Publication Ethics Statement

The results of human and /or animal studies will only be accepted for publication in the Al-Azhar International Medical Journal, (AIMJ) if it is made clear that investigations were carried out to a high ethical standard. Formal and documented ethical approval from an appropriately constituted research ethics committee should be obtained for all studies involving people, medical records, and anonymized human tissues. All such studies should conform to the World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki (June 1964) and subsequent amendments (https://www.wma.net/what-we-do/medical-ethics/declaration-of-helsinki/). Manuscripts should include a statement that the research protocol was approved by the local Ethical Committee.

Animal experiments require full compliance with local, national, ethical, and regulatory principles, and local licensing arrangements and the journal will not accept papers for publication if doubts exist over the standards of care and humanity shown to experimental animals. For this reason, a clear statement of the care principles used should be included in the text.

Action plan for unethical behavior

Publishers and editors have full rights and will take reasonable steps to identify and prevent the publication of documents if research misconduct has occurred. Editors will not in any way encourage or allow such bad behavior to occur.

If the publisher or editors of a journal are aware of any allegations of research misconduct by the publisher or editor, then they defiantly shall handle the allegations.
The journal will retract any published articles if any ethical violation or misconduct has proved and could correct any article when necessary and appropriate.
Publishers and editors always are willing to publish corrections, clarifications, retractions, and apologies when needed.

The publisher has the following responsibilities:

We follow the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE)'s Core Practices.

The publisher is dedicated to supporting the vast efforts of the editors, the academic contributions of authors, and the respected volunteer work undertaken by reviewers.
The publisher is also responsible for ensuring that the publication system works smoothly and that ethical guidelines are applied to assist the editor, author, and reviewer in performing their ethical duties.

The editor has the following responsibilities:

We follow the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE)'s Core Practices. In addition, some key points are listed below.

The editor should acknowledge receipt of submitted manuscripts within two working days of receipt and ensure an efficient, fair, and timely review process.
The editor should ensure that submitted manuscripts are processed in a confidential manner and that no content of the manuscripts will be disclosed to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, and the publisher, as appropriate.
The editor should recuse himself or herself from processing manuscripts if he or she has any conflict of interest with any of the authors or institutions related to the manuscripts.
The editor should not disclose the names and other details of the reviewers to a third party without the permission of the reviewers.
The editor has the right to make the final decision on whether to accept or reject a manuscript with reference to the significance, originality, and clarity of the manuscript and its relevance to the journal.
The editor should by no means make any effort to oblige the authors to cite his or her journal either as an implied or explicit condition of accepting their manuscripts for publication.
The editor should not use for his or her own research any part of any data or work reported in submitted and as yet unpublished articles.
The editor should respond promptly and take reasonable measures when an ethical complaint occurs concerning a submitted manuscript or a published paper, and the editor should immediately contact and consult with the author. In this case, a written formal retraction or correction may also be required.

The author has the following responsibilities:

The author should not submit concurrent manuscripts (or manuscripts essentially describing the same subject matter) to multiple journals. Likewise, an author should not submit any paper previously published anywhere to the journals for consideration. The publication of articles on the specific subject matter, such as clinical guidelines and translations, in more than one journal, is acceptable if certain conditions are met.
The author should present a precise and brief report of his or her research and an impartial description of its significance.
The author should honestly gather and interpret his or her research data. Publishers, editors, reviewers, and readers are entitled to request the author to provide the raw data for his or her research for the convenience of editorial review and public access. If practicable, the author should retain such data for any possible use after publication.
The author should guarantee that the works he or she has submitted are original. If the author has used work and/or words by others, appropriate citations are required. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical publishing behavior and is unacceptable.
The author should indicate explicitly all sources that have supported the research and also declare any conflict(s) of interest.
The author should give due acknowledgment to all of those who have made contributions to the research. Those who have contributed significantly to the research should be listed as co-authors. The author should ensure that all coauthors have affirmed the final version of the paper and have agreed on its final publication.
The author should promptly inform the journal editor of any obvious error(s) in his or her published paper and cooperate earnestly with the editor in the retraction or correction of the paper. If the editor is notified by any party other than the author that the published paper contains an obvious error, the author should write a retraction or make the correction based on the medium of publication.

The reviewer has the following responsibilities:

We follow the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE)'s Core Practices. In addition, some key points are listed below.

The reviewer who feels unqualified to review the assigned manuscript or affirms that he or she cannot meet the deadline for completion of the review should immediately notify the editor and excuse himself or herself from the process of reviewing this manuscript.
The reviewer should inform the editor and recuse himself or herself from reviewing the manuscript if there is a conflict of interest. Specifically, the reviewer should recuse himself or herself from reviewing any manuscript authored or coauthored by a person with whom the reviewer has an obvious personal or academic relationship if the relationship could introduce bias or the reasonable perception of bias.
The reviewer should treat the manuscript in a confidential manner. The manuscript should not be disclosed to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editor.
The reviewer should approach the peer-review job objectively. Personal criticism of the author is unacceptable.
The reviewer should not use for his or her own research any part of any data or work reported in submitted and as yet unpublished articles.
The reviewer should immediately notify the editor of any similarities between the manuscript under review and another paper either published or under consideration by another journal. The reviewer should immediately call to the editor’s attention a manuscript containing plagiarized material or falsified data.

Studies in humans and animals

If the work involves the use of human subjects, the author should ensure that the work described has been carried out in accordance with The Code of Ethics of the World Medical Association (Declaration of Helsinki) for experiments involving humans. The manuscript should be in line with the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals and aim for the inclusion of representative human populations (sex, age, and ethnicity) as per those recommendations. The terms sex and gender should be used correctly.

All animal experiments should comply with the ARRIVE guidelines and should be carried out in accordance with the U.K. Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act, 1986 and associated guidelines, EU Directive 2010/63/EU for animal experiments, or the National Research Council's Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals and the authors should clearly indicate in the manuscript that such guidelines have been followed. The sex of animals must be indicated, and where appropriate, the influence (or association) of sex on the results of the study.

Plagiarism

The journal has a strict policy against plagiarism. All submitted manuscripts are checked for plagiarism using professional plagiarism-checking software. Submitted manuscripts with an unacceptable similarity index resulting from plagiarism are rejected immediately.

Complaints/appeals

All complaints, concerns, or appeals regarding authorship issues or the peer-review process, including concerns raised post-publication, should be addressed to the Editors-in-Chief, who shall investigate the claims by first, requesting information from all parties involved and second, propose a course of action in line with academic ethical principles as outlined by the Committee on Publishing Ethics (COPE; https://publicationethics.org/). Submissions can be halted in the review or publication process until the issue are resolved. In situations, when Editors-in-Chief are involved in the complaint, the Editorial Board members, led by the most senior member, investigate the claims and propose a course of action.

Conflicts of Interest/ Competing Interests

All authors of articles must disclose all conflicts of interest they may have with the publication of the manuscript or an institution or product that is mentioned in the manuscript and/or is important to the outcome of the study presented. Authors should also disclose conflicts of interest with products that compete with those mentioned in their manuscript.

Confidentiality

A submitted manuscript is a confidential material. Academic Journals will not disclose submitted manuscripts to anyone except individuals who partake in the processing and preparation of the manuscript for publication (if accepted). These individuals include editorial staff, corresponding authors, potential reviewers, actual reviewers, and editors. However, in suspected cases of misconduct, a manuscript may be revealed to members of the Academic Journals’ ethics committees and institutions/organizations that may require it for the resolution of the misconduct. Academic Journals shall follow the appropriate COPE flowcharts wherever necessary.

Misconduct

Misconduct constitutes a violation of this editorial policy, journal policies, publication ethics, or any applicable guidelines/policies specified by COPE, WAME, ICMJE, and STM. Any other activities that threaten/compromise the integrity of the research/publication process are potential misconduct. Suspected cases of misconduct will be investigated according to COPE guidelines

Correction and retraction of articles

Corrections may be made to a published article with the authorization of the editor of the journal. Editors will decide the magnitude of the corrections. Minor corrections are made directly to the original article. However, in cases of major corrections, the original article will remain unchanged, while the corrected version will also be published. Both the original and corrected version will be linked to each other. A statement indicating the reason for the major change to the article will also be published. When necessary, retraction of articles will be done according to COPE retraction guidelines.

Acknowledgement

Individuals who participated in the development of a manuscript but do not qualify as an author should be acknowledged. Organizations that provided support in terms of funding and/or other resources should also be acknowledged.

Informed consent

Patients have a right to privacy that should not be violated without informed consent. Identifying information, including names, initials, or hospital numbers, should not be published in written descriptions, photographs, or pedigrees unless the information is essential for scientific purposes and the patient (or parent or guardian) gives written informed consent for publication. Informed consent for this purpose requires that an identifiable patient be shown the manuscript to be published. Authors should disclose to these patients whether any potentially identifiable material might be available via the Internet or in print after publication. Patient consent should be written and archived either with the journal, the authors, or both, as dictated by local regulations or laws. Nonessential identifying details should be omitted. Informed consent should be obtained if there is any doubt that anonymity can be maintained. For example, masking the eye region in photographs of patients is inadequate protection of anonymity. If identifying characteristics are altered to protect anonymity, such as in genetic pedigrees, authors should provide assurance, and editors should so note, that such alterations do not distort scientific meaning. When informed consent has been obtained, it should be indicated in the published article.