PONE-D-22-26363The Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Key Performance Indicators in Three Saudi HospitalsPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Alharbi,

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We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Nasser Hadal Alotaibi

Academic Editor

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: Partly

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: No

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: 1. Table 1 Data Collection, in the sample size category, the author wrote 100% without stating the number of sample size? Does the 100% is referring to the sample size obtained? Best if the author can state the number of sample obtained in frequency too. The sample size obtained for the study is unclear. Is the bed capacity in the respective hospitals is your actual sample?

2. Table 3 Analysis of Variance; best if the author can limit the decimal point to the two decimal point for standardization in statistic. Please follow journal requirement. If it is not stated, two decimal point is best used to indicate the statistic results.

3. Paragraph for discussion (line 185 - 193) is not needed. Focus your discussion based on the result without stating facts that have been previously discussed earlier in the introduction section.

4. The paper is lacking in critical recommendation on the issue, while the author is pushing for proposed contingency plan? what kind of contingency plan that should be proposed for the pandemic? This might add value to the policy maker. Thus the conclusion seemed lacking in providing concrete ending to what should be done to prevent/ address the issue.

Reviewer #2: A well organized article. The ethical review for the research meets the required standards. The methods of statistical analysis used for the research were sound and the results of the 2 way ANOVA test supported the conclusion of the article. Enough data was provided in the article although it would have been easier to absorb/understand the provided data used for analysis (OPD waiting times in days and Elective OR utilization rates during Pre, early and post pandemic periods) if they were all included in a single table of data extraction. The sizes of figures 1-4 could be increased a bit to provide better visibility for the reader. The article was written intelligibly, with appropriate use of the English language although there unnecessary repetition of facts in the introduction and discussion sections eg ''To contain the spread of the COVID-19 disease, the Saudi government adopted the lockdown strategy''. Adequate explanation of the reasons for variation in the results/findings among the 3 hospitals were give in the discussion section with good interpretation of the findings. The limitations were addressed properly and the conclusion was brief and concise. In general, it was a very interesting and quite unique article as it aims to explore, compare and analyse the differences in pandemic effects on Key performance indicators in 3 hospitals providing very different types of medical care.

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Reviewer #1: Yes: Mohd Redhuan Dzulkipli

Reviewer #2: Yes: Atinuke Hephzibah Adeyemo

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The Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Key Performance Indicators in Three Saudi Hospitals

PONE-D-22-26363R1

Dear Dr. Alharbi,

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.

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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If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they’ll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org.

Kind regards,

Nasser Hadal Alotaibi

Academic 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: 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

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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: 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: 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: (No Response)

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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

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