SSU_Journals- Ethical Guideline
Publication Ethics

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Ethical considerations
The journal of Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences in Yazd is committed to ethical issues in research in accordance with the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). Therefore, authors, reviewers, editorial board members, and readers are invited to visit https://publicationethics.org to familiarize themselves with the principles of this committee.

Copyright
Authors transfer all publication rights of their article to the Shahid Sadoughi Yazd Medical Sciences Journal, and the journal reserves the right to reject, accept, revise, edit, and summarize the articles for itself.
The journal of Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences in Yazd has provided open access to its articles under the (CC BY-NC 4.0) license.

Privacy Policy
The Journal of Yazd Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences states that the profile information of readers, authors, and referees, including names, email addresses, contact numbers, etc., will be used for the purposes of the journal and will be confidential and this information will not be shared with anyone else. The article submitted to the journal is only visible to the editorial staff and referees.

Ethical principles for an editor
  • The editor reviews received articles in a specialized and professional manner, without considering the nationality, gender, religion, national, racial, and political issues, position, and organizational affiliation of the authors.
  • The editor conducts the initial review of the received articles as soon as possible.
  • The Editor-in-Chief is obliged to select the reviewers of each article according to the specialized and research area of the article and has full authority in determining the reviewers of each article.
  • The Editor-in-Chief and the Editorial Board decide on the articles based on the opinion of the reviewers however the ultimate responsibility for rejection or acceptance of the articles remains reserved for the editor, and the editor has the right to make a final decision about the acceptance or rejection of an article.
  • Readers and authors can report errors and possible errors in published articles to the editor, and the editor will welcome these reports, and the results will be announced and heard by the audience
  • Keeping the articles received confidential until publication is the responsibility of the editor, and the editor should provide the content of the received articles in the refereeing and evaluation stage only to the authors, reviewers and editors.
  • The Editor or Editorial Board is not allowed to use the contents of the journal articles in their personal research before publication unless the author/authors have obtained permission to use the articles of the article.
Principles of Ethics for journal Reviewers
  • Referees should attach their comments and corrective explanations to the article and submit along with the arbitration form.
  • If the article is not respected in the professional area of the referee, it is necessary to return the article to the journal.
  • It is necessary to observe the principle of impartiality and fairness in reviewing and evaluating the quality of the article by the referee.
  • If the reviewer feels that the article under review is in conflict with one of his articles published or in the process of publication, he or she should immediately return the article to the journal and inform the journal of the circumstances of the conflict in interests or possible bias.
  • It is necessary to observe the principles of confidentiality of the content and information in the article by the referee, and the content of the article should not be shown to another person or discussed.
  • It is necessary for the referees to submit their opinions to the journal in a timely manner so that the editorial board can make a decision regarding the acceptance or rejection of the article.
Principles of ethics for journal writers
  • Authors should refrain from submitting similar articles resulting from the same research project in a way that authors divide their research results into more specific results and write a separate article for each result (salami publications).
  • Authors must know that the use of fabricated data and data falsification are examples of research misconduct.
  • Using all or part of someone else's research findings or published/unpublished ideas without citing the source (referencing) and obtaining permission from the intellectual property owner when necessary, constitutes intellectual theft and is considered research misconduct.
  • Authors, when using a figure, table, questionnaire, or a significant portion of the text or translation of a published text by others, must obtain written permission from the copyright owner of the original text in addition to placing the text used in quotation marks and citing the source.
  • Authors should cite the exact text and mention the source when using a partial section of text or a published translation by others.
  • Authors must cite the source if they use text or a translation of text published by others in the form of paraphrasing, summarizing, drawing conclusions, or interpreting ideas. Of course, paraphrasing should not be done in a way that contradicts the original authors' intentions and the overall spirit of their writing.
  • Authors should act according to scientific standards in reference to other research works, and any unnecessary references to themselves or others are intended to increase the number of incorrect referrals.
  • Authors should be aware that submitting articles to more than one journal is prohibited and considered a research violation.
  • If the authors decide to send a manuscript under consideration for publication in one journal to another publication, they must cancel the manuscript in writing to the first journal no later than notification of acceptance of manuscript for publication in the first journal.
  • Authors need to be aware that the journal is not allowed to publish articles previously published in another journal (republishing).
  • If the abstract of the article has already been presented in the congress or seminar in oral form or poster, the authors can submit the full text to the journal and should inform the journal about this.
  • Presentation and presentation of the report of potential conflicts of interest and national sponsors is the responsibility of the corresponding author.
  • All authors must be eligible for authorship. The names of other colleagues should be mentioned in the Appreciation and Appreciation section.
  • The order of authors' names is determined by the degree of participation of individuals and through their collective consensus. Therefore, the authors of the article in a letter (Author's Commitment Form) sign their written consent based on the order of the authors' names and transfer the copy right to the journal of Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences. Observing this requirement is mandatory if the file is not submitted, the article will be removed from the review process.
Writing conditions and collaborators
Authors are responsible for the content of the article, and the author of the article is someone who simultaneously meets the following four conditions:
  • Presenting a research idea, designing a study, collecting data, or analyzing and interpreting data;
  • Collaboration in writing the initial handwritten draft or reviewing and critically reviewing in a way that the text undergoes changes and evolution in terms of scientific content;
  • Review and approve the final handwritten version before publication; and
  • To be able to take responsibility for accountability in all aspects of conducting research in design, execution, and publication of the article in a way that can address all questions raised regarding the accuracy of the research content and its writing.
The process of modifying the order of authors
Changing the sequence of authors in an article can be done by submitting a letter to the editor with the agreement of all authors, before the article is accepted. Once the initial version of the article has been submitted to the journal, it is not permitted to add or remove authors' names.
 
Plagiarism
 All authors are advised to check their manuscript content before submitting to the journal. Authors can use authoritative and reliable plagiarism software to ensure that the manuscript is free of plagiarism.
It should be noted that all articles submitted to the journal after receiving and also before publication will be reviewed using plagiarism detection software.

Conflict of interest
 For the authors: Conflict of interest information should be announced at the end of the article. Conflict of interest refers to the existence of any financial and non-financial contribution that is likely to impress the authors in their honest opinion.
For reviewers: If the reviewer feels that the article under review is in conflict with one of his articles published or in the process of publication, he or she should immediately return the article to the journal and inform the journal of the circumstances of the conflict of interest or possible bias.
For the editor: Articles submitted to the journal are reviewed by the editor without bias and regardless of race, religion, nationality, gender, status or organizational affiliation of the authors and based on the competence of the articles.

Ethics related to research on humans and animals
Observing ethical standards in clinical and research studies conducted on animals should adhere to the Helsinki Declaration (International Medical Association resolution) and include aspects such as maintaining medical confidentiality, patient consent, patient anonymity, and addressing conflicts of interest.
Participants in research have the right to confidentiality of secrets, and this right should not be violated without their informed consent. The names of patients and hospital bed numbers, especially in images, should not be mentioned, and the method of obtaining consent from patients should be mentioned in the research methodology.
Regarding photos of individuals, the coverage should be in a way that does not lead to the identification of the person, and covering the eyes alone is not sufficient unless written informed consent has been obtained.
The journal is entitled to request signed informed consent forms from the individuals under study from the authors.
Research must be approved by the ethics committee of the organization/institution, and the ethics code should be mentioned in the methodology section of the article. The approved ethics committee resolution should also be submitted.
All clinical trial studies must be registered on the clinical trial website at www.irct.ir before the study begins and after obtaining ethical committee approval, and the corresponding code should be obtained.
Note 1: Starting from December 2009, the publication and printing of clinical trials are subject to their registration in clinical trial registration centers. It is also worth mentioning that the clinical trial code must be included under key terms.
Note 2: Clinical trials conducted within the country must also be registered at the Iranian Clinical Trials Registry if registered outside the country. This includes foreign trials conducted in Iran.
Note 3: Clinical trial articles conducted outside the country, if registered in a timely manner at one of the WHO-approved clinical trial registration centers, are eligible for publication in domestic journals.

The process of addressing research violations
If there is a possibility of research misconduct and deception, the authors are required to explain the subject of the violation, and in case of not receiving explanations within two months or the authors' explanations are not convincing, the occurrence of research misconduct will be notified to the ethics committee of the institute sponsoring research, the head or the head of the work or the study of the authors in order to confirm or eliminate the occurrence by conducting the research. and in the event that it is confirmed that the research misconduct of the journal has the right to take one or more of the measures in accordance with the severity of the violation, including refusal to publish the article in the event that the article is not published and is under investigation; Removing the published article from the journal by citing the reason for removing the article in such a way that the history of the article is made available to the public; publishing an amendment or denial in the future issue of the journal if the article is published; and refrain from accepting future articles of the authors for a specified period of time.
In general, the scientific research journal of Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences in Yazd will take the following actions if research misconduct is observed:
  • If a handwritten submission is suspected of scientific theft (generally or partially), it will be rejected. If scientific theft is identified after publication, the journal will adhere to COPE guidelines on retractions, corrections, and expressions.
  • Refusal to accept the submission of any new articles from the author or authors violating the rules for a minimum of 2 years;
  • Refusal to send articles for review or participate in the editorial board of the journal for authors in violation for a minimum of 3 years;
  • If violations are evident in the submitted manuscript, the journal may go beyond the stated restrictions.

Process of submitting complaints
Authors and researchers can report any violations regarding the journal's policies and ethical considerations to journal.ssugmail.com. Complaints can be about topics such as the review process of articles, article evaluation, issues related to authorship, plagiarism, conflicts of interest, and so on.

Appeal request
Since articles are sent to the editorial board for the determination of acceptance or rejection status after the completion of the review process. If the authors disagree with the editorial decisions and wish to request a revision for the article, they can send their request for revision to the email address journal.ssugmail.com

Complaints investigation and appeals policy
The policy for reviewing complaints and requests for reconsideration is as follows: Upon receiving complaints, the letters are sent to the journal's editor-in-chief, and if the authors and researchers have sufficient evidence to support their claims, the editor-in-chief investigates them. The journal, following COPE guidelines, reviews complaints against the journal, editors, and publishers and tries to respond to complaints as quickly as possible.
The policy of Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences Journal regarding the appeal request is that after receiving the appeal request, it sends the letter to the editor of the journal. If the authors have valid reasons regarding the opinions of reviewers and the editorial board, the article will be sent to another reviewer, and after receiving the reviewer's opinion, the article will be sent to the editorial board for feedback and final decision.

Data Sharing
Journal of Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences of Yazd encourages authors to share their data (raw data, processed data, software, algorithms, protocols, methods and materials) if they do not violate privacy and security issues.
If authors share the data and other results produced by the article in public repositories, it is necessary to provide a data availability statement to the journal so that this statement can be published alongside the article.
It should be noted that a data availability statement includes the name of the repository used, a unique identifier (DOI or reference number), a link to the repository (a permanent, uniform resource locator URL), and data access instructions (if available).

Process of corrections after printing and publishing an article
If authors realize an error or mistake in a published article that occurred during the review, editing, and publication process, they can request a correction to the published article from the journal. As follows:
  • If the error occurred in the published article by the author/authors (Corrigendum).
Authors should send a request letter for article revision, which has been signed by all authors, to the journal's email. This request will be reviewed in the editorial board meeting of the journal, and if the editorial board agrees with the request, the revised article will be published in future issues of the journal.
  • If the error occurred in the article published by the journal (erratum).
Authors can inform the editor-in-chief of a journal of any errors that have occurred via email. The editor-in-chief will investigate the error and, if confirmed, the corrected article will be published in the next issue of the journal.

Archive policy
The articles of the journal are archived electronically through the Eprints repository and Google Scholar.

Pre-Print

A preprint is a document that is shared openly with the public through a group. publish your work online before or at the same time as sending it to a journal. Preprint servers are platforms that enable the posting of papers before they are formally published. Before submitting a manuscript for publication, it is becoming more frequent to have it peer-reviewed across various fields. The journal of Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences (JSSU) will not consider for review articles available as preprints.

AI Policy
Policies for the Utilization of Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Since the usage of generative artificial intelligence (AI) and AI-assisted technologies is snowballing, the Journal of Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences (JSSU) has expanded its publication ethics policies as in the following:
  • Generative artificial intelligence (AI) and AI-assisted technologies are the two main types of artificial intelligence. ChatGPT and AI-assisted are not deemed appropriate tools for content creation or research design.  However, AI can be used for language editing to improve the readability and language of the manuscript.
  • AI and AI-assisted technologies cannot be listed as authors, co-authors, or cited as references since AI cannot meet the authorship criteria of the Journal Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences (JSSU) as AI technologies cannot be held responsible for the content of any research.
The policies on AI technologies follow the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) position statement on using AI and AI-assisted technologies.  Cope clearly states that ‘authors are fully responsible for the content of their manuscript, even those parts produced by an AI tool, and are thus liable for any breach of publication ethics.’



 
Topic URL in SSU_Journals website:
http://jssu.ssu.ac.ir/find-1.75.38.en.html
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