Prevalence of Hepatitis B Virus Surface Antigen (HBsAg) among the Out-patients in a Tertiary Institution in Nigeria.

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1. 

   Access Microbiology

   May 31, 2023

   There is no clear reason for this study. The size of the study is too small. The reviewers have highlighted major concerns with the work presented. Please ensure that you address their comments.

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2. 

   Access Microbiology

   May 31, 2023

   Comments to Author

   Major concerns: 1) Overall you spend a long time focussing on the questionaire data collection, but you ask only two questions about it, which are, awareness compared to demographics. You would benefit immensely from looking at a wider range of parameters, for example, positivity vs awareness, awareness versus living conditions, awareness versus income, awareness vs profession, awareness vs locality. This might show more meaningful information than just comparing this against age (you'd expect awareness of lots of things would increase with age) or sex (you'd expect no significant variability here, and you don't have a well distributed population). 2) The numbers are probably two small to draw many reasonable conclusions, you should consider study power calculations to determine how many people you …

   Comments to Author

   Major concerns: 1) Overall you spend a long time focussing on the questionaire data collection, but you ask only two questions about it, which are, awareness compared to demographics. You would benefit immensely from looking at a wider range of parameters, for example, positivity vs awareness, awareness versus living conditions, awareness versus income, awareness vs profession, awareness vs locality. This might show more meaningful information than just comparing this against age (you'd expect awareness of lots of things would increase with age) or sex (you'd expect no significant variability here, and you don't have a well distributed population). 2) The numbers are probably two small to draw many reasonable conclusions, you should consider study power calculations to determine how many people you need to sample to get an accurate estimation of prevalence in your locality. Consider enlisting the support of a local statistician. 3) You only test for HBsAg, which doesn't particularly tell you if patients are acutely infected, have chronic infection, or have an established infection but it hasn't quite been demonstrated to have become chronic. Chronic infection especially is much more of a risk of transmission amongst very young children and decreases as patients age until its

   Please rate the manuscript for methodological rigour

   Very poor

   Please rate the quality of the presentation and structure of the manuscript

   Good

   To what extent are the conclusions supported by the data?

   Partially support

   Do you have any concerns of possible image manipulation, plagiarism or any other unethical practices?

   No

   Is there a potential financial or other conflict of interest between yourself and the author(s)?

   No

   If this manuscript involves human and/or animal work, have the subjects been treated in an ethical manner and the authors complied with the appropriate guidelines?

   Yes

   Read the original source
3. 

   Access Microbiology

   May 9, 2023

   Comments to Author

   In their interesting cross-sectional study entitled, "Prevalence of Hepatitis B Virus Surface Antigen (HBsAg) among the Out-patients in a Tertiary Institution in Nigeria", the authors have investigated the prevalence of hepatitis B virus infection in a tertiary setting. Further, well-designed questionnaires were used to investigate patient's knowledge and attitude towards safer practices against the spread of HBV. Furthermore, the seroprevalence of the participants were examined with LabAcon rapid kit with a high specificity and sensitivity, respectively. Although the relationship between knowledge of HBV infection and sex was found to be insignificant, the authors observed a significant relationship between knowledge of HBV infection and age. Since the hepatitis infection is of concern owing to its …

   Comments to Author

   In their interesting cross-sectional study entitled, "Prevalence of Hepatitis B Virus Surface Antigen (HBsAg) among the Out-patients in a Tertiary Institution in Nigeria", the authors have investigated the prevalence of hepatitis B virus infection in a tertiary setting. Further, well-designed questionnaires were used to investigate patient's knowledge and attitude towards safer practices against the spread of HBV. Furthermore, the seroprevalence of the participants were examined with LabAcon rapid kit with a high specificity and sensitivity, respectively. Although the relationship between knowledge of HBV infection and sex was found to be insignificant, the authors observed a significant relationship between knowledge of HBV infection and age. Since the hepatitis infection is of concern owing to its spreadability, it calls for widespread awareness. This study has a merit and I recommend the following minor revision for this. 1. A rigorous methodology is adopted for data generation. comments * include the manufacture details for the kit used and outline detailed methodology on the usage if the kits. I propose citing few credible works wherein this kit was used and found to be reliable for HEPATITIS B detection and also add the findings of these works in the discussion section of the manuscript. *include the SPSS software link. 2. The results of this study are well-presented. Comments: I recommend citing few more works from other underdeveloped and developing nations based on the similar idea and discuss their findings in the result section of the manuscript. 3.The manuscript is well-organized and the key findings are well-represented. Comments: It is recommended to cite few more crucial works based on the same theme. 4. The literature survey is scare and therefore it is suggested that the authors include few more literature in the field to enhance their introduction and discussion section. 5. Overall, the manuscript has a merit and I recommend minor revision.

   Please rate the manuscript for methodological rigour

   Good

   Please rate the quality of the presentation and structure of the manuscript

   Good

   To what extent are the conclusions supported by the data?

   Strongly support

   Do you have any concerns of possible image manipulation, plagiarism or any other unethical practices?

   No

   Is there a potential financial or other conflict of interest between yourself and the author(s)?

   No

   If this manuscript involves human and/or animal work, have the subjects been treated in an ethical manner and the authors complied with the appropriate guidelines?

   Yes

   Read the original source
4. 

   Version published to 10.1099/acmi.0.000538.v1 on Access Microbiology

   Dec 13, 2022