-->PONE-D-25-35262-->-->Prevalence and Practice of Traditional Uvulectomy Among Sudanese Children and Adolescents, Along with Maternal Perception and Associated Risk Factors: A Community-Based Cross-Sectional Study-->-->PLOS ONE

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Academic Editor

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Reviewers' comments:

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-->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: Partly

Reviewer #3: Yes

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: Yes

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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

Reviewer #3: Yes

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: 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: To the Editor:

Thank you for the opportunity to review this manuscript.

To the Author:

Overall, the work is well-executed and demonstrates a commendable dedication to community-level research. I do have some suggestions for improvement:

1. Please revise the manuscript to ensure all text reflects your own writing style and avoid the use of AI-generated language. Paraphrase any sections that may have been produced by AI.

2. Please format the author list with numerical superscripts to clearly indicate author affiliations or order.

3. There appears to be an inconsistency in the findings regarding maternal perceptions of uvulectomy. While 30% of respondents believe uvulectomy is a beneficial treatment, a larger proportion (47%) indicated that the presence of the uvula is not harmful to the child. Please address this discrepancy in the discussion. If a significant portion of participants do not believe the uvula poses a threat, explain the basis for the 30% who consider its removal to be a good treatment, particularly given the study's focus on maternal perceptions.

Reviewer #2: Review Report

Title :Prevalence and Practice of Traditional Uvulectomy Among Sudanese Children and Adolescents, Along with Maternal Perception and Associated Risk Factors: A Community-Based Cross-Sectional Study

Review Comments

A.General Comments

-Use appropriate guideline of the journal

-Add line numbers

-Inappropriate sentencing E.g. Introduction

-Subsections entail inadequate contents

-Grammatical errors

B.Specific Comments

i. Scope

-Is that practice or perception ? Is that single practice or repeatition or both? How do you analyze the practice with perception? oe indeendntly since both of them are maternal perceptions and practice?

ii. Title

-Rewrite it

-Add years

iii. Abstract

-The background fails to contain strong knowldge gap and advae consequence

-Method should be methods

-Use CI while stating the percentage

-Associated factors and the appropriate analysis is missed

-What unsterilized tools? What did they actually use?

-Not appropriate analysis is presented

-Partial objective is missed

-Study design is missed

-Results are indequate, inconsitent with the objective E.g. perception, not presented OR or AOR

-The conclusion is weak, rewrite it again,

iv. Introduction

-Inadequate

-Icomplete E.g. years missed

-Magnitude, severity, factis asociated, eforts made gobaly, reginaly and natinaly to prevent and control HTPs including traditiinal veloctomy is missed.

-Fine objectives shoud be presented at the end of the introduction section

v.Methodology

-Use methods and materials instead or maintain the guideline if the journal

-Poorly organized E.g. Sub sections are not wel orgnized

-Study setting :E.g. The ten stats, health services avaiable were missed

-Why you used convinience sampling in comunity based studies

-What is that local language? [translation]

-The tool, its types, source, contents, validation, the data quaity asurance means were missed? E.g. The quaity of numrators and whethe there is supervision is missed.

-What was done for those with UT?

vi.Results

-Is short

-Maintain comsitency

-Use ilusteratives

-Tables are not self explanatory

-Check for statistics

-Sub group analysis for age a <5, 6-10, 1 and more years can be dne, sex can alo better explain it. In additiin, maternal age can be classified as <35 and >35 years, Whether they conault for medical care or not. Again, for whom did they done TU? Is that whonwvr ufrs from it? Or among those whosufer it once? or more than once?

-Consult on how to write the result section [Refer to articles in the same journal]

Vii. Discusion and other consequent sections

-More detail exlpanatin, justificatin and refetrences should be used

-Consult your own findings for better explanations

-The cnclusion is not inline with the the scope

-Rec9mdatins are infated

Reviewer #3: Dear authors

It is a nice topic , unfortunately the habit Traditional uvulectomy still present in some countries beside my comments on this article , I think it is better to conduct other community based interventional study to formulate some strategies for stopping this habit

Title

The present title is “Prevalence and Practice of Traditional Uvulectomy Among Sudanese Children and Adolescents, Along with Maternal Perception and Associated Risk Factors: A Community-Based Cross-Sectional Study” The title is too long It is better to be shorten to “Prevalence and Practice of Traditional Uvulectomy Among Sudanese Children and Adolescents with Maternal Perception and Associated Risk Factors”

Methods

1. The data collected by trained medical students , How many students were participated and at which college’s level

2. The questionnaire used in the study prepared by the researchers or depended on the previous studies , and What are the local languages used?

3. Family income depended on which criteria?

4.

5.

Results

1. The tables are too long about nine pages

2. There are many variables in the tables , I think some can be combined , and others removed like the question “Where are you from?”

3. Clarify about “Reasons for uvulectomy practice” in the table 3 , these are depended on the mother’s knowledge or those mothers whom their children underwent uvulectomy

4. In table 4 , did you find the decision of doing uvulectomy done by more than one person could be both parents or the mother and grandmother and so on?

5. Do you regard the ( Acacia ( Qarad) ,- Rose geraniums ( a'atroon)) as medications ?

6.

Discussion

1. There is a is a poor / minimal comparison with previous (local or international studies) , References

Follow the journal guideline regarding references writing

1. Journal titles should be unified either in abbreviated form or in full title form

2. Only the first six authors surname and initials should be written and the suffix et al will be added for the seventh and above.

3. It is not necessary to add PMID , PMCID , Epub of the articles , only add the doi.

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: Yes: Masood Abdulkareem Abdulrahman

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Prevalence, Practices, and Maternal Perceptions of Traditional Uvulectomy Among Sudanese Children and Adolescents: A Community-Based Cross-Sectional Study

PONE-D-25-35262R1

Dear Dr. Jaber,

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.

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Kind regards,

Kahsu Gebrekidan, Ph.D.

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

**********

-->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

**********

-->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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Reviewer #1: No

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