Can Slight Variations to Lateral Wedge Insoles Induce Significant Biomechanical Changes in Patients with Knee Osteoarthritis?

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This study is a very useful clinical study because it examines the immediate effect of the appropriate height of insoles on patients with medial-type knee OA.

I have some comment for your manuscript. Please refer to the following,

Line 151-152: I recommend that this sentence be moved to the Methods section. In addition, have you taken into account the differences in physical function and structure between men and women? I recommend that physical characters in genders also be added.

Figure 2/3: What do Led marks indicate? Timing to 1st peak EKAM? Please provide this explanation.

Figure 2/3: Please describe the items (stance phase?) on the horizontal axis.

Line 168: Do the power production and generation have different meaning? It is easy to confuse the two words, so it would be good to unify the wording.

Line 184-5: Please provide the result related to gate speed in text.

Line 194 and 196:  I think that Figure and Table should not be refer in the discussion section.

Line 206-211: I understand that you discussed regarding the power absorption. However, I have a concern whether the power absorption and this consideration are sufficiently linked.

Please expand the discussion to be a little more clear.

Author Response

Thank you for taking the time to read and analyse our manuscript. Our team appreciates the efforts you have put into helping us improve the quality and coherence of this paper. We have made the necessary changes to improve the direction of our research. Further elaboration on the changes we have made can be found below.

Response Line 151-152: alterations were made. The health status of the participants was assessed by the Knee Injury and Osteoarthritis Outcome Score (KOOS). Results are in the results section (line 156).

Figure 2/3: alterations made.

Line 168: name changed (line 173, generation)

Line 184-5: Different speeds inserted (line 191)

Line 194 and 196: alteration made

Line 206-211: Rewording of the paragraph for greater clarity and explanation of the idea (line 212) .

Our team recognises the suggested changes have made the necessary changes to clarify our intentions.

Reviewer 2 Report

This is very interesting study, that can have potential impact on clinical management of patients with knee-OA. I just have few minor comments:

- line 74 - degrees sign should not be underlined,

- table 1 should be placed after it is cited in text, not before,

- table 1 - units should be in square brackets,

- please repeat the aim of the study at the beginning of discussion.

I recommend to publish this article after minor revisions.

Author Response

Thank you for reviewing the article and for the comments on it.

Your opinion is extremely important to us to improve this article.

All suggested changes have been made.

In relation to the table, it was placed before the reference solely to improve the formatting and appearance of the article. I hope you understand.

Thanks