PONE-D-24-41152The mHealth clinical decision-making tools for maternal and perinatal health care in Sub-Saharan Africa: A systematic reviewPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Olomi,

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This manuscript is well written but still needs a few corrections. 

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Muhammad Farooq Umer, PhD Epidemiology and Health Statistics

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: 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: Good effort by the authors.

The few numbers of studies identified and analyses is an indication of the need to have more standardized and comprehensive documentations and research around mHealth in the SSA.

In line 395, the following it was mentioned that, "However, as previous reviews have identified...." It would be better to have references of some of these previous reviews.

In line 398, "To our knowledge, this is the only review written about mHealth clinical-decision-making tools

399 used in maternal healthcare in SSA." The authors need to be more cautious in the framing of their assertion. This seemed to contradict some of the discussion in line 407 - 410. The authors should check.

Between line 442 to 449, "review used a comprehensive search strategy, including a grey literature search" was mentioned as limitation and as strength. Limitations and the strengths sections of the manuscript should be revised and made clearers.

Once again, this is a very good attempt by the authors.

Best!

Reviewer #2: It was a nice oppertunity to review this manuscrpt. I have come comments below:

1. Period is missing in line 86

2. E-Health missing in line 89.

3. Reference missing in sentence of line 91 and 92.

4. What is LMICs in page 89?

5. I would suggest deleting “which was achieved as indicated in the results section part” in line 119.

6. I suggest rewriting the Materials and Methods section since there are many titles. Registration should not be the part of Method please include elsewhere. In review question section please explain in sentences rather than presenting a table. I would asl o advise not to include bullet sentences in inclusion and exclusion criteria. Please correct to Literature Search in line 151. In line 153 “Date restrictions…….please rephrase it.

7. In lines 163 and 164 authors mentioned “independent reviewers” who are also listed in the authors of the manuscripts please clarify this.

8. The quality appraisal in line 173 is not clear. Please rephrase it.

9. I suggest the table 1A, Table 1B and Table 2 should be mentioned in Data Synthesis and listed in the appendix rather than keeping in the main body of the manuscript.

10. In line 196 the “Figure 1” please include (appendix 1)

11. Design of Studies of line197 should move in Methodology and Method section.

12. I see quality Appraisal in line 238 as well. Please include in Methodology and Methods.

13. The title intervention Context is duplicated in line 245 and 269. I am not clear why it is in the results section. I also noticed that Infrastructure, data storage and technical aspects of line 289 is part of the methodology.

14. The subtitle of Results in line 310 was in italics.

15. Subtitles of Strength and limitations are in italics.

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: Yes:  Shreedhar Acharya, NOSM University, Sudbury, Ontario

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The mHealth clinical decision-making tools for maternal and perinatal health care in Sub-Saharan Africa: A systematic review

PONE-D-24-41152R1

Dear Dr. Olomi,

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,

Muhammad Farooq Umer, PhD Epidemiology and Health Statistics

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: The comments are addressed. Kudos for the efforts . I encourage all the authors to continue to explore more research opportunities and contribute to the body of knowledge.

Best wishes.

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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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