Version: 2Date:21 May 2013
Reviewer: Atsushi Nakajima
Reviewer's report:
This study is interesting.
It would be nice to add a minor point. That would be useful but not essential. As
indicated below.
<Minor criticisms>
It will be better if you add to a figure which show the role of CXCL1, CXCL9 and
LCN2 in the pathogenesis of NASH.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-13-120 (2013)

Reviewer's report
Title:The FLS (Fatty liver Shionogi) mouse reveals local expressions of
lipocalin-2, CXCL1 and CXCL9 in the liver with non-alcoholic steatohepatitis
Version: 3Date:29 June 2013
Reviewer: Manlio Vinciguerra
Reviewer's report:
All my comments have been satisfactorily addressed by the authors
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, but I do not feel adequately qualified to assess the
statistics.
Declaration of competing interests:
'I declare that I have no competing interests'