Content of review 1, reviewed on July 05, 2022

  1. I just wonder that the pool effects for survive analysis is not HR? but OR and RR in this paper?
  2. Are the registered their paper with protocol? The ethical statement for meta-analysis should be added.
  3. The exclusion inclusion criteria are too simple and should be identified according to PICOS.
  4. There are more recent PRISMA guidelines. Why were older guidelines used? Page, M. J., McKenzie, J. E., Bossuyt, P. M., Boutron, I., Hoffmann, T. C., Mulrow, C. D., Shamseer, L., Tetzlaff, J. M., Akl, E. A., Brennan, S. E., Chou, R., Glanville, J., Grimshaw, J. M., Hróbjartsson, A., Lalu, M. M., Li, T., Loder, E. W., Mayo-Wilson, E., McDonald, S., McGuinness, L. A., Stewart, L. A., Thomas, J., Tricco, A. C., Welch, V. A., Whiting, P., & Moher, D. (2021). The PRISMA 2020 statement: an updated guideline for reporting systematic reviews. BMJ, 372, n71. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.n71
  5. All analyses were based on the basis of previous published studies and therefore there exists no requirement for ethical approval and patients’consent.
  6. No description of the specific process of screening literatures. Moreover, for full transparency and reproducibility, search strategies should include other strategies for the remaining database. Furthermore, the authors list the search strategy regarding text-term is too simple and incomprehensive(Without mention Medical subject headings[MeSH] terms and free text terms combined with Boolean operators?), they mentioned they restricted their included studies in cohort while the search strategy was presented without study design.
  7. Whether they conducted a manual search strategy additionally as complementary retrieval from key journals, conference proceedings in case of the omission of eligible studies that were presented only with abstract which as a essential approach for including the potentially eligible literatures.
  8. It is not clear whether title and abstract screening and full text screening was done independently by two reviewers. Please clarify.
  9. There is no references were cited in statistical analyses for presenting the scientificity of methods.
  10. All references regarding RH for liver cancer in the discussion are based on Chinese, are there any recent studies abroad that publications to support their conclusion?
  11. The English writing needs to be improved. This manuscript is so hard to read due to some description is too simple.
  12. Evidence for discuss the differences in perioperative outcomes between primary hepatectomy and RH is insufficient, which cannot conclude that RH is more appropriate as a secondary treatment.
  13. The findings in their discuss their is prolix and i recommend that you can expand the discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of some RH and RFA?
  14. RH has a higher rate of postoperative complications than RFA, and later concludes that RFA has a lower rate of postoperative complications, which means that RH is not more suitable for secondary treatment than RFA? Furthermore, they highlighted that RFA is more suitable for those with poor systemic status, small residual liver size, poor liver function, and inability to tolerate anesthesia or surgery, which is contradict with the statements in introduction(and without and cites?)? How does such a conclusion suggest that RH is more suitable for secondary treatment?
  15. Is it strange that the authors didn't mention the limitations(Number of included studies and quality, bias?) of their manuscript in the discussion section? Means their MS is perfect without limitations?
  16. Their conclusion is too absolute that should be interpreted cautiously, (only including 8 retrospective studies).
  17. The rate of complication rates shown in Figure.4 only based on the 3 included studies, reliable evidence?

Source

    © 2022 the Reviewer (CC BY 4.0).

References

    Zhichao, C., Jiefang, W., Yonghua, L. 2022. Comparison of the efficacy and safety of repeated hepatectomy and radiofrequency ablation in the treatment of primary recurrent liver cancer: a meta-analysis. World Journal of Surgical Oncology.