Potential Impact of Non-Steroidal Mineralocorticoid Receptor Antagonists in Cardiovascular Disease

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

1-The manuscript is original and novel

2-The Presentation of the manuscript is good which attract the Interest to the readers.

3-The introduction provide sufficient background and include all relevant references and styled according to the style of the journal.

4- I will be happy if authors, specify in paragraph 4.4,consideration and cited the following papers https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopha.2021.112227

Author Response

14 January, 2023

Special Issue Editors
International Journal of Molecular Sciences

Dear Editors,

Thank you for your letter regarding our manuscript (MS ID# ijms- 2142794), which we recently submitted to the Special Issue entitled “Molecular Endocrinology and Metabolism” of the International Journal of Molecular Sciences. While we were disappointed that our manuscript was not acceptable for publication, we are grateful for your positive comments and we appreciate the opportunity to resubmit our revised manuscript.

We have made every effort to address all of the issues and concerns raised by the Editors and reviewers. As detailed in the point-by-point response letter, we have made extensive changes in the text in accordance with the reviewers’ suggestions. Finally, the manuscript has been re-checked for possible errors. The revisions are visible in track changes mode.

Although we were allowed only 5 days to revise our manuscript, we believe that our revisions have greatly improved our manuscript and strengthened the implications of our results. We hope that the revised manuscript will now be suitable for publication in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences.

Yours sincerely,

Akira Nishiyama, MD, PhD

Department of Pharmacology,

Faculty of Medicine, Kagawa University,

1750-1 Ikenobe, Miki-cho, Kita-gun, Kagawa 761-0793, Japan

Phone: +81 87 891 2125; Fax: +81 87 891 2126

E-mail: [email protected]

Response to the Editor

Editor’s comment

Your manuscript has been reviewed by experts in the field.

Response

We thank the Editor for providing us with the opportunity to address the reviewer’s comments and to resubmit a revised manuscript.

Response to the comments raised by reviewer #1

Comment-1

The manuscript is original and novel.

Response

Thank you very much for this comment.

Comment-2

The Presentation of the manuscript is good which attract the Interest to the readers.

Response

Thank you very much for your kind appreciation.

Comment-3

The introduction provides sufficient background and include all relevant references and styled according to the style of the journal.

Response

Thank you very much for your time to go through every detail in the manuscript.

Comment-4

I will be happy if authors, specify in paragraph 4.4, consideration and cited the following papers https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopha.2021.112227

Response

We have added the provided reference in the revised manuscript, as follows:

Page 8, Lines 367-371

“Aldosterone promotes atherosclerosis [60], where low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL)-C plays a central role [61]. However, finerenone treatment reduces intrinsic arterial stiffness in Munich Wistar Frömter (MWF) rats accompanied with changes in elastin organization, normalization of matrix metalloproteinases, and reduction of oxidative stress [62].”

Reviewer 2 Report

This is an excellently written article with a thorough review of literature and strong findings and clinical implications. I don't have much to add other than asking the authors to add a few sentences concerning the strengths and limitations of this review. 

Author Response

14 January, 2023

Special Issue Editors
International Journal of Molecular Sciences

Dear Editors,

Thank you for your letter regarding our manuscript (MS ID# ijms- 2142794), which we recently submitted to the Special Issue entitled “Molecular Endocrinology and Metabolism” of the International Journal of Molecular Sciences. While we were disappointed that our manuscript was not acceptable for publication, we are grateful for your positive comments and we appreciate the opportunity to resubmit our revised manuscript.

We have made every effort to address all of the issues and concerns raised by the Editors and reviewers. As detailed in the point-by-point response letter, we have made extensive changes in the text in accordance with the reviewers’ suggestions. Finally, the manuscript has been re-checked for possible errors. The revisions are visible in track changes mode.

Although we were allowed only 5 days to revise our manuscript, we believe that our revisions have greatly improved our manuscript and strengthened the implications of our results. We hope that the revised manuscript will now be suitable for publication in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences.

Yours sincerely,

Akira Nishiyama, MD, PhD

Department of Pharmacology,

Faculty of Medicine, Kagawa University,

1750-1 Ikenobe, Miki-cho, Kita-gun, Kagawa 761-0793, Japan

Phone: +81 87 891 2125; Fax: +81 87 891 2126

E-mail: [email protected]

Response to the Editor

Editor’s comment

Your manuscript has been reviewed by experts in the field.

Response

We thank the Editor for providing us with the opportunity to address the reviewer’s comments and to resubmit a revised manuscript.

Response to the comments raised by reviewer #2

Comment-1

This is an excellently written article with a thorough review of literature and strong findings and clinical implications. I don't have much to add other than asking the authors to add a few sentences concerning the strengths and limitations of this review. 

Response

Thank you very much for your comment. We have discussed elaborately the possible molecular mechanism underlying cardioprotective effects of nonsteroidal MRAs from pre-clinical studies. Also, we have summarized the important information in a table, so that reader can get a clear picture at a glance which might be a strength of this review. In contrast, we have discussed mainly the cardioprotective effects and molecular mechanism of finerenone and esaxerenone among the available non-steroidal MRAs which could be a limitation of this review. To address the comment, we have added the following text in the manuscript-

Page 14, lines 485-489

“Here, we have discussed elaborately the pre-clinical evidence of non-steroidal MRAs, and possible molecular mechanism underlying cardioprotective effects and summarized the information in Table 1 and 2. Due to the convincing therapeutic efficacies especially in terms of cardioprotective effects, we have mainly discussed about finerenone and esaxerenone among the available non-steroidal MRAs.”