Publication Ethics

 

Ethics:

Each submitted manuscript is required to include an ethics approval statement indicating the approving university or institute's name, along with the approval number (if applicable) for any human and animal studies conducted. The study should adhere to the ethical standards outlined in the 2013 revision of the Helsinki Declaration, which can be accessed at http://www.wma.net/en/30publications/10policies/b3/.

Maintain the confidentiality of subjects by refraining from including participants' names, initials, or hospital numbers, particularly when reporting experiments involving animals. Authors should specify whether the institution's or a national research council's guidelines, or any applicable national laws regarding the care and use of evidence for approval by a local Ethics Committee, have been followed. Such evidence must be provided by the authors upon request, applicable to both human and animal studies.

Moreover, the methods section must specify whether consent forms were acquired and signed by all participants engaged in the study. IJMEDPH will not entertain any paper that fails to meet ethical standards.

Policy on Research and Publication Misconduct

The editorial board will vigilantly oversee and handle potential publishing misconduct, encompassing issues such as duplicate publication, plagiarism, and the utilization of false or fabricated data, images, and figures. Additionally, the board will carefully examine any modifications to authorship, unexplained conflicts of interest, and ethical concerns associated with submitted manuscripts. Should there be suspicions of research or publication misconduct, the board will adhere to the guidelines and recommendations outlined by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

[https://publicationethics.org/sites/default/files/peer-review-manipulation-after-publication-cope-flowchart.pdf]

Post-Publication Policy on Paper Retraction

The Editor-in-Chief will consider retracting a paper under the following circumstances:

  • When there is substantial evidence suggesting the unreliability of the findings, attributed to misconduct such as data fabrication, miscalculation, or experimental errors.
  • If the findings have been previously published elsewhere without proper cross-referencing, permission, or valid justification.
  • In instances where plagiarism is identified within the paper.
  • When the paper discloses unethical research practices.

Conflict of Interest

Authors are required to transparently disclose any relationships or interests pertinent to their work. Each submitted manuscript should include a designated 'Conflict of Interest' section positioned at the conclusion of the paper. This section must outline both financial and non-financial conflicts of interest. If authors have no conflicts of interest, the statement should explicitly declare: "The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest."

Appeals

 

Authors are permitted to submit a formal appeal for rejected submissions. To initiate the appeal, authors must send a written request to [email protected], with the subject line containing the term "appeal." This appeal should include detailed reasons, accompanied by point-by-point responses addressing the comments provided by the reviewers and/or Academic Editor.

It is crucial to recognize that decisions on appeals are final and not open to further review. Given that priority is given to new submissions, it's important to acknowledge that the appeal process may take longer than the initial submission process.