Peer Review History
| Original SubmissionJune 21, 2022 |
|---|
|
PONE-D-22-17747The Prevalence of Hypertension and Hypertension Control Among Married Namibian Couples PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Weare, 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 Jan 02 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. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:
If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter. If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols. We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript. Kind regards, Melkamu Merid Mengesha, MPH Academic Editor PLOS ONE Journal Requirements When submitting your revision, we need you to address these additional requirements. 1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. The PLOS ONE style templates can be found at https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=wjVg/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_main_body.pdf and 2. Please provide additional details regarding participant consent. In the ethics statement in the Methods and online submission information, please ensure that you have specified (1) whether consent was informed and (2) what type you obtained (for instance, written or verbal, and if verbal, how it was documented and witnessed). If your study included minors, state whether you obtained consent from parents or guardians. If the need for consent was waived by the ethics committee, please include this information. If you are reporting a retrospective study of medical records or archived samples, please ensure that you have discussed whether all data were fully anonymized before you accessed them and/or whether the IRB or ethics committee waived the requirement for informed consent. If patients provided informed written consent to have data from their medical records used in research, please include this information. 3. In your Data Availability statement, you have not specified where the minimal data set underlying the results described in your manuscript can be found. PLOS defines a study's minimal data set as the underlying data used to reach the conclusions drawn in the manuscript and any additional data required to replicate the reported study findings in their entirety. All PLOS journals require that the minimal data set be made fully available. For more information about our data policy, please see http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/data-availability. "Upon re-submitting your revised manuscript, please upload your study’s minimal underlying data set as either Supporting Information files or to a stable, public repository and include the relevant URLs, DOIs, or accession numbers within your revised cover letter. For a list of acceptable repositories, please see http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/data-availability#loc-recommended-repositories. Any potentially identifying patient information must be fully anonymized. Important: If there are ethical or legal restrictions to sharing your data publicly, please explain these restrictions in detail. Please see our guidelines for more information on what we consider unacceptable restrictions to publicly sharing data: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/data-availability#loc-unacceptable-data-access-restrictions. Note that it is not acceptable for the authors to be the sole named individuals responsible for ensuring data access. We will update your Data Availability statement to reflect the information you provide in your cover letter. 4. Please include your full ethics statement in the ‘Methods’ section of your manuscript file. In your statement, please include the full name of the IRB or ethics committee who approved or waived your study, as well as whether or not you obtained informed written or verbal consent. If consent was waived for your study, please include this information in your statement as well. Additional Editor Comments: The reviewers have raised important concerns on your submission that need to be addressed. The following points were emphasized: weak data interpretation and that conclusions are not based on data; editorial and citation related issues; clarity on variable measurement and operational definition; survey weight; lack of adequate description about the study setting and population including inclusion and exclusion criteria; data quality; and the need for a substantial improvement of the discussion as it has been a shallow presentation. The authors should provide a point-by-point response to these and other comments of the reviewers in their revised submission. [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: Partly Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: I Don't Know Reviewer #2: 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 Reviewer #2: 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 Reviewer #2: 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: Weare et al. presented the study to explore the spousal concordance for hypertension (HP) and hypertension control in Namibia. The data from Namibia Demographic and Health Survey were analyzed to investigate the relationship between spouse, HP as well as disease control. They identified that, in Namibian adults, the partnership is correlated with HP and its control. The method is straightforward and the figures are easy to follow. This paper addressed a significant clinical problem, and the results are original with novelty in the target population. My major concern in this study is that the data interpretation is weak and the conclusion could not be fully supported based on the current context. As my expertise is hypertension, I will mostly comment on that part of the methods and data. 1. In methods for the built variable models: although bivariable models and multivariable models have been widely used, the models are more than what is included in the methods. Please explain the rationale for using each model (especially for the multivariable model), and provide citations of similar studies using the same model before. 2. In lines 182-183 “with the exception of partner age”: from Table 1 partner characteristics, BMI status also showed a difference here, while authors did not cover the exception. Please clarify. 3. In lines 183-184: the authors argued the HP prevalence in partner status, while no data was presented in the table. Please explain how these prevalence data are generated. 4. In lines 199-20: Same as point 4. 5. Please explain what is the gray box in the final columns of the tables. 6. In Table 4, The Pearson test showed the significance of BMI status here. Please elaborate on it in the context. 7. In line 257, the authors argued the “3.67 times”. Please explain this number was generated. 8. In line 260, please clarify how the consistency between the US study (non-significant) and your study results (assume significantly). 9. Please double-check for errors including typos, extra marks, and grammar Reviewer #2: Thank you the editor in chief, for providing this golden opportunity to me to review the interesting manuscript. This paper used very strong multilevel model to assess the prevalence, and control of HTN in Namibian couples. The researcher also identified those factors which had association with the prevalence and control of HTN in couples. There are very interesting finds which can play a great role in alleviating the increasing burden of NCD. However, to assure its contribution for readers, still it needs a great work. For this matter I tried to put my concerns here below headed as minor and major comments. I hope the author will cover all points and make the manuscript sounder. Looking for the modified document!! Minor Comments: • Line 35-41: In abstract, the result section does not include all relevant findings in line with the topic of the study. • Line 88-96: Citation has to be put. • Line 99-102: Why the research question was mixed with the Methods? It has to be separated! • Line 169 (Fig 1): Mention it in the method section. • Line 171: What type of weighing was used? Why? • Line 171-184: The citation of table missed. • Line 171: The appropriate heading needs to be given for the first objective which was “The prevalence of HTN in couples” and you need to compare both groups too with respect to the outcome variable. • Line 171-177: You mentioned as the males and females experienced the variability of HTN level across the categories of individual characteristics. But, there is no any comparison statistics in table 1 that put in the narration. It would be better to put the actual P-values in the table. • Table 1: How the variables like age, BMI, wealth index were measured? The unit? Additionally mention them in method section. Better to make the table topic more self-explanatory! When? Where? • Line 201: You defined uncontrolled HTN as those who were either unaware of their hypertension status or those who were aware but not controlled. Here both partners were unaware of their hypertension in 37.7% of couples. What about those who were aware but not controlled? And also in line 203 both partners were in control of their hypertension in only 8.31% of hypertensive couples. Which means those with uncontrolled HTN would be about 91.7%? What about 37.7%? • Line 189: Individuals? Male? Female? • Line 229: The association was simply marginal, you discusses as if they had association. What?? • Line 239: In contrast? Two similar issues are compared. Why you mentioned as a contrast? • Line 241: Regarding residency, rural or urban category was obtained as a factor? Correct it. • Line 257: 3.67? Major comments: • The author operationalized the “HTN control” in line 118-119. However, how those who were aware but not controlled were identified in NDHS survey? It has to be mentioned in a clear way. Generally, the way how an author categorized either controlled or uncontrolled HTN is not clear. The survey was not facility based and it was a snapshot. So, how confident is the author to measure and report the individuals’ HTN control status. • Even though secondary data was used, the author has to explain the following points in method part deeply: The study setting? The setting characteristics?, which population data set was used in this analysis?, how many of them fulfilled the inclusion criteria, how many of them were removed/dropped? (492 couples for HTN prevalence Vs 121 for HTN control), what study design was applied ?, how the study subjects were recruited? (all stages of sampling need to be explained in detail), what type of weighting was applied? And why?, how the data quality was assured in NDHS?, how missed variable were managed?, why a Multilevel LR model was applied?, how much was the cluster correlation level (within-cluster correlation)?, how you measured?, at what level of intra-cluster correlation the multilevel analysis is recommended?, what individual and community level factors were considered, how you assessed your model fitness? (The steps of model building have to be explained clearly). Generally, the method section is poor in mentioning above issues. Hence, the authors must incorporate these points seriously. • Discussion need to be sequenced based on the order of objectives of this study. • The discussion is shallow especially for the factors obtained for the HTN. The possible explanations for each variable were not discussed deeply. So, re-write it. • In discussion, you only tried to discuss those variables for females HTN. What about those factors for males’ HTN? • In conclusion section, the authors have to make sure that all mentioned recommendations considered all identified factors. • Did the researcher answer the research question? Which was the couple’s concordance in HTN prevalence and HTN control? I do not think so. How can we measure either the concordance exists or not? For me the researcher simply assessed the prevalence of HTN and associated factors for both sexes (males and females), and even though I do not agreed with the measurement of the variable HTN control status, the control status and factors were also assessed. I need clear explanation on these issue, and the author has to make the findings of this study more easily readable for the readers of this document. • The topics for tables and figures have to be made self-explanatory and the fig. topic needs to be put at the appropriate place, preferably at the bottom of figures. • For web page references, the URL, Access date and citation dates have to be incorporated. • English editing is also highly needed. ********** 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 Reviewer #2: Yes: Mathewos Alemu Gebremichael ********** [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.
|
| Revision 1 |
|
PONE-D-22-17747R1The prevalence of hypertension and hypertension control among married Namibian couples.PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Weare, 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 21 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. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:
If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols. We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript. Kind regards, Melkamu Merid Mengesha, MPH Academic Editor PLOS ONE Journal Requirements: Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. 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. Additional Editor Comments: It is of great pleasure that the authors have thoroughly addressed reviewer's comments in their revised submission. Just a minor comment: The authors should identify specific confounding variables than putting an equivalence between hypertension risk factors versus confounding factors. Also add who collected the data and efforts taken to maintain data quality. Does the definition for obesity line 145 inclusive of BMI=30? In figure 1, exclusion of 605 couples is from 1249 couples not from the 644 couples. as it currently stands, the exclusion seems from the 644 couples, and this should get corrected. [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] 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 ********** 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 ********** 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 ********** 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 ********** 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 addressed all my comments and significantly improved the manuscript. No further comments. ********** 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 ********** [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.<quillbot-extension-portal></quillbot-extension-portal> |
| Revision 2 |
|
The prevalence of hypertension and hypertension control among married Namibian couples. PONE-D-22-17747R2 Dear Dr. Weare, 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, Melkamu Merid Mengesha, MPH Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): Reviewers' comments: <quillbot-extension-portal></quillbot-extension-portal> |
| Formally Accepted |
|
PONE-D-22-17747R2 The prevalence of hypertension and hypertension control among married Namibian couples. Dear Dr. Weare: 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 Mr. Melkamu Merid Mengesha Academic Editor PLOS ONE |
Open letter on the publication of peer review reports
PLOS recognizes the benefits of transparency in the peer review process. Therefore, we enable the publication of all of the content of peer review and author responses alongside final, published articles. Reviewers remain anonymous, unless they choose to reveal their names.
We encourage other journals to join us in this initiative. We hope that our action inspires the community, including researchers, research funders, and research institutions, to recognize the benefits of published peer review reports for all parts of the research system.
Learn more at ASAPbio .