Review for 10.1186/s12876-019-1118-6 (2019)

Reviewer ’s report  
 
Title: Incidental finding of diffuse cavernous rectal haema ngiomatosis during bowel cancer 
screening  
 
Version: 1 Date: 20 Mar 2019  
 
Reviewer: Jan Bornschein  
 
Reviewer's report:  
 
The case presented by Abeysekera et al. is a valuableand educative contribution. Only  minor 
changes are suggested.  
 
Minor (line numbers as in the word document provided by the authors):  
 
- Page 4 / line 4: Please change to "suspected".  
 
- Page 4 / line 12: Please change to "At screening,…".  
 
- Page 5 / line 9: Please change to "Incidentally,  …". 
 
- I would personally shorten the paragraph on patient's consent. We don't need the whole 
history of his consenting process. "The patient has provided written consent to 
publication of this data." Should be sufficient.  
 
- Title page: I personally would prefer the phrase "None to declare" (as phrased further on 
in the paper).  
 
- Legend Figure 1: Please consider to rephrase "purple coloured discoloration". 
Furthermore, check spelling to be consistent with Figure 3 ("discolouration").  
 
- Legend Figure 5: Plea se change to "Nodular, predominantly…".  
 
- Figure Legends 4 -6: I would prefer consistent sentence format for these radiology 
legends.  
 
- General: I would omit "(venous blood)" from all positions in the manuscript. You can ad 
a phrase like "indicating venous  blood supply" at one position for further explanation, but 
everything else is speculation.  
 
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 which 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.  
 
Yes 
 
Are you able to assess any statistics in the manus cript or would you recommend an 
additional statistical review?  
If an additional statistical review is recommended, please specify what aspects req uire further 
assessment in your comments to the editors.  
 
Not relevant to this manuscript  
 
Quality of written English  
Please indicate the quality of language in the manuscript:  
 
Acceptable  
 
Declaration of competing interests  
Please complete a declaration of co mpeting 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 financially from the 
publication of this  manuscript, either n ow 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 rela ting to the content 
of the manuscript?  
 
4.  Have you received 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 interest s? 
 
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.  
 
No competing interest.  
 
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 in cluded as confidential comments 
to the editors, which will not be published.  
 
I agree to the open peer review policy of the journal