Effects of Depressive and Anxiety-Related Behaviors in Patients Aged 30–75+ Who Have Experienced COVID-19
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
In this study, the authors explored the impact of depressive and anxiety behaviors in COVID-19 survivors aged 30-75+. It involved data collection through validated questionnaires and statistical analysis. The findings underscore the importance of tailored interventions and support systems to address the long-term psychological effects of the pandemic. The work seems novel. However, the presentation of the paper including the highlighting of the salient contributions needs improvement. Please refer to my detailed comments for specific feedback in this regard.
The following are my comments for improvement of this paper:
1. The Abstract is too long. The guidelines for the abstract available in the submission statement (https://www.mdpi.com/journal/covid/instructions) include – “A single paragraph of about 200 words maximum”. To add to this, the abstract just contains one sentence – “The findings underscore the importance of tailored interventions and support systems to address the long-term psychological effects of the pandemic” and does not highlight all the scientific contributions of this study.
2. Several fact-based statements throughout the paper are missing supporting references. For instance, this statement – “It's worth noting that similar isolation measures were put in place during previous outbreaks like SARS in 2003 and MERS in 2012, which affected regions in Asia and Canada” should have a supporting reference.
3. The review of recent works related to the effect of COVID-19 on mental health isn’t adequate as most of the cited works are papers published in 2020. Consider including recent works in this field such as https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-48044-7_27 and https://doi.org/10.1016/S2352-4642(23)00022-6 in the review.
4. Please elaborate on the inclusion and exclusion criteria that were used for recruiting the participants.
5. The step-by-step experimental protocol that each participant followed should be clearly presented
6. A comparison with prior works is missing: Please include a comparative study (qualitative and quantitative) with prior works in this field to highlight the novelty of this work.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
I appreciate the opportunity to review the manuscript titled “Effects of Depressive and Anxiety Behaviors in Patients Aged 2 30–75+ Who Have Experienced COVID-19” and hope my comments assist the authors in the revision process to improve the readability and the quality of the work.
The manuscript focuses on the effects of depressive and anxiety behaviors in patients aged 30-75+ who have experienced COVID-19. The study employs a cross-sectional approach, collecting data at a specific point in time to assess the prevalence and severity of depressive and anxiety symptoms in the target population.
The paper is well-written, the method seems to have been followed faithfully and the results are of clinical relevance.
Nevertheless, there are a quite number of aspects that I would suggest revising:
1) In order to increase readability and the possibility of reaching the article through search engines, I recommend writing the research questions or working hypotheses clearly.
2)The manuscript lacks information about the missing data and how they are handled.
3) I suggest making the tables in the manuscript clearer and more easily readable.
4) The discussion sections should be reorganized because they are poor. I believe there should be better integration of the results with the existing literature. In the discussions, please support your statements with previously published high-quality literature. Moreover, a comparison between the emerged results and other research items is lacking. Please solve this issue.
5) I also suggest the manuscript be edited to correct English language errors.
I suggest the authors reformatting the tables in the manuscript to make them clearer and more easily readable.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The authors have revised their paper as per all my comments. I do not have any additional comments at this point.
The authors have revised their paper as per all my comments. I do not have any additional comments at this point.
Reviewer 2 Report
Thank you for following my suggestions. The manuscript has been carefully improved in quality and readability.
No further revisions required.
