Reviewer’ s report
Title: Factors affecting self-rated health of immigrant women married to native men and raising
children in South Korea: A cross-sectional study
Version: 0Date: 02 Dec 2019
Reviewer: Gracia Fellmeth
Reviewer's report:
Many thanks for the opportunity to review this interesting paper. It is well conducted. I have a few
comments for the authors' consideration.
Introduction: page 3. line 50-51. "Not surprisingly..." please provide justification for your
assumption that migrant women should lack knowledge of family planning ( or else remove "notsurprisingly")
Methods- study design. Can you provide some more details around the sampling frame for
NMFS? What was the response rate for the survey - i.e. are these results likely to be representative.
Variables and measurement - dependent variable: was this single question piloted / tested before
using? Can you be sure that the interpretation of this question (and its response categories) wasaccurate and similar (i.e. allowing for comparison) across each of the languages used? It is a verybroad question, hence my interest as it could be interpreted in multiple ways, from physical tomental health etc.
I would recommend removing words such as "surprisingly" or "interestingly" from the results.
They should be used only in the discussion when interpreting your findings.
Discussion: I would be careful of drawing any causal associations here (as you rightly state in your
limitations section). Occasionally you imply this in your results - e.g. page 11, line 21-24:"thisstudy confimed that perceived discrimination led to the deterioration of health status" - You havefound an association, but cannot conclude that one factor led to the other.
Study limitations: There is much literature on the different cultural manifestations and expressions
of health and ill-health which you could reference here, and state more clearly that inter-countrycomparisons of self-rated health are very difficult to interpret. Language/translation issues shouldalso be mentioned as a potential limitation.
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.
Unable to assessAre 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 manuscript or would you recommend an
additional statistical review?If an additional statistical review is recommended, please specify what aspects require furtherassessment in your comments to the editors.
I recommend additional statistical reviewQuality of written English
Please indicate the quality of language in the manuscript:
AcceptableDeclaration of competing interests
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