PONE-D-21-11918

Practice of antenatal exercise and its associated factors among pregnant women in Arba Minch town, Southern Ethiopia: A community based cross-sectional study

PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Beyene,

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PLOS ONE

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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

Reviewer #2: Yes

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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3. 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

Reviewer #2: Yes

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4. 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: Yes

Reviewer #2: 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 authors have addressed all the comments. As indicated in my earlier comments, given the paucity of information on prenatal physical activity in Africa, this study would contribute to the body of knowledge on prenatal physical activity and exercise in Africa.

Reviewer #2: Thank you for the opportunity to review this manuscript. The approach is not new, however, it brings data from a population that has been little studied in relation to the practice of PE and with that the material becomes more interesting.

Title – very long - Practice of antenatal exercise and its among pregnant women in Arba Minch town, Southern Ethiopia: A community based cross-sectional study

Suggestion - Factors associated with antenatal exercise in Arba Minch town, Southern Ethiopia: A community based cross-sectional study

Abstract -

I suggest that the results with positive or negative association according to the PE practice be presented separately, both in the results and in the conclusion

Ethics – “informed consent was taken” - Written or verbal? If verbal, how was this obtained and recorded?

Introduction

– please update your data

Reference 3 - according to article - Review of Recent Physical Activity Guidelines During Pregnancy to Facilitate Advice by Health Care Providers. Evenson KR, Mottola MF, Artal R.Obstet Gynecol Surv. 2019 Aug;74(8):481-489. doi: 10.1097/OGX.0000000000000693.

Reference 7 - according to article - Physical Activity Patterns and Factors Related to Exercise during Pregnancy: A Cross Sectional Study. Nascimento SL, Surita FG, Godoy AC, Kasawara KT, Morais SS.PLoS One. 2015 Jun 17;10(6):e0128953. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0128953. eCollection 2015.

Method:

Sample size – “adequate practice of 95 antenatal exercise to be 50%” - Very high 50%, what is the reference used?

I also suggest that you include a figure that explains the representativeness of the sample in different districts, sub-districts, this was not made explicit and can be very well explained with a figure or even a map.

Results

– Will the tables not be shown in the results? They are all in the supporting information. I believe it is fundamental to see the numbers of the data presented and the tables must appear in the text, especially 5, 6 and 7 with the analyses.

And it needs to be very clear which associations are positive and which are negative (this in the results, discussion and conclusion)

Discussion

It also needs to contextualize more in the discussion the importance of marriage, education of the woman and the husband in the society where the study was carried out.

And in the limitations, further reinforce the question of the representativeness of the sample, that is, how much it represents the city, region or country where the study was carried out.

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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Factors associated with antenatal exercise in Arba Minch town, Southern Ethiopia: a community-based cross-sectional study

PONE-D-21-11918R1

Dear Dr. Beyene,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements. Please also note one of the reviewer identified an important text change in the conclusion section (see comments appended below) that you will need to address during our final technical checks  

Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication.

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Kind regards,

Dario Ummarino, Ph.D.

Senior Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

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: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: 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: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: Yes

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

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: Yes

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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: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: 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 Response)

Reviewer #2: Yes

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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: Thank you for the quick response. The authors have attended to the comments to my satisfaction. The manuscript can be accepted.

Reviewer #2: The presentation of results at the conclusion of the article is reversed - this needs to be corrected - see-

"Husband’s primary school level, history of miscarriage, inadequate knowledge, and unfavourable attitude was positively associated with adequate antenatal exercise whereas, the employment status of women and practice of regular exercise before current pregnancy was negatively associated with adequate antenatal exercise."

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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: Yes: Prof Daniel Ter Goon

Reviewer #2: No