Reviewer's report
Title:Transarterial chemoembolization for hepatocellular carcinoma with portal
vein tumor thrombus: A meta-analysis
Version: 1Date:9 February 2013
Reviewer: Robert De Knegt
Reviewer's report:
The treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma remains a challenge for all doctors,
and despite important improvements over the last years prognosis has remained
poor. When contraindications exist to proceed with liver transplantation or
surgical resection, several options remain: radio frequency ablation, transarterial
chemo-embolization and sorafenib. In this manuscript a meta-analysis on
transarterial chemoembilization is being described.
The authors have performed their analysis according to well accepted standards,
and therefor their conclusions should be considered valid. There is a good
description of the strong points of the study, and the weak points. With regard to
the last one, definitely the absence of controlled randomized trials. However, with
the papers included in the analysis, the number of patients is such that indeed
transarterial chemo-embilization should be considered beneficial. This means
that no major revisions are needed.
However, the manuscript should be corrected by a native speaker before
publication, as there are many smaller linguistic and typing errors.
The lay-out of table 1 should be improved, it is difficult to oversee all the
information given.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Needs some language corrections before being
published
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Reviewer's report
Title:Transarterial chemoembolization for hepatocellular carcinoma with portal
vein tumor thrombus: A meta-analysis
Version: 1Date:9 February 2013
Reviewer: Robert De Knegt
Reviewer's report:
The treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma remains a challenge for all doctors,
and despite important improvements over the last years prognosis has remained
poor. When contraindications exist to proceed with liver transplantation or
surgical resection, several options remain: radio frequency ablation, transarterial
chemo-embolization and sorafenib. In this manuscript a meta-analysis on
transarterial chemoembilization is being described.
The authors have performed their analysis according to well accepted standards,
and therefor their conclusions should be considered valid. There is a good
description of the strong points of the study, and the weak points. With regard to
the last one, definitely the absence of controlled randomized trials. However, with
the papers included in the analysis, the number of patients is such that indeed
transarterial chemo-embilization should be considered beneficial. This means
that no major revisions are needed.
However, the manuscript should be corrected by a native speaker before
publication, as there are many smaller linguistic and typing errors.
The lay-out of table 1 should be improved, it is difficult to oversee all the
information given.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Needs some language corrections before being
published
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
Please review this paper.
user
Reviewer's report
Title:Transarterial chemoembolization for hepatocellular carcinoma with portal
vein tumor thrombus: A meta-analysis
Version: 1Date:9 February 2013
Reviewer: Robert De Knegt
Reviewer's report:
The treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma remains a challenge for all doctors,
and despite important improvements over the last years prognosis has remained
poor. When contraindications exist to proceed with liver transplantation or
surgical resection, several options remain: radio frequency ablation, transarterial
chemo-embolization and sorafenib. In this manuscript a meta-analysis on
transarterial chemoembilization is being described.
The authors have performed their analysis according to well accepted standards,
and therefor their conclusions should be considered valid. There is a good
description of the strong points of the study, and the weak points. With regard to
the last one, definitely the absence of controlled randomized trials. However, with
the papers included in the analysis, the number of patients is such that indeed
transarterial chemo-embilization should be considered beneficial. This means
that no major revisions are needed.
However, the manuscript should be corrected by a native speaker before
publication, as there are many smaller linguistic and typing errors.
The lay-out of table 1 should be improved, it is difficult to oversee all the
information given.
Level of interest: An article of importance in its field
Quality of written English: Needs some language corrections before being
published
Statistical review: No, the manuscript does not need to be seen by a
statistician.
Declaration of competing interests:
I declare that I have no competing interests
assistant