Infrared Thermography as a Non-Invasive Tool in Musculoskeletal Disease Rehabilitation—The Control Variables in Applicability—A Systematic Review

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Infrared Thermography as a non-invasive tool in the musculoskeletal disease rehabilitation - the control variables in applicability - a systematic review

General comments:

This study focuses the possibility of using thermovision in the diagnosis and therapy  in the musculoskeletal disease. The work is interesting and widely supported by the literature. Valuable is information on the importance of maintaining thermal imaging standards.

The subject of the work is in line with the aim of special issue: Novel Trends in Imaging Techniques in Medicine and Sports.

Reviewer's comments:

1.Please provide a conceptual map for search process (diagram of the search for works, indicating the reasons for the rejection of the works)

2. It would be worth considering adding example thermal images.
3. In addition, consideration may be given to listing the guidelines and recommendations for IR imaging in medicine in the form of a table.

Detailed comments:

line 132:  ROI - the abbreviation should be explained the first time it is used in the text; in this case, the explanation appears in line 176

Author Response

Thank you very much for the positive reviews and valuable tips from the reviewers. All changes have been made in a text editor to make them visible.

We hope the corrections will be satisfactory for editors and reviewers.

General comments:

This study focuses the possibility of using thermovision in the diagnosis and therapy  in the musculoskeletal disease. The work is interesting and widely supported by the literature. Valuable is information on the importance of maintaining thermal imaging standards.The subject of the work is in line with the aim of special issue: Novel Trends in Imaging Techniques in Medicine and Sports.

Reviewer's comments and answers:

1.Please provide a conceptual map for search process.

Diagram of the search for works, indicating the reasons for the rejection of the works - PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) flow chart was added

2.It would be worth considering adding example thermal images.

Due to the length of the text, no sample photos have been added

3.In addition, consideration may be given to listing the guidelines and recommendations for IR imaging in medicine in the form of a table.

 The tabular form of presenting recommendations seems to us to be redundant.

4.line 132:  ROI - the abbreviation should be explained the first time it is used in the text; in this case, the explanation appears in line 176

Thank you for this remark, it has been correct

Additionally, linguistic corrections have been made.

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript aims to provide guidelines for an infrared thermographic examination of musculoskeletal injuries and evaluation of their rehabilitation.
I find the topic interesting and being worth of investigation and the document is well strucutred, organized, fluidly written, has enough background information, the methodology followed is clearly explained, the results are clearly presented.
Although I propose the following comments/suggestions:
- The abstract is poorly descriptive of the content.
- keywords should be in alphabetical order.
- I strongly suggest authors from refraining using personal pronouns such as "we" and "our" throughout the text and I encourage them to write it in an impersonal form of writing.
- The authors repeat the indications of existing general guidelines (American Academy of Thermology, European Thermological Society or the Polish Society of Thermographic Diagnostics in Medicine.)
- The cited ISO standards are outdated, new ones were produced in 2017.
- A PRISMA systematic review approach should had been followed to ensure the repeatability of the study.

Author Response

Thank you very much for the positive reviews and valuable tips from the reviewers. All changes have been made in a text editor to make them visible.

We hope the corrections will be satisfactory for editors and reviewers.

Responses to reviewers' comments

The manuscript aims to provide guidelines for an infrared thermographic examination of musculoskeletal injuries and evaluation of their rehabilitation.

I find the topic interesting and being worth of investigation and the document is well structured, organized, fluidly written, has enough background information, the methodology followed is clearly explained, the results are clearly presented.

Although I propose the following comments/suggestions:

- The abstract is poorly descriptive of the content.

Abstract has been changed to be more informative

- keywords should be in alphabetical order.

This has been corrected

- I strongly suggest authors from refraining using personal pronouns such as "we" and "our" throughout the text and I encourage them to write it in an impersonal form of writing.

This has been corrected

- The authors repeat the indications of existing general guidelines (American Academy of Thermology, European Thermological Society or the Polish Society of Thermographic Diagnostics in Medicine.)

The repetitions result from the fact that we tried to narrow down all the recommendations regarding the standardization of thermal imaging tests in one work.

- The cited ISO standards are outdated, new ones were produced in 2017.

This has been corrected

- A PRISMA systematic review approach should had been followed to ensure the repeatability of the study.

Diagram of the search for works, indicating the reasons for the rejection of the works - PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) flow chart was added.

Additionally, linguistic corrections have been made.

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

I thank the authors for improving the manuscript through addressing the reviewers comments and suggestions.

But to my understanding they can still improving it.

At abstract it still is incomplete, it misses which are the main results (in what this papers differs from others) and which is its future impact.

The keyword "termography" is misspelled. 

Author Response