Gender differences in earnings among people with multiple sclerosis and associations with type of occupation and family composition: A population-based study with matched references

Alejandra Machado; Azadé Azad; Emma Pettersson; Jan Hillert; Kristina Alexanderson; Emilie Friberg

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0288998

Peer Review History

Original SubmissionNovember 29, 2022
7 Jun 2023 Decision Letter - Sreeram V. Ramagopalan, Editor PONE-D-22-32848Gender differences in earnings among people with multiple sclerosis and associations with type of occupation and family composition: a population-based study with matched referencesPLOS ONE Dear Dr. Machado, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. Please submit your revised manuscript by Jul 22 2023 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. 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Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice. [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] 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 ******** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes ****** 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 ****** 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 ****** 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: Thank you to the authors for this interesting piece of research. This paper aimed to determine the relationship between earnings and gender for those diagnosed with MS. The analysis also analysed the interactions between gender, MS occupation, family status. Comparisons were made between those without MS across occupation type and family status. The study was carried out through a population matching cohort analysis. The findings are inline with previous studies and the additional deeper analysis of gender and MS provides valuable insight into this important topic. The introduction provided good background to published studies on gender inequalities, the impact of earnings following a diagnosis of MS and the theorised reasons for these variations. The methods are robust and the authors have used additional techniques to allow for some of the limitations of the data (ie using Huber's). There are a number of different results to consider due to the main effect and interactions factorial results. These are well explained by the authors and the final section of the results does a great job at summarising a complex analysis. The discussion is well written and insightful. I particularly felt it was important to discuss the impact of part time hours and the author's discussion of methods used to try and limit this (through SA/DP) is welcomed. Overall I found this paper very useful and enjoyed reading it. I have set out one minor comment for the authors consideration below: Abstract/Introduction: (Line 49 and Line 104) The authors are looking at a number of relationships for earnings in the paper, I wonder if it would be helpful to the reader to have the aims of the study to be even more explicit. E.g. that it is looking at gender differences between those diagnosed MS and those without MS AND between those diagnosed while also considering family status and occupation. ****** 6. 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 ******** [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0288998.r001
Revision 1
30 Jun 2023 Author Response RESPONSE LETTER Manuscript PONE-D-22-32848 Dear Editor, Thank you for the possibility to submit a revised version of our manuscript titled "Gender differences in earnings among people with multiple sclerosis and associations with type of occupation and family composition: a population-based study with matched references". We also thank the reviewer for the valuable comments. We have carefully addressed the issue raised. Please, find below our point-by-point responses. In addition, changes have been made according to the comments and tracked in the revised manuscript, including reference list formating, using the Track-Changes tool. On behalf of all authors, yours sincerely, Alejandra Machado, Corresponding author Reviewer Comments Reviewer's Responses to Questions 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 ________________________________________ 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes ________________________________________ 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 ________________________________________ 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 Comments to the Author Reviewer #1: Thank you to the authors for this interesting piece of research. This paper aimed to determine the relationship between earnings and gender for those diagnosed with MS. The analysis also analysed the interactions between gender, MS occupation, family status. Comparisons were made between those without MS across occupation type and family status. The study was carried out through a population matching cohort analysis. The findings are in line with previous studies and the additional deeper analysis of gender and MS provides valuable insight into this important topic. The introduction provided good background to published studies on gender inequalities, the impact of earnings following a diagnosis of MS and the theorised reasons for these variations. The methods are robust and the authors have used additional techniques to allow for some of the limitations of the data (ie using Huber's). There are a number of different results to consider due to the main effect and interactions factorial results. These are well explained by the authors and the final section of the results does a great job at summarising a complex analysis. The discussion is well written and insightful. I particularly felt it was important to discuss the impact of part time hours and the author's discussion of methods used to try and limit this (through SA/DP) is welcomed. Overall I found this paper very useful and enjoyed reading it. I have set out one minor comment for the authors consideration below: Abstract/Introduction: (Line 49 and Line 104) The authors are looking at a number of relationships for earnings in the paper, I wonder if it would be helpful to the reader to have the aims of the study to be even more explicit. E.g. that it is looking at gender differences between those diagnosed MS and those without MS AND between those diagnosed while also considering family status and occupation. Authors response: Thank you for your comments and the opportunity to further clarify the aims of the study. We have now stated explicitly that differences are observed between those with and without MS while considering type of occupation and family composition among PwMS. (See: Page 2; lines 49-50; and Page 4, lines 104-105). Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response to reviewers R1.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0288998.r002
10 Jul 2023 Decision Letter - Sreeram V. Ramagopalan, Editor Gender differences in earnings among people with multiple sclerosis and associations with type of occupation and family composition: a population-based study with matched references PONE-D-22-32848R1 Dear Dr. Machado, 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. An invoice for payment will follow shortly after the formal acceptance. To ensure an efficient process, please log into Editorial Manager at http://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/, click the 'Update My Information' link at the top of the page, and double check that your user information is up-to-date. If you have any billing related questions, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org. 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, Sreeram V. Ramagopalan Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): Reviewers' comments: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0288998.r003
Formally Accepted
12 Jul 2023 Acceptance Letter - Sreeram V. Ramagopalan, Editor PONE-D-22-32848R1 Gender differences in earnings among people with multiple sclerosis and associations with type of occupation and family composition: a population-based study with matched references Dear Dr. Machado: I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. 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. If we can help with anything else, please email us at plosone@plos.org. Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access. Kind regards, PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff on behalf of Dr. Sreeram V. Ramagopalan Academic Editor PLOS ONE https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0288998.r004

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