PONE-D-19-19407

Health impact of hepatic-venous occlusive disease in Tahtay Koraro district - Tigray region, Ethiopia, 2017

PLOS ONE

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3. We noticed you have some minor occurrence of overlapping text with the following previous publication(s), particularly in the Introduction, which needs to be addressed:

http://njmonline.nl/getpdf.php?id=933

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0973-6883(11)60128-X

https://doi.org/10.1016/0268-960X(93)90023-W

http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2010/313280

In your revision ensure you cite all your sources (including your own works), and quote or rephrase any duplicated text outside the Methods section. Further consideration is dependent on these concerns being addressed.

4. We noticed you have some minor occurrence of overlapping text with the following previous publication(s), particularly in the Introduction, which needs to be addressed:

http://njmonline.nl/getpdf.php?id=933

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0973-6883(11)60128-X

https://doi.org/10.1016/0268-960X(93)90023-W

http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2010/313280

In your revision ensure you cite all your sources (including your own works), and quote or rephrase any duplicated text outside the Methods section. Further consideration is dependent on these concerns being addressed."""

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Additional Editor Comments:

The manuscript needs extensive revision according to reviewers' commnents.

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

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Reviewer #1: No

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Reviewer #1: Yes

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5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: The study titled 'Health impact of hepatic-venous occlusive disease in Tahtay Koraro district- Tigray region, Ethiopia, 2017 is a unique study that reports on the epidemiology of the disease in a small town in Ethiopia.Hepatic venous occlusive disease seems to be uniquely affecting this small village and the risk factors are not known. There is very scant information on the impact as well as epidemiology of the disease and hence the study is significant. However, the manuscripts needs some editing before it can be published.

1. the title could be modified to "Health impact of hepatic-venous occlusive disease in a small town in Ethiopia- case study from Tahtay Koraro district in Tigray region, 2017

2. the results in the abstract should describe the trend over time of VoD fatality given in figure 3. They should describe the change points in 2008/09 and 2009/10 and why these inflection years.

3. in the abstract, line 29, after however, they should add 'the problem...

4. on page 3, line 53, instead of saying 'according to ...., it is sounds better to say, 'It has been reported that the incidence ...

5. on page 4, line 69, they should add a couple of sentences that describe what the current gaps are what the study adds to the current literature. it looks like that there are only two studies (ref 12 and 14) that have been made on this disease but none of them are published. But, searching the internet with "hepatic-venous occlusive disease in Tahtay Koraro district- Tigray region" came up with may more studies that should be included in this review. For example, I listed 7 below (and there may be more)

0. Cindy Chiu,1 Colleen Martin,1 Daniel Woldemichael,2 Girmay W Selasie,2 Israel Tareke,3 Richard Luce,4 Gidey G Libanos,5 Danielle Hunt,1 Tesfaye Bayleyegn,1 Adamu Addissie,6 Danielle Buttke,1 Amsalu Bitew,7 Sara Vagi,1 Matthew Murphy,1 Teshale Seboxa,6 Daddi Jima,8 and Asfaw Debella8. SURVEILLANCE OF A CHRONIC LIVER DISEASE OF UNIDENTIFIED CAUSE IN A RURAL SETTING OF ETHIOPIA: A CASE STUDY. Ethiop Med J. 2016 Jan; 54(1): 27–32.

1. Bane A, Seboxa T, Mesfin G, Ali A, Tsegaye Y, M WT, et al. An outbreak of veno-occlusive liver disease in northern Ethiopia, clinical findings. Ethiopian medical journal. 2012 Apr;50(Suppl 2):9–16. PubMed PMID: 22946291. Epub 2012/09/06. eng. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

2. Mesfin G, Ali A, Seboxa T, Bane A, Tensae MW, Gebressilassie S, et al. An epidemiological study into the investigation of liver disease of unknown origin in a rural community of northern Ethiopia, 2005. Ethiopian medical journal. 2012 Apr;50(Suppl 2):1–8. PubMed PMID: 22946290. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

3. Schneider J, Tsegaye Y, M WT, S GS, Haile T, Bane A, et al. Veno-occlusive liver disease: a case report. Ethiopian medical journal. 2012 Apr;50(Suppl 2):47–51. PubMed PMID: 22946295. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

4. Debella A, Abebe D, Tekabe F, Mamo H, Abebe A, Tsegaye B, et al. Toxicity study and evaluation of biochemical markers towards the identification of the causative agent for an outbreak of liver disease in Tahtay Koraro Woreda, Tigray. Ethiopian medical journal. 2012 Apr;50(Suppl 2):27–35. PubMed PMID: 22946293. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

5. Abebe D, Debella A, Tekabe F, Mekonnen Y, Degefa A, Mekonnen A, et al. An outbreak of liver disease in Tahtay Koraro Woreda, Tigray region of Ethiopia: a case-control study for the identification of the etiologic agent. Ethiopian medical journal. 2012 Apr;50(Suppl 2):17–25. PubMed PMID: 22946292. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

6. Debella A, Abebe D, Tekabe F, Degefa A, Desta A, Tefera A, et al. Physico-chemical investigation of consumables and environmental samples to determine the causative agent of liver disease outbreak in Tahitay Koraro Woreda, Tigray. Ethiopian medical journal. 2012 Apr;50(Suppl 2):37–45. PubMed PMID: 22946294. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

6. On page 4, lines 72- please remove this line.

7. On page 4, line 76, please add population size.

8. the results section needs some editing with each table and figure described fully. Start as follows:

Table 1 shows ....

9. There are many typographical errors that need to be edited. The corresponding author's e-mail is misspelled, on page 5, line 97, Excel is misspelled.

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Reviewer #1: Yes: Mulugeta Gebregziabher, PhD

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Health impact of hepatic-venous-occlusive disease in small town in Ethiopia – case study from Tahtay Koraro district in Tigray region, 2017

PONE-D-19-19407R1

Dear Dr. Weldearegay,

We are pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it complies with all outstanding technical requirements.

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With kind regards,

Prof. Raffaele Serra, M.D., Ph.D

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

amended manuscript is acceptable

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

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2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

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3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

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5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: No

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6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: The authors have responded to my comments. However, the manuscript still needs some editing. The organization of the results section as well as the flow of the paragraphs could be improved with some editorial help.

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7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No