First Multiplatform Application for Pharmacies in Spain, Which Guides the Prescription of Probiotics According to Pathology

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This is an important application of probiotics to the medical field and broadens the potential tools for medial professionals. In general, the wording and sentence structure can be improved to make the reading more straight forward and easier to understand. 

The website figures shown look highly polished and easy to use. This will be a big help with adoption of this platform. Adoption of a tool like this is often the most difficult part. It would be beneficial to include the steps, potential roadblocks, regulations, and a timeline on the rollout of a system like this. These considerations may change the development decisions. for instance, security of medical records may require specific database, or security criteria. 

Below I have included a few specific notes on the manuscript.

The Abstract has several pronouns in a row that make it less clear.

Figure 1 is taken from another publication. Make sure that there is proper approval to replicate the image in this publication.

Line 76 - The Objective should include more measurable criteria.

Line 194 - I think you mean established rather than stablished.

This is an exciting manuscript and I look forward to seeing more medical tool like this to incorporate probiotics into normal medical prescriptions.

Thank you,

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

In my opinion, this study is an important one in the field of medical probiotic research, being the first probiotic guide in Spain.

The intestinal microbial balance has a big influence on human health and on the prevention of different diseases. Therefore, the development of a multiplatform application that could be used by all practitioners (professionals but also anonymous users) could be useful in maintaining a good balance of the  intestinal microbiota and to realise a network connection between doctors and pharmacists.

I think that the present study could have big interest for the professionals and could be used as a tool to facilitate the collaboration between them, but I have some small comments:

 

1. Lines 97-98: I think that the words Lactobacillus and Lactobacillus acidophilus should be written in italic (Lactobacillus, Lactobacillus acidophilus). Please check in the whole manuscript.

2. Line 109: please put the full stop (dot) before the reference 14.

3. Lines 116-117: please explain under the Figure 2 (Entity relation model) the meaning of N, M and 1 so that could be easily understood by the readers.

4. I think that Figures 3,4,5,6 should be in English, considering that all the article it is written in English.

 

Thank you!

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

1. There is no cross-reference to Fig 1 in the text.
2. Authors made copy of Figure 1 from reference 2. Do Authors have the permission of Moya and Ferrer? The illustration does not quite fit into the content of the Introduction. Is too detailed. Authors should create something original on the basis of their knowledge and literature.
3. Reference 8 line 49 is not the original WHO/FAO report. There is also newer definition of probiotics from ISAAP (“Live microorganisms that, when administered in adequate amounts, confer a health benefit on the host”), which should be cited. Look at: https://isappscience.org/for-scientists/resources/probiotics/ and it was published in https://www.nature.com/articles/nrgastro.2014.66
4. The aim of the study was not precisely presented. What are the research hypotheses? What authors wanted to achieve?
5. The ‘Introduction’ is too general and little informative. There should be given more reliable information about probiotics.
6. Figure 2 caption: Of what? Give more details.
7. 3 - 6 captions: again give more details – homepage of what? Recommended probiotics – for what? Give explanation. If somebody opens the article at page 5 or 6 – the person will know nothing from these figures without good caption.
8. There are only 15 references. Authors should give more recent references in the Introduction.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

I have no more comments.