Acta Medica Ruha journal Signs the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA)
We are pleased to announce that Acta Medica Ruha has signed the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA (https://sfdora.org).
Ethical Principles and Publication Policy
A) Publication and Authorship
Acta Medica Ruha is an online, international, double-blind peer review, scientific, academic, open to public access journal. Journal's publishing language is English. Published in four issues (March, June, September, December) online and open to public access. It may publish special or additional issues.
For any sorts of writing sent to our journal, they accept and declare that they will follow all the "Writing Rules" of Acta Medica Ruha journal and all conditions stated in the journal, and they transfer all kinds of publishing rights indefinitely to Acta Medica Ruha journal.
Acta Medica Ruha journal has all copyrights of the articles accepted to publish.
Authorship and Changes in Authorship
All authors are expected to contribute significantly to each of the following aspects:
• Conceptualisation and design of the study, acquisition of data or analysis and interpretation of data.
• Drafting the manuscript or critically revising it for important intellectual content.
• Giving final approval to the version to be submitted. Before submitting their manuscripts, authors should carefully review the list and order of authors to ensure accuracy and completeness.
Changes to the author list, such as additions, deletions, or rearrangements, should only be made prior to acceptance of the manuscript and with the approval of the journal Editor. To initiate such changes, the corresponding author must submit to the Editor: (1) justification for the changes to the author list and (2) written confirmation (by e-mail or letter) that all authors agree to the proposed addition. The approval of the corresponding author is also required in the case of adding authors, changing the author ranking, or deleting authors. The editor will only consider changes in authorship after the manuscript has been accepted. Publication of the manuscript will be suspended during the editor's review of the request. In addition, after an article has been accepted for publication, authors will not be allowed to leave the article, authors will not be allowed to be added, and reordering will not be allowed.
B) Editors, Reviewers and Other Parties
Considering the conflicts of interest between our editors, referees, other parties and the publisher, all parties in the journal Acta Medica Ruha accept and declare that they have transferred all their rights to Acta Medica Ruha indefinitely and gratuitously in order to ensure that the publication process of the studies is completed independently and impartially. All rights of Acta Medica Ruha journal belong to its publisher (Principal owner/concessionaire). Our editors, referees and other parties cannot claim any material and moral rights from the publisher (Principal owner/concessionaire). They accept and declare all duties gratuitously on a voluntary basis.
Otherwise, they can resign from editorial, refereeing and other duties after notifying the publisher (Principal owner/concessionaire) in writing. They cannot make any claims for the period prior to the notice of resignation.
Our editors, referees and other parties accept and declare that they comply with all the conditions in Acta Medica Ruha journal and transfer all kinds of copyright/material/moral rights to Acta Medica Ruha indefinitely and gratuitously.
C) Open Access Policy
Acta Medica Ruha is an e-journal that is open to public access. Open access policy is based on the rules of Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI) . By open access, it is implied that all users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print and search whole texts and give link to them, and that the journal is free for public use on the Internet.
D) Plagiarism
Acta Medica Ruha journal accepts all terms and conditions of COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) regarding plagiarism policy. Flowcharts and workflows determined by COPE regarding plagiarism are embraced.
All articles sent to Acta Medica Ruha journal to be published are checked by using Turnitin / iThenticate software. Acta Medica Ruha journal studiously demands and reviews all plagiarism reports from authors for their articles sent. The similarity rate of the articles sent to our journal should be below 20%. Articles that are determined having plagiarism in the first stage of evaluation are denied and not considered for publishing.
E) Ethical Principles Policy
Acta Medica Ruha journal editorial committee embraces the criteria of International Council of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), World Association of Medical Editors (WAME) and Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in terms of ethical principles.
Research & Ethics
All authors must contribute significantly to the research. Authors are responsible for subjects such as plagiarism, forgery, falsification and false authorship. In case of detecting any of those, the article is rejected. An article that is in the evaluation process cannot be sent to another journal or published. The author is responsible for uploading the document and information on the system that are asked for the studies that require ethical committee permission. Our journal makes authors obliged to identify the ethical committee that approves the research.
All scientific research protocols must be approved by an ethics committee in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, US Federal Policy for the Protection of Human Subjects, European Medicines Agency Guidelines for Good Clinical Practice,"Guide for the care and use of laboratory animals (8th edition, 2011)" and/or "International Guiding Principles for Biomedical Research Involving Animals (2012)" and our journal expects authors to comply with these standards.
According to the journal's ethics policy, approval of research protocols by an ethics committee in accordance with international agreements is required for all research studies.
If the submitted manuscript does not include ethics committee approval, it will be reviewed according to the COPE guidelines (Guidelines for Editors: Research, Audit and Service Evaluations). If the study requires ethical approval, authors will be asked to provide ethical approval to continue the review process.
If the authors are unable to provide ethical approval, their manuscript will be rejected and their institution and, where necessary, the relevant organisations in their country will be informed that such studies require ethics committee approval. If they give approval, the review of the manuscript will continue.
If the study does not need ethics committee approval after the review of the editorial board, the authors may be asked for ethics committee approval or a letter from a relevant independent board stating that the study does not need ethics committee approval based on the integrity of the research.
If the authors provide an approval or a document showing that ethical approval is not required, the review process can continue. If the authors cannot provide both documents, the manuscript may be rejected.
For articles on experimental research on humans, a detailed description of the procedures that patients and volunteers may be exposed to, followed by a statement indicating that informed consent has been obtained, should be included. The journal may request a copy of the Ethics Committee Approval from the relevant institution. Informed consent must also be obtained for case reports and clinical images.
Studies using human or animal subjects must be approved by the appropriate institutional and/or local Ministry of Health ethics committees. Ethical approval of research protocols is required for experimental, clinical and pharmaceutical studies and some case reports in accordance with international agreements.
Ethics committee reports or an equivalent official document may be requested from authors. For manuscripts involving experimental research on humans, a statement indicating that the written, informed consent of patients and volunteers has been obtained should be included.
In studies on animals, the precautions taken to prevent pain and suffering of animals should be clearly stated. In the Method section of the manuscript, the explanation about patient consent, the name of the ethics committee, the date and number of the ethics committee approval should be stated. It is the responsibility of the authors to carefully protect the anonymity of the patients.
Studies Requiring Ethical Committee Approval:
• Clinical studies conducted on humans,
• All sorts of researches conducted with qualitative or quantitative approaches that require collecting data from participants by using surveys, interviews, focus groups, observation, experiment and interview methods,
• Retrospective studies in accordance with the law on the protection of personal data,
• Researches on animals,
• Using humans and animals (including material/data) for experimental or scientific purposes.
Additionally;
• Stating that "Informed Consent Form" is received for case reports,
• Getting permission from the owners and stating while using scales, surveys and photos of others,
• Stating that copyright regulations are applied for the use of intellectual and artistic works.
F) Clinical Trials and Reporting Guidelines Policy
The Acta Medica Ruha journal encourages the registration of all clinical trials via ClinicalTrials.gov (www.clinicaltrials.gov) or one of the registries of the WHO’s International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP: https://www.who.int/clinical-trials-registry-platform). Especially the phase 3 clinical trials must be registered at or before the time of first patient enrollment. The name of the registry and the registration number together with the information of funding source should be provided at the end of the abstract.
For further information on the reporting guidelines for health research, authors are suggested to refer to the EQUATOR network website (http://www.equator-network.org/). The EQUATOR Network collects more than 370 reporting guidelines for many study types, including for:
• Randomised trials: CONSORT
• Observational studies: STROBE
• Systematic reviews: PRISMA
• Case reports: CARE
• Qualitative research: SRQR
• Diagnostic / prognostic studies: STARD
• Quality improvement studies: SQUIRE
• Economic evaluations: CHEERS
• Animal pre-clinical studies: ARRIVE
• Study protocols: SPIRIT
• Clinical practice guidelines: AGREE
G) Ethical Policy on Children and Vulnerable Groups
In studies on children and vulnerable groups, journal authors are asked to strictly adhere to the principles set out in documents such as ethical principles, the current Helsinki Declaration, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights (UNESCO, 2005), the Universal Declaration on the Human Genome and Human Rights (UNESCO, 1997), the International Declaration on Human Genetic Data (UNESCO, 2003), the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Dignity in the Practice of Biology and Medicine: The Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine strictly adheres to the principles set out in documents such as the current Good Clinical Practice Guidelines. Three basic ethical principles, namely respect for human beings, kindness and justice, must be strictly adhered to in research. These are fully applicable in clinical research with children.
H) Peer Review Policy
Acta Medica Ruha journal only considers manuscripts that are approved by each author and have not been previously published in another journal or submitted to another journal.
Submitted manuscripts that pass the preliminary control are scanned for plagiarism using iThenticate / Turnitin software. After the plagiarism check, the eligible manuscripts are evaluated by the Editor-in-Chief in terms of originality, methodology, importance of the subject matter and suitability to the scope of the journal.
The Editor-in-Chief evaluates manuscripts for their scientific content regardless of the ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, citizenship, religious beliefs or political philosophy of the authors and ensures fair double-blind peer review of the selected manuscripts.
The selected manuscripts are sent to at least two national/international referees for evaluation and the final decision for publication is made by the Editor-in-Chief after the corrections are made by the authors in line with the requests of the referees.
The Editor-in-Chief does not allow any conflict of interest between authors, editors and referees and is responsible for the final decision regarding the publication of the manuscript in the journal.
The judgement of the reviewers should be objective. During the review, the reviewers are expected to comment on the following issues.
• Does the article contain new and important information?
• Does the abstract clearly and accurately describe the content of the article?
• Is the problem stated in an important and concise way?
• Are the methods comprehensively described?
• Are the interpretations and conclusions justified by the results?
• Are adequate references made to other studies in the field?
• Is the language of the manuscript acceptable?
Reviewers should ensure that all information about submitted manuscripts is kept confidential and should notify the editor if they are aware of copyright infringement and plagiarism on the part of the author.
A referee who feels incapable of reviewing the subject matter of an article, or who knows that rapid review will be impossible, should notify the editor and provide an excuse for the review process.
The editor informs reviewers that manuscripts are confidential information and that this is a privileged interaction. Reviewers and the editorial board cannot discuss manuscripts with other people. The anonymity of reviewers is important.
Referee Evaluation Process
All submissions to Acta Medica Ruha will undergo a rigorous screening and evaluation process to determine the journal's scope and academic quality and its alignment with innovations in the field. The journal utilises a double-blind peer review system that ensures anonymity between authors and reviewers. The process proceeds as follows:
• Initial assessment: Upon submission, a newly received manuscript will be reviewed by the Editor or Deputy Editor to ensure compliance with the basic submission criteria and by the Editor-in-Chief to assess its suitability for the scope of Acta Medica Ruha. Manuscripts that do not meet these initial criteria will be rejected without further review.
• Peer review: Upon successful completion of the initial screening, the manuscript will be assigned to a processing editor who will then distribute it to at least two experts in the relevant field for a double-blind peer review process.
• Initial decision: A decision on a peer-reviewed article will only be made after at least two review reports have been received. At this point the manuscript may be rejected, corrections (major or minor) requested, or accepted. If accepted, the manuscript is sent to the layout editor for formatting. The final decision to accept the manuscript will be made by the Editor-in-Chief following a recommendation from the processing editor.
• Revision phase: An article requiring revision will be returned to the submitting author, who will have up to three weeks to format and revise the article. The revised text will then be subject to review by the processing editor. The processing editor will assess the adequacy and appropriateness of the changes, as well as the responsiveness of the author(s) to the reviewers' comments and suggestions. If the revisions are deemed insufficient, the cycle will be repeated and the manuscript will be returned to the submitting author for further revision.
I) Correction Policy
If the editors or the publisher learns from a third party that a published work contains a significant error or inaccuracy, the authors must immediately correct or retract the article or provide the journal editors with evidence of the accuracy of the article. In addition, authors should immediately report and correct any errors or inaccuracies in a published manuscript. Acta Medica Ruha is committed to publish correction (errata and corrigenda) or retraction in accordance with the COPE Guidelines. In all cases, these notices are linked to the original article.
J) Article Withdrawal Policy
• Preliminary Evaluation Stage: The articles at this stage can be withdrawn by the author(s).
• Referee Evaluation Stage: Authors who want to withdraw the article and publish it elsewhere for reasons such as a delay in the evaluation process of the sent article, etc. may withdraw from the journal with a written application and the approval of the journal editor board of this application.
• After Article Acceptance: After the article's acceptance, the requests of the authors to withdraw the article are rejected. In addition, after an article is accepted for publication, authors will not be allowed to leave the article.
Acta Medica Ruha is committed to publish correction (errata and corrigenda) or retraction in accordance with the COPE Guidelines. Information on COPE Retraction Guidelines can be found here: Retraction Guidelines
K) Financial Resources Policy
All authors are required to declare what kind of support they have received to conduct their research. Declaring funding sources acknowledges the contributions of funders, fulfils funding requirements and encourages greater transparency in the research process.
Each author must separately declare all sources of funding received for the research submitted to the journal. This information includes the name of the granting organisations, grant numbers and a description of the role of each funder. If the funder did not play any role in the research, this should also be indicated.
Authors do not have to provide a full list of each organisation that supported them if the grant is not relevant to the published research.
L) Appeal and Complaint Policy
The Editorial Board of the journal handles appeals and complaints in accordance with the COPE guidelines. Authors can contact the Editorial Office directly for their objections and complaints. When necessary, an impartial representative is appointed for issues that the Editorial Board cannot resolve internally. The Editor-in-Chief will make the final decision in the decision-making process for appeals and complaints.
Complaints and Appeals
Our journal handles complaints and appeals by following the procedure below. Complaints are not limited to long delays in the review of manuscripts and publication ethics, but all complaints are first handled by the editors-in-chief of the journal. The editors-in-chief may review the complaints and appeals together with the Editorial Board when necessary.
Complaints Regarding Article Content: The editor-in-chief reviews the authors‘ complaints and the referees’ reports and makes a decision: Confirm the rejection of the manuscript, consider the author's objection, and seek a new opinion from an independent referee. The final decision of the editors-in-chief is communicated to the authors. An explanation of the results of the appeal is shared with the authors when deemed necessary.
Complaints about Processes: Complaints about processes are handled by the editor-in-chief. Long delays in the handling of manuscripts are analysed by the editors and any problems deemed necessary are reported to the editor-in-chief. The editor-in-chief evaluates the complaints, and information is shared with the authors when deemed necessary.
Complaints about Ethical Principles: The editor-in-chief and editors take into account the author's or referee's complaints about publication ethics. The editor-in-chief and editors follow the publication ethics published in our journal. The editorial board of our journal reviews the concerns of complainants or reviewers. Details of the review and its progress are openly shared with complainants. The editors-in-chief or editors provide feedback to the complainants about the course of action and the final decision.
M) Archiving Policy
The archiving policy of the journal covers the following issues:
• The journal allows article authors to archive their own articles on the author's personal website or corporate pages and/or to use the final published version of the article for archiving in an institutional repository after publication.
• Authors are permitted to self-archive their articles in public and/or commercial subject-based archives.
• There is no embargo period for authors, but the published source should be cited and a link should be given to the URL of the article in the journal or to the DOI of the article.
• Authors can download the article as a PDF document. Authors can send copies of the article to their colleagues without any embargo.
• Articles published in our journal are digitally archived on the journal website (https://actamedicaruha.com/index.php/pub/issue/archive) and PKP Preservation Network (PN), LOCKSS, CLOCKSS pages.
N) Disclaimer of Liability
The views and opinions expressed in the articles published in the journal reflect the viewpoints of the author(s) and not those of Acta Medica Ruha journal, Editor-in-Chief, Editors, Editorial Board and Publisher. In addition, the ethical and biostatistical responsibility for each study unilaterally belongs to the author(s). The Editor-in-Chief, Editors, Editorial Board and Publisher do not accept any responsibility or liability for such situations. All responsibility for the published content belongs to the authors.
O) Advertising Policy
Advertisements may be published in Acta Medica Ruha with the approval of the Editor-in-Chief. Advertisements can be found on the cover pages of the journal and/or on the website. Potential advertisers should contact the Editor-in-Chief. Advertisers have no influence on editorial decisions or advertising policies.
