Title: Elevated fasting glucose level increases the risk of fatty liver disease: A 10-year study
of 31,154 individuals
Version: 1 Date: 19 Oct 2022
Reviewer's report:
Deng et al conducted a retrospective study to investigate the median time-to-onset, cumulative
prevalence, and the contributing factors for FLD development in patients who underwent routine
screening and evaluation at a large public hospital in China. This is an interesting study but with
the following issues that I included in my comments below:
Major points:
1. In Section 2.2, the authors need to provide an explanation as to how they decided on the
variables to control for. Is it based on prior literature results, biological plausibility, statistical
testing etc?
2. The authors compared several baseline characteristics between the elevated and normal FBG
group, did the authors investigate any other baseline variables? What about comorbidities,
history of alcohol use etc? Variables such as these could certainly confound the results if they
are not accounted for in the model.
3. Could the authors comment on whether they excluded patients with a history of alcohol use?
This needs to be clearly stated or explained.
4. Do the patients in the elevated FBG group have a diagnosis of diabetes mellitus prior to the
routine screening/evaluation? Were they on any anti-hyperglycemic medications?
Minor points:
5. Please make sure that the supplementary material is translated into English.
6. Extensive English language editing is needed to improve readability of the manuscript.
7. The phrase “physical examination” was used throughout the manuscript and is confusing. It
should be changed to “routine screening and evaluation”, which is what I believe the authors
meant.
8. The authors should discuss the limitations in second to last paragraph and state their
conclusions in the final paragraph of the manuscript.
Title: Elevated fasting glucose level increases the risk of fatty liver disease: A 10-year study
of 31,154 individuals
Version: 1 Date: 19 Oct 2022
Reviewer's report:
Deng et al conducted a retrospective study to investigate the median time-to-onset, cumulative
prevalence, and the contributing factors for FLD development in patients who underwent routine
screening and evaluation at a large public hospital in China. This is an interesting study but with
the following issues that I included in my comments below:
Major points:
1. In Section 2.2, the authors need to provide an explanation as to how they decided on the
variables to control for. Is it based on prior literature results, biological plausibility, statistical
testing etc?
2. The authors compared several baseline characteristics between the elevated and normal FBG
group, did the authors investigate any other baseline variables? What about comorbidities,
history of alcohol use etc? Variables such as these could certainly confound the results if they
are not accounted for in the model.
3. Could the authors comment on whether they excluded patients with a history of alcohol use?
This needs to be clearly stated or explained.
4. Do the patients in the elevated FBG group have a diagnosis of diabetes mellitus prior to the
routine screening/evaluation? Were they on any anti-hyperglycemic medications?
Minor points:
5. Please make sure that the supplementary material is translated into English.
6. Extensive English language editing is needed to improve readability of the manuscript.
7. The phrase “physical examination” was used throughout the manuscript and is confusing. It
should be changed to “routine screening and evaluation”, which is what I believe the authors
meant.
8. The authors should discuss the limitations in second to last paragraph and state their
conclusions in the final paragraph of the manuscript.
Please review this paper.
user
Title: Elevated fasting glucose level increases the risk of fatty liver disease: A 10-year study
of 31,154 individuals
Version: 1 Date: 19 Oct 2022
Reviewer's report:
Deng et al conducted a retrospective study to investigate the median time-to-onset, cumulative
prevalence, and the contributing factors for FLD development in patients who underwent routine
screening and evaluation at a large public hospital in China. This is an interesting study but with
the following issues that I included in my comments below:
Major points:
1. In Section 2.2, the authors need to provide an explanation as to how they decided on the
variables to control for. Is it based on prior literature results, biological plausibility, statistical
testing etc?
2. The authors compared several baseline characteristics between the elevated and normal FBG
group, did the authors investigate any other baseline variables? What about comorbidities,
history of alcohol use etc? Variables such as these could certainly confound the results if they
are not accounted for in the model.
3. Could the authors comment on whether they excluded patients with a history of alcohol use?
This needs to be clearly stated or explained.
4. Do the patients in the elevated FBG group have a diagnosis of diabetes mellitus prior to the
routine screening/evaluation? Were they on any anti-hyperglycemic medications?
Minor points:
5. Please make sure that the supplementary material is translated into English.
6. Extensive English language editing is needed to improve readability of the manuscript.
7. The phrase “physical examination” was used throughout the manuscript and is confusing. It
should be changed to “routine screening and evaluation”, which is what I believe the authors
meant.
8. The authors should discuss the limitations in second to last paragraph and state their
conclusions in the final paragraph of the manuscript.
assistant