Scientific Quality
The scientific quality of the publications is maintained by an eminent editorial team. The editorial team consists of an editor-in-chief, a scientific advisory board, and an editorial board. The editorial team is selected based on expertise and publishing credentials, not on gender, nationality, religion, ethnicity, or any other personal attributes.
General: As all members have active and demanding careers in academia and/or patient care, it is a policy of the journal not to overwhelm them with unnecessary workloads. All members of the editorial team will be required to review articles, but never more than three per calendar year. They are required to complete the review within two weeks. The identity of the reviewers will remain anonymous. The reviewers are expected to keep the manuscript confidential, provide an unbiased scientific opinion of the manuscript, and declare any conflict of interest. Any member of the editorial team can initiate special issues and invite articles. They are also encouraged to promote the journal within the scientific community. A member of the editorial team can request to be removed at any time without providing any explanation. Unless such a request is received, it is assumed that the editorial board member agrees to serve the five-year term.
Editor-in-Chief: As per the ICMJE guidelines, the editor-in-chief is ultimately responsible for editorial decisions. The editor-in-chief can reject any article at any time before publication, including after acceptance if concerns arise about the integrity of the work. The tenure of the Editor-in-Chief is five years and is renewable.
Scientific Advisory Board: The scientific advisory board consists of a limited number of experts. The term of the scientific advisory board is five years and is renewable.
Concerns about published articles: If any allegation is made against a published article, all members of the scientific advisory board will be notified of the allegation. It is mandatory that the person who raises the allegation discloses any conflict of interest. Two of the most appropriate advisory board members will be assigned the task of investigating the case. After a thorough investigation, they will make a recommendation to the editor-in-chief either to dismiss the allegation or to publish an erratum, corrigendum, or retraction. The editor-in-chief will make a decision based on the recommendation. The decisions will be published.
If the allegation is against a manuscript published by a member of the editorial team, then it will be handled by the publisher independent of the editorial team. A minimum of two experts will be assigned the task of investigating the case. To maintain transparency, the actions taken, and the outcome will be published.
Concerns about accepted, but not yet published articles: Accepted articles undergo scientific and copy editing by the in-house editorial team before being published. If any concerns are noticed at this stage, they will be brought to the attention of the managing editor. The managing editor will discuss the issue with the authors, and the article will be published only if the concerns are fully addressed.
Appeal for fair review: If an author for correspondence believes that his or her article did not receive a fair review, and was rejected unjustly, the author can make an official complaint via [email protected]. Again, a similar procedure as described above will be followed. The editor-in-chief will make the final decision based on the recommendation of the scientific advisory board. This will be final and no further appeal is possible.
If the appeal is from one of the editorial team members about his or her article, then it will be handled by the publisher independent of the editorial team as described above. The decision of the independent experts will be final, and a copy of the decision will be sent to the author.
Editorial Board Members: One of the challenging aspects of running a journal is finding appropriate reviewers. On occasions where an appropriate reviewer can not be found or a timely review was not submitted by the reviewer who had agreed to review, an appropriately qualified editorial board member may be contacted to review the article. Also, on occasions where external reviewers cannot make a recommendation or bias in the reviewer report is observed, one of the appropriate editorial board members may be contacted for expert opinion.