Ethical Guidelines

This journal is committed to upholding the highest standards of publication ethics. This journal adheres to the principles and guidelines established by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) for all parties involved in the publication process — authors, reviewers, and editors.

Authors

Authorship of a manuscript submitted to this journal must be based on substantial contributions to the work. Each author must have made a meaningful contribution to one or more of the following: conception and design of the study, acquisition or analysis of data, interpretation of results, drafting or critically revising the manuscript. All authors must be able to take public responsibility for the work and its final published form.

This journal generally accepts manuscripts with up to six (6) authors. Submissions with more than six authors must include a written justification explaining each author’s specific contribution. All authors must be listed; non-author contributors (e.g., translators, proofreaders, layout editors) should be acknowledged in the Acknowledgements section.

Authors must jointly agree on authorship and author order before submission. Changes to authorship — including additions, removals, or reordering — are not permitted after a manuscript has been accepted for publication.

By submitting a manuscript to this journal, all authors confirm that they have read and agree to the journal’s ethical guidelines, and that the manuscript has not been published elsewhere and is not currently under review by another journal.

Corresponding Author (CA) Responsibilities:

The CA serves as the primary point of contact for all editorial correspondence with the journal.
The CA is responsible for the accuracy of all author metadata entered on the submission platform.
The CA receives the Article Processing Charges (APC) invoice and is responsible for its timely payment.
The CA receives the copy-edited and formatted proof, must review it carefully, and is responsible for any remaining errors (e.g., misspelt names, incorrect affiliations).
The CA must use a valid institutional email address and respond promptly to all editorial communications.

All articles published in this journal are published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0). By submitting to this journal, authors warrant that the work is original and that they hold the rights to publish it. Where the manuscript incorporates text, figures, data, or other material from third-party sources, authors are responsible for obtaining all necessary permissions.

Authors must declare all conflicts of interest — including research grants, funding sources, paid or unpaid institutional relationships, or personal relationships with individuals involved in the publication process — at the end of the manuscript.

Plagiarism and self-plagiarism are strictly prohibited. Plagiarism includes word-for-word copying and the use of ideas or concepts from others without proper citation. All submissions are screened using iThenticate prior to peer review. Manuscripts exceeding the acceptable similarity threshold will be returned or rejected.

The use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) or AI-assisted tools (e.g., ChatGPT, Copilot, Grammarly AI) is permitted only to improve readability and language. AI must not be used for data interpretation or research conclusions. AI tools must not be listed as authors but must be disclosed in the Acknowledgements section. Only human authors bear responsibility for the content of the article.

Where research involves human subjects, authors must confirm that the study was approved by an appropriate ethics committee and conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki (2013). Participants must not be identifiable in the manuscript. Informed consent must be documented where clinical images or personal data are used.

Reviewers

All manuscripts submitted to this journal undergo an initial assessment by the Editor-in-Chief (EiC), including a plagiarism check via iThenticate. Manuscripts that pass the initial screening are assigned to a responsible editor who manages the peer review process.

This journal employs a double-blind peer review process, in which both the authors’ and reviewers’ identities remain anonymous throughout the review. Each manuscript is reviewed by at least two independent reviewers with relevant expertise in the subject area. Reviewer identities are verified through ORCID, Google Scholar, Scopus, or CV verification.

Authors may suggest potential reviewers but editors retain full authority over reviewer selection. Suggested reviewers must be free of conflicts of interest. Authors may also request the exclusion of specific reviewers, provided the request is reasonable and justified.

Once assigned, reviewers have one (1) week to accept or decline the review invitation. Upon acceptance, reviewers have two (2) weeks to complete and submit their review. Reviewers are provided with structured on-screen guidelines covering all essential aspects of manuscript evaluation.

Reviewers are expected to conduct their reviews with objectivity, fairness, and confidentiality. Specifically, reviewers must:

Provide clear, constructive, unbiased, and timely reviews.
Maintain strict confidentiality of all manuscript content and review communications.
Not use unpublished information from a manuscript for personal advantage.
Not involve any third party in the review without prior permission from the editor.
Declare and recuse themselves from any manuscript in which a conflict of interest exists.
Report any suspected research or publication misconduct to the responsible editor immediately.

To complete a review, the reviewer downloads the anonymized manuscript, fills in the structured review form, selects a recommendation (Accept, Minor Revision, Major Revision, or Reject), and may optionally upload a supplementary review report.

Editors

The Editor-in-Chief (EiC) holds ultimate responsibility for all editorial decisions, including acceptance, rejection, correction, and retraction of articles. The EiC is also the primary point of contact for ethical concerns, appeals, and complaints. Complaints regarding misconduct by the EiC should be directed to the Executive Editor.

Editorial decisions are made based on the following criteria:

Accept — The manuscript fits the journal’s scope, contains no technical errors, meets English language standards, and raises no ethical concerns.
Minor Revision — The manuscript is acceptable in principle but requires small adjustments before final acceptance.
Major Revision — Significant revisions are required; the revised manuscript may be returned to reviewers for re-evaluation.
Reject — The manuscript does not meet the journal’s standards or scope.

When an author disagrees with a reviewer’s comments, the author must contact the EiC directly. The EiC will review the manuscript and the relevant reviewer report, and may assign an additional reviewer if necessary.

Editors must maintain up-to-date profiles including their fields of expertise to ensure appropriate manuscript assignments and to avoid conflicts of interest. Editors must recuse themselves from handling any manuscript in which a conflict of interest exists.

Ethical Concerns, Appeals & Complaints

Any party with an ethical concern regarding a published or submitted manuscript should contact the Editor-in-Chief promptly via the Contact Us page. The EiC will initiate an investigation, which may involve contacting the authors’ institutions, funding agencies, or seeking independent advice from other editors or journals. The EiC will determine the appropriate course of action, including correction, retraction, or expression of concern.

Corrections

This journal distinguishes between two types of post-publication corrections:

Silent Correction — Minor typographical errors that do not affect the content or understanding of the article may be corrected directly in the published document without a formal notice.
Formal Correction — Errors that affect the content or understanding of the article, but do not compromise its overall integrity, will be corrected with an editorial notice published alongside the abstract. Relevant indexing databases will be notified accordingly.

Retractions

This journal follows the COPE Retraction Guidelines. A retraction is issued when a published article:

Contains fabricated, falsified, or unreliable data due to experimental error or miscalculation.
Constitutes plagiarism or duplicate publication.
Reports unethical research or violates research ethics standards.
Has been published without proper attribution or permission to republish.

Retracted articles will be removed from the article page, but the title and authors’ names will remain visible, with the title preceded by “RETRACTED:”. The DOI will remain registered, and a formal retraction notice will be published stating who initiated the retraction and the reason. This journal reserves the right to apply a processing fee for corrections and retractions in exceptional cases.