GENERAL PROVISIONS
The Editorial Board of the journal «Current problems of health care and medical statistics» strictly follows the ‘Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals’, developed by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors.
The present ethical guidelines of the journal «Current problems of health care and medical statistics» have been developed based on the above-mentioned document. The rules do not change the substance of the guidelines proposed by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors but are adapted to the information space of the countries where the authors, reviewers, and readers of the journal work.
This document presents ethical principles to be followed by authors in conducting and describing scientific research, as well as by reviewers and editorial staff in evaluating and reviewing submitted articles.
BASIC ETHICAL PRINCIPLES OF THE EDITORIAL BOARD
The Editorial Board bases its relationship with the founder on the principle of editorial freedom.
The Editorial Board has an independent policy on the selection and publication of research papers.
Editorial Board takes full responsibility for all papers published in the journal.
Editorial Board ensures compliance of published papers with internationally accepted ethical principles.
Editorial Board is constantly working to improve the journal.
The Editorial Board continually strives to meet the needs of readers and authors to the fullest extent possible.
The Editorial Board takes all reasonable steps to ensure the quality of the published papers.
The Editorial Board works closely with authors and reviewers to ensure the high quality of published papers.
The Editorial Board base the decisions on acceptance/rejection of papers only on the importance of the paper, originality, clarity, and relevance of the research.
The Editorial Board ensures that papers reflecting different points of view can be published.
The Editorial Board guarantees that no financial interest can influence the level of requirements for the considered and published paper.
Editors make decisions solely on the validity of the research work and its relevance to the journal's readers, not on the commercial success of the journal.
The editors are always ready to acknowledge errors and, if necessary, publish corrections, clarifications, retractions, and apologies.
ETHICAL ISSUES IN CONDUCTING AND DESCRIBING SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH
Authorship
Authorship is significant scholarly involvement in conducting the research and preparing its results for publication. The criteria for authorship are significant involvement in
1. conceptualization and design or data collection, or analysis and interpretation of the findings;
2. preparation of a draft of an article or its qualitative revision regarding principal aspects of its content;
3. the final approval/agreement of the print version.
All persons defined as "authors" must meet the above criteria. Each author must be substantially involved in the work to take responsibility for the content of the publication. Provision of research funding, overall management of the research team, data collection alone cannot constitute grounds for acknowledging authorship.
The order in which the authors are identified in the article is determined by their joint decision. All participants designated as authors receive the right of authorship.
Persons who provided financial and technical assistance in conducting the research and preparing the manuscript may be indicated in the acknowledgment section. Research participants who only collected data may be listed under the heading "clinicians" or "research participants". However, they must provide written permission for their names to be made public, as readers may infer their approval of the data and conclusions presented in the article.
When submitting an article, the authors are obliged to indicate in a covering letter the contribution of each person to the article. This information may be published.
RELIABILITY OF THE RESULTS PRESENTED
The authors are responsible for the reliability of the results in the manuscript. Authors should check the references of the cited papers.
the authors must inform the Editorial Board in the cover letter in which institutions and in which scientific programs the research was conducted. The manuscript submitted to the Editorial Board must be signed by all authors. This means that all authors take responsibility for the content of the publication.
RESPECTING PATIENTS' RIGHTS AND ENSURING CONFIDENTIALITY
In studies in which diagnostic or treatment methods do not comply with standard procedures, the approval of the ethics committee of the institution in which the work was performed and its compliance with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975 and its revised version of 2000 must be given. In cases of doubt, the authors are obliged to provide the Editorial Board (on request) with the justification of the approaches used as well as proof that the institution's ethics committee has approved the questionable aspects of the research.
Patients have the right to confidentiality, which must not be disclosed without their consent. No patient identifiable information (mentioning patients' names and initials, card registration number) may be placed in articles. The photographs submitted for publication must also not allow identifying the patient. Authors must inform patients (parents, guardians) about the possible publication of paper covering the specifics of their disease and the methods of diagnosis and treatment used, about the guarantees of confidentiality when the paper is published in printed or electronic form, and that it will be available on the Internet after publication. When submitting an article to the Editorial Board, the authors must provide written informed consent from the patient to disseminate the information and report this in the article.
ETHICAL ASPECTS OF THE USE OF ANIMALS IN MEDICAL RESEARCH
When describing experiments on animals, authors are obliged to place in the article the information on compliance of the content and use of laboratory animals in the research with international, national rules or rules on the ethical treatment of animals of the institution where the work was performed.
ETHICAL ISSUES IN REVIEWING AND PEER-REVIEWING MANUSCRIPTS
EVALUATION OF CREDIBILITY OF RESULTS
The Editorial Board is obliged to take all available measures to assess the validity of the results and conclusions of the manuscript under review. For this purpose, in addition to the official reviewers, it may involve additional experts who are proficient in specific fields of medicine (morphology, pathophysiology, microbiology, biochemistry, etc.), as well as specialists engaged in mathematical and statistical analysis. In exceptional cases, the Editorial Board may request copies of documents to support the submission.
To minimize the incompleteness or inaccuracy of the information in the references, the Editorial Board checks all references on a mandatory basis.
If errors are found in the published articles, the Editorial Board will post information about correcting the errors.
If after the publication of the article it is found that the authors have submitted a falsified paper, the editorial staff undertakes to publish information about it in the next issue. This is based on the results of an investigation conducted by the institution that carried out the research and submitted it to the Editorial Board. At the same time, the Editorial Board is obliged to question the credibility of the authors' previous works published in the journal. The Editorial Board may ask the institution where the authors work to confirm the credibility of their previously published works. In the absence of confirmation, the Editorial Board will place a notice in the journal stating that the credibility of previous works has not been confirmed.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
To ensure the credibility of published articles and public confidence in the peer-review process, the Editorial Board maintains a system for managing conflicts of interest of authors, reviewers, editorial staff, and members of the Editorial Board.
When preparing a particular manuscript, a conflict of interest can arise if one of the participants in the publication and review process (author, reviewer, or editor) has obligations that could affect his or her opinion. The causes of conflicts of interest arising in the process of publishing articles can be financial and personal relationships, scientific rivalry, intellectual preferences of the participants of publishing activity (authors, reviewers, editors), as well as their close relatives
All participants of the process of preparation of the manuscript for publication are obliged to inform the Editorial Board if there are potential reasons for a conflict of interest.
While submitting the manuscript to the editorial staff authors must indicate on the title page the data whether the conflict of interests does or does not exist, to inform the editorial staff about the source of the research support such as grants, equipment, medicinal preparations, to guarantee in the covering letter, that they haven't received any rewards from manufacturers of medicinal preparations, medical equipment, papers including the competitors able to affect the research results. Authors should inform the sponsor and its role in defining the study design; in collecting, analyzing, and interpreting the data; in describing the study; and in deciding whether to submit the text for publication. If necessary, the authors are obliged to provide additional information, if requested by the editors, to enable the editors to assess the influence of the sponsors on the conduct of the study.
Authors have the right to indicate in the cover letter the names of those specialists to whom they think the manuscript should not be sent for review due to a possible, usually professional, conflict of interest. This information is strictly confidential and is taken into account by the Editorial Board when organizing the review.
Reviewers are obliged to inform the Editorial Board about the possibility of a conflict of interest during the reviewing process and the reasons that may influence their opinion on the manuscript. They have the right to refuse to review a particular article if they consider it justified.
To ensure impartial, independent, objective expertise of the manuscripts under review and to avoid any conflict of interest, the Editorial Board conducts a review in strict compliance with the reviewing rules of the journal.
All articles received by the Editorial Board pass through the institute of reviewing. Two independent reviewers are appointed by the editor-in-chief (deputy editor-in-chief) from members of the Editorial Board who are experts in the relevant field. Leading specialists of the Russian Federation and other countries who have a scientific degree can also be involved as reviewers. The editor does not appoint external reviewers if there is an obvious likelihood of a conflict of interest. Reviewers are notified that manuscripts of articles are the private property of authors and refer to non-public information. Reviewing is confidential. Reviewers submit a review to the Editorial Board, which should reflect the relevance of the research performed, completeness and reliability of the information provided, the degree of novelty of the results, their scientific and practical significance, economic and social value, as well as reasonable conclusions about the article as a whole, comments and, if necessary, recommendations for its improvement. The author of the peer-reviewed article is allowed to read the text of the review.
The decision to allow the article to be published in the journal is taken collegially at the meeting of the Editorial Board.
The editorial staff, as well as members of the Editorial Board who participate in decision-making on a particular manuscript, should not have a personal, professional, or financial interest. Otherwise, they should inform the editor-in-chief of their interest and refuse to participate in the decision-making process to avoid a conflict of interest.
Based on the reviewers' conclusions, the Editorial Board decides on accepting the manuscript for publication in the submitted form, the necessity of its revision or rejection.
In case of disagreement with the opinion of the reviewers, the author has the right to provide a reasoned response to the Editorial Board. Failure or unwillingness of the author to take into account reasonable comments and recommendations of the reviewers is the basis for the rejection of the article from further consideration.
In controversial cases, the article may be sent for review to an additional reviewer. At the meeting of the Editorial Board, when deciding on the admission of the article to publication, all reviews received as well as the author's responses are considered.
After the Editorial Board decides on the admission of the article for publication, the responsible secretary informs the author about it and specifies the terms of publication. In case the article is rejected from publication, the Editorial Board sends a detailed reasoned rejection to the author.
The Editorial Board may use the information provided in the messages about the conflict of interest and financial interest on the part of the authors, reviewers, members of the Editorial Board to make decisions about the publication of the article. The Editorial Board has the right to publish this information if it considers it important for the evaluation of the article.
CORRECTION AND APPROVAL OF MANUSCRIPTS
The Editorial Board reserves the right to shorten published papers and adapt them to the headings of the journal. The text of the article prepared for print, with the editorial revisions, is sent to the authors for approval in PDF format by e-mail. The author’s corrections and approval should be received by the Editorial Board within 5 days. After this period the Editorial Board will consider that the authors have approved the text.
COPYRIGHT
When an article is accepted for publication, the authors transfer the copyright to the publisher in accordance with the concluded agreement.
Transfer of copyright implies the right of the Editorial Board without the consent of the authors: to place in the journal preliminary information about the forthcoming publication of the article; to transfer the rights to distribute the article to third parties; to provide open access to the articles, information (data) about the authors, correspondence address (to an unlimited number of persons) on the journal website; to transfer electronic copies of the article, data about the authors, correspondence address to international information databases to provide open access to the article and information to the general public.
The authors retain the right to: use the published data for their further research, for preparation of theses, monographs, manuals, and other scientific publications with the obligatory reference to the publication in the journal; place the electronic copy of the article provided by the Editorial Board on the personal sites, sites of the organization in which the research was conducted, sites of professional societies and associations where the authors are members.
At the same time, the authors do not have the right to transfer, without the consent of the Editorial Board, the right to use the article for distribution or for providing open access to it to an unlimited number of people or third parties.
The authors must inform about their consent to the transfer of the copyright in a covering letter when sending the article to the editorial office. The copyright transfer agreement enters into force from the moment the Editorial Board accepts the article for publication. If the article is not accepted for publication, this agreement does not enter into force. The Editorial Board notifies the author within 5 calendar days after the decision has been made.
ETHICAL ISSUES IN PUBLISHING
MULTIPLE PUBLICATIONS
The Editorial Board does not accept for publication articles that are simultaneously submitted for publication to other journals or that contain information already published in large part by other print or electronic publications. The authors must guarantee in a covering letter that the submitted article has not been previously published or submitted to another journal for review and publication. These rules do not apply to articles not accepted for publication by another journal or to published papers containing preliminary research results. The Editorial Board does not preclude consideration of papers previously submitted to a scientific conference in the form of abstracts or posters, but not published in full or considered for publication in a collection of scientific papers or publication in a similar format. The new publication should mention and cite these contributions.
The Editorial Board welcomes authors to provide details of their previously published work on the topic and paper included in the submitted article. Copies of such papers should be attached to the submitted article, which will help the Editorial Board to decide whether the submitted article can be classified as a multiple (duplicate) publication. Multiple (duplicate) publication is defined as the publication of an article whose content is largely the same as that of a paper already published in a print or electronic publication.
The Editorial Board reserves the right to carry out checks for other articles by the authors in international information databases. If it is found that the authors attempt to submit a repeated or duplicate publication without notification, the Editorial Board has the right to refuse to consider the manuscript. If after the publication of an article in the journal it is found that a similar article has been printed in other publications and the authors have not informed the Editorial Board about it, in the next issue it will be published that this publication is repeated or duplicate, with or without an explanation or confirmation of the authors.
In some cases, the Editorial Board may decide that it is permissible to republish a paper. The basis for such a decision is the recognition of the need for the widest possible dissemination among the medical public of the information covered in the article.
Republishing is carried out in strict compliance with international copyright laws, ethical standards and with the consent of the authors and the two editors. Permission for such republication must be free of charge.
Publication of such an article is possible under the following conditions:
1. The authors have obtained the approval of the editors of the two journals;
2. The republishing Editorial Board must be provided with a copy of the original version;
3. To ensure the priority of the primary article, the republished (duplicate) paper must be published within the period determined by the two editors, but not earlier than one week after the publication of the primary version;
4. The article for republishing should be intended for a different group of readers; a shortened version may be sufficient;
5. The republished version accurately reflects the data and its interpretation in the primary version;
6. On the title page of the republished version it is obligatory to place a message that the article has already been fully or partially published and provide a link to the original publication;
7. The title of the re-publication should mention that it is a re-publication (exact reprint, abridged edition, full-text translation, or abridged translation of the text) of the original article.
PUBLICATION OF NEGATIVE RESULTS
The Editorial Board takes serious care in publishing the results of any carefully conducted research, regardless of whether the results are negative or positive. However, the Editorial Board takes into account that many studies showing negative results are inconclusive and incomplete. The possibility of publishing inconclusive research results is considered by the Editorial Board in a special way, as often such articles have no biomedical value and consume the resources of the journal.
CORRESPONDENCE AND PUBLICATION OF CRITICAL COMMENTS
The Editorial Board provides readers the opportunity to send their comments, questions, or critical comments on published articles as well as short communications and comments unrelated to previously published articles by post or e-mail to the Editorial Board. All letters received will be considered by the Editorial Board.
All critical comments received on the published articles are considered at the meeting of the Editorial Board. The authors of critical articles must declare any competing interests or conflicts of interest when submitting their articles. In case the criticism of the published work is justified, the journal assumes the obligation to place the critical paper on the pages of the journal. The authors of the criticized article will also be given the opportunity to publish their responses. These papers will be placed in the Letters to the Editors section. The published correspondence may be edited by the Editorial Board (scope of the publication, grammar, and style correctness). Authors of critical papers and authors of responses should approve editorial changes to both the primary letter and the response. As a rule, the Editorial Board places the critical papers and the authors' answers in the same issue.
In encouraging discussion of the articles published in the journal, the Editorial Board undertakes to carefully review the critical paper sent in, seeking to identify all rude, inaccurate, and defamatory statements, and not to allow personal comments influencing opinions or data to appear.
COMMERCIAL CONSIDERATIONS AND PROMOTIONAL ACTIVITIES
The Editorial Board does not charge a fee for publishing articles. The lack of financial obligations to authors allows the Editorial Board to pursue an independent editorial policy and select only high-quality work.
To reduce the cost of the journal and make it available to a wide range of professionals, the Editorial Board reimburses part of the cost of the publication by placing advertising papers. The magazine publishes only advertisements for medicines, medical equipment, and medical devices permitted for use in the manner prescribed by law. Advertising articles, as well as articles sponsored by manufacturing firms and/or their distributors, are not accepted.
According to the rules adopted by the magazine, the space provided by the magazine for advertising should not exceed 5%. The Editorial Board undertakes to immediately refuse to place an advertisement if false information is found in it or to place information for readers in the magazine if it is subsequently found that the advertiser has not provided complete or truthful information in an advertisement that was previously published.
COMPLAINTS AND APPEALS
Authors, readers, and reviewers have the right to appeal to the Ethics Committee, which is the founder of the journal «Current problems of health care and medical statistics» if they find violations of ethics in the work of the Editorial Board.
Address: 11 Dobrolyubov St., Moscow, Federal Research Institute for Health Organization and Informatics of Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation.
Complaints and applications are considered by the Ethics Committee within 1 month. The results of the review of the complaint shall be sent to the complainant in writing.
Ethics Committee considers only appeals that contain claims of ethical violations by authors, reviewers, or the journal's Editorial Board. Complaints and appeals about the rejection of manuscripts due to a low scientific level are not considered by the Ethics Committee, as this issue is the exclusive competence of the Editorial Board and the Editorial Council of the journal.