Title: Survey on cervical cancer knowledge and its influencing factors among 2,578 women in
Shache county, Kashi, China
Version: 0 Date: 16 Dec 2022
Reviewer's report:
Thank you for referring me this interesting manuscript for reviewing.
Actually, this survey discussing an important subject in the community which need more
attention and studies by health institutions.
This manuscript needs to be revised carefully before publication, and below are some notes
which need to be considered by the authors:
General notes:
1. You mentioned many references (3-15) which study the subject about the awareness, people
education, preventive measures and treatments of cervical cancer; So, you need to write how
your survey or study differs from the previous studies otherwise it going to be similar to them
and no any additional facts will be added to health institutions.
2. The manuscript needs proof reading
3. In epidemiological study, it would be better to use urban area rather than county area
Title:
The title should mention the area and the kind of people of survey because the survey was limited
to specific area and specific population.
Abstract:
• Method: the method needs to be rewritten again because it is not clear and the authors do not
mention here the number of the subjects in this manuscript but instead, they mention it in the
results. The method needs more description of this study. Also, you mentioned in the method
that you conduct cervical cancer education! But you do survey only!
• Results: The number of your subjects need to be fixed and consistent, you mentioned that the
number of subjects from rural area was 1557 and they are 1591 in line no. 168! And the number
of subjects from the county area was 853 and in line no. 167 was 987! Which numbers are the
right?
• Keywords: Awareness, screening, vaccine are not reasonable
Introduction:
The 1st reference is old one, it should be more recent.
Line no. 109-111 need to be rewritten.
Line no. 118&119: are you investigated the awareness of cervical cancer by giving lectures?
Giving lectures is not a way for investigation.
Object and method:
In this part of the study, you need to describe the women who are involved in the survey in
details, who are they? Who are the women who met the criteria of your survey? Are they the
attendants for the community health institutions, county women’s committee and others? And
why they attend these places? Are they complaining from health issues? So, you need to describe
them carefully to know who are involved in your survey to avoid the wrong sampling.
The questionnaire form should be attached with the manuscript.
Are you mention the ethnicity in the questionnaire? It should be mentioned
The number of women from rural area is about double the number of women from the county
area. I think this point make bias in the statistical analysis; therefore, it would be better to take
the opinion of statistician about this issue
Results:
• Basic information:
1. the number of respondents in county area is 987 but in the abstract was 853 and the number
of respondents in the rural area is 1591 but in the abstract was 1557!
2. Line no. 175 you mentioned (other nationalities), it is not other nationalities but other races
or other ethnic groups.
• Knowledge about cervical cancer:
1. The presentation of the percentages is so confusing, need to be rewritten in clear way.
2. Line no. 191: the cervical cancer screen rate (in the region) was 9.6%, but this percentage
represent the rate in your survey not in the whole region, since we cannot make your sample
(2578) represent the whole region
• Factors influencing the knowledge score of cervical cancer:
The details of scoring system should be written in clear way
• Access to knowledge on cervical cancer prevention and treatment
The line no. 247-252 this paragraph is misleading because you mentioned two reading (two
percentages) for the community education and two percentages for Wechat platform!!
Discussion:
Line no. 263&264 have unclear sentences, need to be written in clear way.
The way of discussing the reading (the percentages) is confusing and misleading, this is may be
because you are presenting the discussion in a way differs from that of the result.
I hope you all the best