Reviewer's report
Title:Sonographic patterns of uterine fibroids among Ghanaian women
undergoing pelvic ultrasound scan
Version:3Date:7 November 2015
Reviewer: samuel O Obi
Reviewer's report:
The Editor
BMC Women’s Health.
Thanks for asking me to review the manuscript titled ‘Sonographic patterns
ofuterine fibroids among Ghanaian women undergoing pelvic ultrasound scan
Below are my comments on the manuscript which are mostly ‘Major compulsory
Revision’
A. The arrangement of the work is a bit bizarre and did not follow the standard:
Abstract, introduction, materials and method, Results Discussion, References.
B. BACKGROUND:
i) I do not agree with the assertion that there limited studies on fibroid among
African-American women. This study is in African women and your review should
focus more on findings among African, stating previous findings and then the
grey areas which your current study sets out to achieve.
ii) Are there previous studies in Africa including Ghana on sonographic pattern of
fibroid? If yes, what pattern was reported and how did it differ from findings in
other parts of the world? What are the limitations of the studies in Africa which
the current study intends to address?
C. LITERATURE REVIEW
i) It is difficult to believe that prevalence of fibroid in Africa has not been studied
previously despite a large number of scientific works emanating from Africa on
fibroid. You should do more searches for studies on the topic from Africa and
make reference to them because the current study is among African women
ii) Surprisingly, sonographic pattern of fibroid, which is the whole essence of the
study, was not given much attention in your review.
D. MATERIALS AND METHODS
i) Brief description of the procedure adopted for the ultrasound scanning is
needed.
Ii) At what point were the patients recruited and what additional data from the
patients were used and how were the data obtained?
ii) How was quality control ensured on the reports obtained from the centres?
iii) How many of the patients referred to the centre refused to give consent for
study and what happened to the results obtained?
E. RESULTS
i) Some patients who claimed they were previously diagnosed with fibroid were
found not to have fibroid. It will be interesting to find out where and how the
previous diagnosis was made?
ii) Most fibroid are diagnosed clinically. Two factors will influence the ultrasound
confirmation rate of fibroid: diagnostic competence of the referring physician and
the sonographer.
iii) Sonographic pattern of fibroid must be completely separated from location of
fibroid in the myometrium
F. TABLES AND FIGURES
i) Tables 1, 2, 3 and figure 1 should be incorporated as sentences into the result
G. DISCUSSION
i. The authors must remember that the patients under study are selected group
already suspected of having fibroid and findings should not be generalized to
entire population. This is because inclusion in the study depended among other
things on the health seeking attitude of the patients.
ii. The discussion should focus on sonographic pattern of fibroid and its
relationship to patients’ symptoms if it is intended to aid management of patients
with fibroid in Africa.
iii. The authors appeared to be writing essay on fibroid instead of focussing on
key message of the study which is to identify the sonographic pattern of fibroid
among Ghanaian women
OBI SN
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.