Knowledge of and Attitude towards First Aid Measures among Drivers in Sharjah

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

An important and interesting paper that is based on a large sample and sound methods. It reports the findings of a comprehensive and detailed questionnaire

 The study authors raise the need for awareness of first aid techniques to be provided more universally  rather than confined to relevant emergency professionals and draw attention to training provided to drivers from transport companies.

Note and commend the extensive international references and findings that inform this study and made available to  the reader.  Though also note that it is published in the Chinese Journal of Traumatology which may not be readily accessed by non-specialist academic readers

Interesting finding of this study is that current work occupation was the only variable found to be significantly related to general overall first aid knowledge.,

An interesting effect that has not been systematically examined and that is reported for school students is that first aid training increases injury awareness and likelihood of using injury prevention awareness

Some further edits needed.

Table 1 mentioned in the text appears to be the first Table identified as “Table2”.

How were the classifications “poor, moderate, good” determined—One assumes they reflect a numerical score but possibly could reflect the importance [health wise] of different items …clarify.

The authors should consider whether the findings in the Table could be  more readily appreciated if row percentages had been used.  Eg.,  that those respondents who were in the “Other” category of occupation had a good knowledge score. Column percentages are helpful in describing the sample but row percentages more useful in other categories including current work and occupation.

Editing required

Author Response

Reviewer 1:

Thank you for reviewing our research article we took your comments in consideration and have edited accordingly.

Point 1: Table 1 mentioned in the text appears to be the first Table identified as “Table2”.

Response: edited done.

Point 2: how were the classifications “poor, moderate, good” determined—One assumes they reflect a numerical score but possibly could reflect the importance [health wise] of different items …clarify.

Response: a clear part of tool of the study was clarified accordingly and the research tool is taken from previous research done: For each individual a scoring system was calculated representative of overall knowledge score. The knowledge was assessed in both broad and specific manner. Three different scoring levels were used, a score 67% and above was labeled as ‘good knowledge’, and between 33% and 67% was labeled ‘moderate knowledge’, whereas any score below 33% indicated ‘poor knowledge’. (Reference number 1)

1. Midani O, Tillawi T, Saqer A, Hammami MB, Taifour H, Mohammad H. Knowledge and attitude toward first aid: A cross-sectional study in the United Arab Emirates. Avicenna J Med 2019;9:1-7.

Point 3: The authors should consider whether the findings in the Table could be  more readily appreciated if row percentages had been used.  Eg.,  that those respondents who were in the “Other” category of occupation had a good knowledge score. Column percentages are helpful in describing the sample but row percentages more useful in other categories including current work and occupation.

Response: please clarify this point more because I couldn’t understand it. We based the design of the tables on other tables found in the reference articles.

Reviewer 2 Report

The work, unfortunately, is a repetition of many previous studies, and this lack of novelty is my main complaint. In my opinion, the introduction should be improved and the discussion should be based on widely available literature. The work needs major revisions and possible resubmittal.

Author Response

Thank you for the comments, that were took into consideration and edited accordingly.

Point: The work, unfortunately, is a repetition of many previous studies, and this lack of novelty is my main complaint. In my opinion, the introduction should be improved and the discussion should be based on widely available literature. The work needs major revisions and possible resubmittal.

Response:

• For the repetition part, there is only one article similar in the U.A.E covering this topic, and this was mentioned clearly in the article. We took your comments about the improvements and edited over the introduction and discussion and added extra references that were used but not mentioned. Please if you can be more detailed in the comment in order to use it as a constructive way in the research ex: mention what needs improvement in clear points if applicable please.

Reviewer 3 Report

Thank you for the opportunity to read and review your research contribution. Knowledge of first aid is an interesting and priority topic for every driver and especially for professional drivers. It is essential that in order to obtain a driving license, they are taught how to act in an emergency situation and offer first aid while they arrive emergency services.

However, there are a series of aspects that should be taken into account:

1. They should begin the article with a summary and include the keywords.

2. There must be a conclusions section.

3. Very scarce bibliography. It is recommended to review pages of scientific entities such as the American Heart Association (AHA) or the European Resuscitation Council (ERC) to provide recent bibliography and increase the number of references.

Author Response

Thank you for the constructive comments, that were took into consideration and edited accordingly.

Point 1: They should begin the article with a summary and include the keywords.

Response: a summary part was added in the introduction and keywords were submitted in the full file but I didn’t find them in the uploaded pdf but I added them thanks for the comment.

Point 2: There must be a conclusions section.

Response: a conclusion section was added in the end of the article.

Point 3: 3. Very scarce bibliography. It is recommended to review pages of scientific entities such as the American Heart Association (AHA) or the European Resuscitation Council (ERC) to provide recent bibliography and increase the number of references.

Response: we took this into consideration and added WHO and ERC references and added extra references that were used in the article text but not mentioned in the references part as a problem that got fixed.

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

All corrections have been taken into account. In its current form, the article can be published. There is still the question of the relevance of the issues raised, but this I leave to the decision of the Editor in Chief.