Current knowledge of physicians’ dual practice in Iran: A scoping review and defining the research agenda for achieving universal health coverage

Javad Moghri; Jalal Arabloo; Mohammad Barzegar Rahatlou; Maryam Saadati; Negar Yousefzadeh

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0277896

Peer Review History

Original SubmissionAugust 25, 2022
27 Oct 2022 Decision Letter - Andrea Cioffi, Editor PONE-D-22-23688Current knowledge of Physicians' dual practice in Iran: A scoping review and defining the research agenda for achieving Universal Health CoveragePLOS ONE Dear Dr. Arabloo, 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 Dec 11 2022 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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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: Reviewer’s Comment I am pleased reviewing this article. I found it interesting and informative for policymakers and researchers. The authors have used a sound methodology and rigorously searched for available evidence. In general, it is a well-designed study, used scientific research methodology and written in standard English. I have only few comments for the authors Abstract Method(L 28-33): As inclusion criterion, did you use a time frame for studies to be included in your review? If so, I suggest including the timeframe, otherwise mention that there was no time frame used as a searching strategy. Usually a certain period of time is included to narrow your searching strategies so that most relevant studies are included. Result(L 36-47): The result and conclusion section of the abstract needs a minor revision to make a smooth flow and coherent. In my opinion, it would be much better if you add summary of your findings before you put your recommendation about "more research is required...". Therefore, L39-43 seems a recommendation and need to be moved into conclusion. Similarly, under result section you can add your main findings which are basically limited evidence on the subject matter and methodological gaps even for those identified few articles. Materials and methods 1) I see you have mention certain inclusion criteria. It is also important to list out you exclusion criteria. I recommend explaining the inclusion and exclusion criteria explicitly. 2) Why didn’t you add a third reviewer when there was a disagreement besides of the in-depth discussions? I believe using a third reviewer can be tie breaker during those disarrangements. ****** 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.0277896.r001
Revision 1
28 Oct 2022 Author Response Additional Editor Comments: The manuscript is well written, however - as indicated by the reviewer - some minor revisions are necessary. Response: Thank you for your consideration. Reviewer #1: Reviewer’s Comment Comment: I am pleased reviewing this article. I found it interesting and informative for policymakers and researchers. The authors have used a sound methodology and rigorously searched for available evidence. In general, it is a well-designed study, used scientific research methodology and written in standard English. I have only few comments for the authors Response: Thank you for your consideration and valuable comments. Abstract Method(L 28-33): As inclusion criterion, did you use a time frame for studies to be included in your review? If so, I suggest including the timeframe, otherwise mention that there was no time frame used as a searching strategy. Usually a certain period of time is included to narrow your searching strategies so that most relevant studies are included. Response: Thank you. We added "until August 3, 2020" to the method sections of abstract and main text. Result(L 36-47): The result and conclusion section of the abstract needs a minor revision to make a smooth flow and coherent. In my opinion, it would be much better if you add summary of your findings before you put your recommendation about "more research is required...". Therefore, L39-43 seems a recommendation and need to be moved into conclusion. Similarly, under result section you can add your main findings which are basically limited evidence on the subject matter and methodological gaps even for those identified few articles. Response: Thank you. We moved L39-43 into conclusion section. We also added following sentences to the result section: There were limited evidence on the nature, types, and prevalence of this phenomenon for different provinces and medical specialties and on health policy options in Iran. There seems to be a methodological gap (a gap in the type of study and its method) in the subject area. Most studies have only used quantitative or qualitative study methods and based on the self-report of research samples in most of the included studies. Materials and methods 1) I see you have mention certain inclusion criteria. It is also important to list out you exclusion criteria. I recommend explaining the inclusion and exclusion criteria explicitly. Response: Thank you. We corrected this section as follow: The studies were selected based on the following eligibility criteria: Inclusion criteria: 1) All primary or secondary studies on dual practice in physicians at any level of the Iranian health system 2) Only the studies with a full text in English or Persian were included. Exclusion criteria: 1) Studies on dual practice in other health professionals such as nurses 2) Review studies, editorials, letters to the editors, abstracts, and commentaries; 3) Studies without a full text or with a full text in a language other than English or Persian; 4) Duplicate studies whose findings have been published in several articles, and in this case, the most high-quality ones were included in the study. 2) Why didn’t you add a third reviewer when there was a disagreement besides of the in-depth discussions? I believe using a third reviewer can be tie breaker during those disarrangements. Response: Thank you. We corrected this section as follow: Disagreements between reviewers were resolved by the decision of a third reviewer. Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0277896.r002
6 Nov 2022 Decision Letter - Andrea Cioffi, Editor Current knowledge of Physicians' dual practice in Iran: A scoping review and defining the research agenda for achieving Universal Health Coverage PONE-D-22-23688R1 Dear Dr. Arabloo, 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, Andrea Cioffi Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): Reviewers' comments: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0277896.r003
Formally Accepted
9 Nov 2022 Acceptance Letter - Andrea Cioffi, Editor PONE-D-22-23688R1 Current knowledge of Physicians' dual practice in Iran: A scoping review and defining the research agenda for achieving Universal Health Coverage Dear Dr. Arabloo: 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. Andrea Cioffi Academic Editor PLOS ONE https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0277896.r004

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