The Authors Reply

Abstract

To the Editor-We are grateful to dr sammour for the thoughtful comments on our study. 1 these comments gave us the opportunity to include additional information that we did not previously cover owing to space restrictions. indeed, our institutional committee (sNUBh iA-CUC) reviewed and approved our study protocol before study commencement. the approval date was december 10, 2012 and the approval number is BA1212-118/083-01 (subject code: 64-2012-083). the dogs were killed at the end of each experiment by intravenous injection of KCl and intramuscular injection of a Zoletil-rompun mixture (4.4 and 2.2 mg/kg) under general anesthesia. this euthanasia method was approved by the committee, and it is consistent with the recent AVMA Guidelines for the Euthanasia of Animals. 2 For pain control, ketoprofen (1-2 mg/kg, intravenously or subcutaneously) was used preoperatively for preemptive analgesia and postoperatively for up to 4 days. in the incontinence dog model, we were not able to measure any behavioral incontinence effects because we did not include a monitoring protocol in the study design. however, perineal wound care was performed regularly, and most of the wounds healed after 1 week, without any major wound problems. the weight of the animals was routinely measured every week, and all animals were housed in the Preclinical research Center. Cages were cleaned and organized at least once a day following proper disinfection procedures. the comments from dr sammour also brought our attention to the standard reporting guidelines regarding animal research. Although the Consolidated standards of reporting trials (CoNsort) guidelines have improved the quality of human randomized clinical trials, less attention has been paid to animal studies. 3 Poor-quality animal studies may prevent the successful translation of research from bench to bedside and risk the unethical use of animals in research that does not advance scientific knowledge. 4 the manner in which experiments are reported-the extent of details in the methods section and the presentation of key results-is a cornerstone of the peer review process and forms the basis for their utility and validity for future research. 5 however, most bioscience journals proctectomies with the bio-thiersch procedure to date. our results are encouraging, but longer follow-up is necessary. in our series, there was no recurrence of prolapse within 6 months of surgery, but a recurrence was seen after 1 year. After sufficient follow-up, we will present our results. Perhaps then we will explore different biological materials, and dissolvable sutures may be looked at as well.