Review for 10.1186/1471-230X-10-85 (2010)

Reviewer's report
Title:A meta-analysis for the effect of prophylactic GTN on the incidence of
post-ERCP pancreatitis and on the successful rate of cannulation of bile ducts
Version: 1Date:1 January 2010
Reviewer: Ming-Hua Zheng
Reviewer's report:
This is a very nicely conducted systematic review of the literature with a
meta-analysis of included studies. The analysis is conducted according to the
strict guidelines of the Cochrane Collaboration. Overall, this is a well conducted
analysis and I look forward to seeing it published after the following comments
are addressed.
1. Recently, there are several published meta-analyses in this field (see the
following references). As we had noticed, the main conclusions of the drug is
very similar in these papers including your MS. Please elaborate on why this
meta-analysis was needed. Were there a significant number of new studies
published with important results since that last update? Was there reason to
suspect that a different conclusion would be reached in this update or was it
thought that the results of the last update would be strengthened? Compared to
these analyses, what is the new finding in your meta-analysis? Please
explanation it in the section of discussion.
Reference:
1) Bai Y, Xu C, Yang X et al. Glyceryl trinitrate for prevention of pancreatitis after
endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography: A meta-analysis of
randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trials. Endoscopy 2009;41:690-5.
2) Bang UC, Nojgaard C, Andersen PK et al. Meta-analysis: Nitroglycerin for
prevention of post-ercp pancreatitis. Aliment Pharmacol Ther 2009;29:1078-85.
3) Shao LM, Chen QY, Chen MY et al. Nitroglycerin in the prevention of
post-ercp pancreatitis: A meta-analysis. Dig Dis Sci 2010;55:1-7
2. Please follow the Quorum guidelines for reviews. Please include a figure that
shows a flow chart of the study selection process. Please include a table with the
excluded studies, summarizing the reasons for exclusion and references. Please
include a figure detailing how many abstracts were identified, how many
screened, how many selected for review, how many excluded, and why.
3. Was there an attempt to find additional studies/data from poster presentations
at conferences or from experts in the field? Did the authors solicit experts? If not,
why not?
4. The MS needs to be edited and rewritten by an English speaking profession.
There are a few typographical errors and statements that lack clarity. Such as:
when the abbreviation appeared in its first time, it should be spelled in its full form
and then followed by abbreviations, such as commin bile duct (CBD). There are
several similar mistakes in the MS.
5. Please expand the abstract’s methods to add more detail (eg, years searched,
databases etc).
6. Please revise the conclusions to only present the findings without subjective
interpretation and in concise form.
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.