Reviewer's report
Title:Use of HIV counseling and testing and family planning services among
postpartum women in Kenya: a multicentre, non-randomised trial
Version:2Date:1 June 2015
Reviewer: Gideon Rutaremwa
Reviewer's report:
Major Compulsory Revisions
page 6 lines 8-30 Simplify the data collection section for the reader. Please make
the paper as clear as possible so that the reader does not have to decipher what
belongs to data collection and what belongs to other sections of the paper. For
example in line 15 of page 6, informed consent is part of the ethical
considerations, while lines 19 through 30 appear to be general
background/context and not part of data collection. I suggest that this section
must be improved.
page 7 lines 13-14 Explanation of the outcome variables is not provided. For
example why the threshold of 15-months followup? Why provider initiated testing
and counseling and not the client initiated? Concerning the use of family
planning, are the authors considering all methods, all modern methods or some
specific modern methods?
page 10 line27-28 undecided women are not synonymous to infecund. Why were
infecund women included in the analysis in the first place, when the subject of
investigation is postpartum FP and PITC experiences? This must be clarified in
the methodology and thought the manuscript.
Minor Essential Revisions
Abstract is good but there is need for clarity as to whether the authors are
assessing the "feasibility" of integration of PITC services on FP utilization during
the postpartum period or whether the study is on the assessment of the effect of
integration of PITC ....... as manuscript title seems to suggest. Assessing the
effect of an intervention clearly differs from assessing its feasibility.
Still in the abstract there is need to present the Confidence intervals (CIs) as part
of the results.
The authors should consider presenting the threshold of significant results
(alpha) in the methodology section of the manuscript so that it is not over
repeated throughout the document especially in the results section of the
manuscript.
page 3 line 13 alludes to recent studies, yet reference is made to a document
that is 10 years old. Indeed there are many recent authors who have addressed
this issue (in the past 5 years) I suggest this information be up-dated and at least
three pieces of recent work referenced.
page 3 line 22 refers to "few developing countries ....." is there a possibility of
providing some examples.
Multivariate results section (pp.9-11) present the Confidence intervals also
The list of abbreviations is missing after the conclusions, yet there are many
abbreviations presented in this manuscript.
Tables 1-3, pp.17-19 correct the percentages in parentheses to only one decimal
point.
Tables 4-6 pp 20-22 the column for standard errors is not necessary since the CI
are also presented in the same tables.
Is it possible to give some key highlights of the propensity score matching of the
groups and the conclusions drawn from this?
Level of interest: An article whose findings are important to those with closely
related research interests
Quality of written English: Acceptable
Statistical review: Yes, and I have assessed the statistics in my report.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests