The Anatolian Journal of Health Research takes the criteria of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) and the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) that have been prepared as a guide for authors, referees and editors.

Ethical Responsibilities of the Author

Authors who send studies to the Anatolian Journal of Health Research are expected to comply with the following ethical responsibilities:

-Studies sent by authors are expected to be original. In the case that the author(s) utilize(s) other studies or use(s) other studies, they are required to provide complete and accurate citations and/or include clearly stated quotations.

-Individuals who have not contributed to the content intellectually in the formation of the study should not be indicated as authors.

-If any, situations and relationships of studies that may constitute conflict of interest should be explained in all studies sent for publication.

-During the assessment processes, data outputs may be requested from the author(s) regarding their article, and in such a case, the author(s) should be prepared to submit the expected data and information to the Publication Board. The authors are required to keep the data regarding a published article for a period of 5 years.

-The author(s) should have documentation showing that they have the usage rights of the data that are used, necessary permissions regarding research/analyses or the consent of subjects on whom an experiment is carried out.

-In the case that the author(s) notice(s) a mistake or error regarding their article at the stage of early viewing or assessment, they are required to inform the editor of the journal and collaborate with them in the processes of revision or retraction.

-The authors cannot keep their studies in the application process of multiple journals. Each application may be made following the completion of the previous application process.

-One cannot request a change in author responsibilities of a study whose evaluation process has started (e.g. author addition, changing the order of authors, author removal).

Ethical Duties and Responsibilities of the Editor

The editor is required to comply with the ethical responsibilities included in the ‘COPE Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors’ (https://publicationethics.org/files/Code_of_conduct_for_journal_editors_Mar11.pdf) and the ‘COPE Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors’ (https://publicationethics.org/files/u2/Best_Practice.pdf) published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) (https://publicationethics.org/) and listed below.

The editor is responsible for all articles published in the journal. The ethical duties and responsibilities of the editor are as follows:

General Responsibilities

The editor is required to spend effort to contribute to increasing and developing the quality of the journal.
The editor is required to support the freedom of speech of the authors.
Relations with Readers

The editor needs to make sure that the parts where reviewer assessment is not required in the journal (letters to the editor, invited writings, conference announcements, etc.) are clearly indicated.
The editor needs to spend effort for the articles published in the journal to be compatible with the knowledge and skills of the readers of the journal.
Relations with Reviewers

The editor must request reviewers to assess the articles that are suitable for their knowledge and expertise. This way, it must be ensured that articles are appropriately assessed by people who are experts in their field.
The editor is responsible for demanding reviewers to state that they do not have any conflict of interest regarding an article before assessing it.
The editor is required to provide reviewers with all necessary information regarding the reviewer assessment process and what is expected of the reviewer.
The editor must make sure that the reviewer assessment process continues in a double-blind fashion and must not reveal the reviewers to the authors or the authors to the reviewers.
The editor must assess reviewers based on their timing and performance.
The editor must create a database regarding reviewers and update this database based on the performance of reviewers.
The editor must remove reviewers who provide rude and unqualified comments or respond late from the reviewer list.
The editor must constantly renew and broaden the reviewer list based on the areas of expertise of reviewers.
Relations with Authors

The editor must constantly update the publication and writing rules and sample template regarding what is expected from authors.
The editor must assess articles sent to the journal in terms of the journal’s writing rules, significance of the study and its originality, and if they decide to reject the article at the stage of first submission, they should communicate the reason for this to the authors in a clear and impartial way. In this process, if it is decided that the article should be revised based on grammar, punctuation and/or styling and format (margins, appropriate citation, etc.), the authors need to be informed on this issue, and time should be provided to them for them to make the necessary revisions.
Articles must include the submission and acceptance of publication dates.
When the authors have a request of information regarding the status of their article, they should receive information on this status in a way that would not disrupt the double-blind review process.
Relations with the Board of Editors

The editor must communicate the publication and writing rules to the new members of the Board of Editors and explain what is expected of them.
The editor must communicate the most up to date version of the publication and writing rules to the members of the Board of Editors.
The editor must assess the members of the Board of Editors and choose editors that will show active participation in the development of the journal to the Board.
The editor should inform the members of the Board of Editors regarding their roles and responsibilities listed below.
- Supporting the development of the journal

- Writing reviews about their areas of expertise when requested

- Reviewing and improving the publication and writing rules

- Performing the necessary responsibilities in the management of the journal

Ethical Responsibilities of the Reviewer

Assessment of all studies by “Double-Blind Review” affects the quality of publication directly. This process provides confidence by assessment of the publication objectively and independently. The assessment process for the Anatolian Journal of Health Research is carried out by the principle of double-blind review. The reviewers cannot directly communicate with the authors, and assessments and comments are transferred via the journal management system. In this process, assessment forms and reviewer comments on full texts are communicated to the author(s) via the editor.

In this context, reviewers who assess studies for the Anatolian Journal of Health Research are expected to have the following responsibilities:

-They should agree to assess only studies related to their area of expertise.

-They should make assessments under impartiality and confidentiality.

-If they think they are faced with conflict of interest in the assessment process, they should refuse to review the study and inform the editor of the journal.

-As required by the principle of confidentiality, they must dispose of the studies they have reviewed after the review process. They may use only the final versions of the studies they have reviewed only after publication.

-They should make the assessment objectively and only regarding the content of the study. Nationality, gender, religious beliefs, political beliefs and commercial concerns must not be allowed to affect the review process.

-They should do the review with a constructive and polite language. They must not include personal degrading comments involving enmity, accusations or insults.

-They should complete the review of the study they have agreed to review on time and based on the ethical responsibilities listed above.

Publication Ethics and Scientific Responsibility

The publication processes of the Anatolian Journal of Health Research are based on the impartial production, development and sharing of knowledge using the scientific method.

In our journal, current clinical and experimental research in the field of health sciences, studies in the form of reviews, case reports and letters to the editor and studies related to interdisciplinary fields are published in the form of refereed articles. In realization of scientific production, all components of the publication process, editors, authors, reviewers and readers, need to comply with ethical principles. In this context, in line with the guides and policies published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in open access (Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors, COPE Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors), our journal’s publication ethics and open access policy also requires all components of the publication process to comply with ethical principles.

If situations such as manipulation, skewing of data used in articles or usage of made up data are noticed, this situation will be communicated to the institution where the author works through legal channels, and the article will be rejected. Our journal has the right to request output files regarding analysis results based on the warnings provided by the editors and/or reviewers.

While all manuscripts sent to our journal are assessed by the method of referee (reviewer) assessment (peer review), the local or national ethics board approval documents of original research articles must be uploaded onto the system.

Before publishing articles in the Anatolian Journal of Health Research, the articles are screened in the IThenticate (http://www.ithenticate.com/) software. After screening, the articles are sent back to the authors if found necessary to be reviewed or revised, or if plagiarism or unethical behaviors are noticed, the articles are rejected. For the text screened with the plagiarism detection software, the similarity rate except for the references must not exceed 15%. Articles with higher rates are sent back to the authors.

Articles must not have been published elsewhere or be under review for publication in another journal. Manuscripts that have not been prepared in compliance with the publication rules will not be considered for review. Manuscripts must be uploaded from the webpage http://anatoljhr.org along with the "Publication Rights Transfer Form" and the “Ethics Board Approval Document”.

Informing the Editor of an Unethical Situation

In the Anatolian Journal of Health Research, in the case that editors notice a behavior of reviewers or authors that does not comply with ethical principles or an unethical situation regarding an article under review, in early viewing or a published article, they must declare it by a message to the address anatolia.health.res@gmail.com.

Some behaviors that are considered against scientific research and publication ethics:

Plagiarism: Showing the original ideas, methods, data or works of others as if they partly or completely belong to oneself without providing citation appropriate for scientific rules,

Forgery: Using actually non-existing or doctored data in scientific research,

Distortion: Doctoring research records or obtained data, showing devices or materials that were not used in research as if they were, doctoring or shaping research results in line with the interests of the persons or organizations providing support,

Republishing: Presenting duplicate publications as separate publications in academic assignments and promotions,

Salami-Slicing: Dividing the results of a study into parts in a way to disrupt the integrity of the study and inappropriately, publishing these parts in multiple runs and presenting these publications as separate publications in academic assignments and promotions,

Unjust authorship: Including individuals without active contribution among authors or not including those with active contribution, changing the ordering of authors inappropriately and without a legitimate reason, removing the names of those with active participation in later publications, getting one’s name among the authors by using one’s influence despite not having active contribution,

-In publications made as a result of studies conducted by receiving support, failure to disclose the supporting persons, organizations or institutions and their contributions,

-Using dissertations or studies that have not been presented or have been defended but not approved as a source without the permission of the author(s),

-Failing to comply with ethical rules in studies conducted on humans and animals, not shopping respect for patient rights in publications, harming animal health and ecological balance, failing to obtain required permissions,

-Using resources, spaces, facilities and devices provided or allocated for scientific research outside of their purpose,

-Making inaccurate or misleading declarations regarding scientific research and publications in academic assignments and promotions.

Publication Policy

-After the pre-review of the editor, manuscripts that are sent for publication in the journal are sent to two reviewers determined by the Publication Board who are experts of the topic.

-In the case that both reviewers approve the manuscript, it is decided to publish the article. In the case that both reviewers reject the manuscript, the article is not published. In case one reviewer approves it, and the other rejects it, the Publication Board may decide to either send it to a third reviewer or reject it by considering the contents of the reports.

-Manuscripts that are decided to be published are sent back to the author(s) of the manuscript for the revisions stated in the reviewer reports to be made. After the revisions are made, the editor decides upon whether or not the article will be published based on checking whether or not the reviewer comments were taken into consideration.

Plagiarism Policy

Plagiarism is a violation of ethics without regards to being deliberate or not. Similarity of studies to other sources without showing references and publication in this form are not only unethical, but also a crime and unacceptable. The Publication Board may act in compliance with COPE rules against claims and suspicions of plagiarism, reference manipulation and data forgery regarding studies sent to the journal.

Price policy

The Anatolian Journal of Health Research does not demand any payment for the submission, assessment, acceptance, publication and dissemination of an article.

Time of article assessment

It is aimed to complete the assessment process of manuscripts sent to the Anatolian Journal of Health Research within 12 weeks following the pre-review. In extraordinary cases, this time may be extended by some amount.

Amendment and retraction processes

Articles send to the Anatolian Journal of Health Research may not be retracted after the reviewer process has started or for the article has been sent to another journal. The authors may retract their articles whose reviewer process has not started by communicating with the journal’s editors with a petition stating that they would like to retract them. As long as the article retraction request has not been approved by the Publication Board, the authors may not send their article for review to another journal.

Amendments, Retractions

Initially, the editors assume that the authors have established their studies over honest observations. If there are situations that require amendments or corrections of typographic errors in the articles, the corrections are included on a numbered page within the table of contents. Includes original quotes; related to the original article (similarly if online). If there is scientific dishonesty, the journal publishes a retraction notice. In the retraction text, the reason for retracting the article is explained.

Conflict of Interest

In the name of preventing conflicts of interest, the editors must avoid gathering individuals that may have any relationship together in the assessment process. The editors, who make the final decision about the articles, must also not have any personal, professional or financial connection to the issues that will make decisions upon. For their articles to be assessed within ethical principles and for an independent process to be carried out, individuals must inform the Publication Board regarding potential conflicts of interest.

If there is a direct or indirect commercial connection or an organization providing financial support in the article, the authors must state that they do not have any commercial relationships to the used commercial product, drug and firm, or if there is any relationship, what kind of a relationship (consultant, other agreements) they have on the title page. Additionally, if a conflict of interest is in question, the author must explain this. Conflicts of interest that are expected to be declared include academic undertakings, personal relationships, political, financial or institutional connections.