Balkan Health Science Journal

Balkan Journal of Health Sciences, published by Trakya University Faculty of Health Sciences, is an international peer-reviewed scientific journal based on open access, independent and unbiased double-blind peer-review principles, aiming at the free circulation and distribution of information. It has been published as an electronic journal twice a year, in April and October, starting from 2022. It continues to be published three times a year as of 2023. The publication language of the journal is Turkish and English. The journal includes studies in the field of health sciences (such as nursing, nutrition, physiotherapy and rehabilitation, audiology, health management, occupational therapy, midwifery, medicine and other health sciences). The journal is open access and there is no fee for article submission, article processing and publication. Issues published on the journal's website can be accessed free of charge.

The journal includes original research and review articles using quantitative and qualitative data, case studies, technical reports and notes, letters to the editor, etc. It is accepted. The required forms for all articles are available on the journal website.

Articles should be prepared in Microsoft Word, 11 point Times News Roman font, 1.5 line spacing, justified, and leaving 2.5 cm of space from the top, bottom, right and left sides of the page. Except for the first page, other pages should be numbered. The title of the articles should be written in 12-point font, capital letters and bold characters. In the article, information such as author, institution, supporting institution/company should be written as XXX.
Articles to be sent by authors should be arranged to include the following sections. The text file to which the article is sent should include the title page, Turkish and English abstracts, keywords, texts of the article, references, tables (one table per page), and subtitles of the figures (if any) on the last page, respectively.
Title page: The title page should include the Turkish and English title of the article, the name and surname of the author(s), the institution they work for, and their ORCID IDs according to their order in the article. The phone number, address and e-mail information of the corresponding author should also be included. Author contributions (such as idea, design, data collection, data analysis and comments, article writing, critical review) should be stated. Information about the supporting company, conflict of interest, and the congress where the study abstract is presented as a paper, if any, should be added.
Abstracts: On the second page, Turkish and English abstracts should be given with the article title, should not exceed 250 words and abbreviations should not be used. Turkish summaries in research articles; It should be presented under the title of Summary with the headings Amaç, Yöntem, Bulgular and Sonuçlar, summaries in English; It should be presented under the heading Abstract with the headings Aim, Method, Results, Conclusion. In the rewiews, the summary section should include information and purpose regarding the subject and should be short and a single paragraph. Summaries of case reports should include information about the case and be short and single paragraph.
Short Title (Running Title): It should be given under the main title on the title page of the article, its content should include the article title and not exceed 8 words.
Key words: At least three and at most five keywords should be given under the abstracts in Turkish (Anahtar kelimeler) and English (Keywords) in accordance with "Medical Subject Headings (MESH)". For English keywords, www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/MBrowser.html and for Turkish keywords, www.bilimterimleri.com can be used. A comma should be placed between Turkish and English keywords, and all letters should be written in lowercase. Turkish keywords should be sorted alphabetically, and English words should be sorted according to the order of Turkish keywords.
Article Texts: In research articles, Introduction, Purpose, Materials and Methods, Findings, Discussion, Conclusion and Recommendations, Acknowledgments, Conflict of Interest, Author Contribution (idea, design, data collection and/or processing, analysis and/or interpretation, article writing, critical review, resource/funding), Resources.
Authors must contribute in at least 3 areas specified in parentheses. The limitations of the research should be given before the title of results and recommendations. Reviews should include Introduction and Conclusion sections. Case reports should be organized as Introduction, Case(s), Discussion and Conclusion after the title and abstract. The text file should not contain author names, information about institutions, figures and images used in the article. The written language of the articles must be clear and understandable. In Turkish articles, the Turkish dictionary of the Turkish Language Association or http://www.tdk.org.tr, as well as the dictionary of terms of the Turkish Medical Associations related to their branches, should be taken as basis. Abbreviations used in articles should be written clearly when they are first used in the text, and their abbreviated form should be given in parentheses next to it.
Tables/Figures/Graphs: Tables in the article should not contain vertical lines, should be prepared using the table menu in the Word program, and the number of tables should not exceed 5. A period should be used between fractions (such as 10.45). Figures, pictures, tables and graphs should not be sent embedded in the text. Tables should be included in the file to which the text is sent, one table per page. Each of the figures, graphics and photographs of the article should be sent as a separate image file in high resolution jpeg format. Descriptions of the figures should be written at the end of the file to which the manuscript is sent. Where tables, figures and graphs appear in the text should be stated at the end of the sentence. If previously published figures, pictures, tables and graphics are used, written permission must be obtained and this permission must be stated as an explanation in the description of the figure, picture, table and graphic.
References: Our journal's reference writing style is "Vancouver style". When using the Endnote program, unlike the Vancouver style, journal names are written in longer formats. In Vancouver style, journal names are abbreviated. For this purpose, an example link for the Vancouver writing style is provided within the scope of spelling rules. When the Endnote program is printed, please provide the short name of the journal if your source is a journal.
For detailed information, you can use the link regarding Vancouver source writing style.
Link:http://www.osirjournal.net/old/upload/files/2013/VANCOUVER_Reference_guide.pdf
Sources that are not published and cannot be given with page numbers (unpublished congress, symposium, meeting, etc. documents) should not be used.
You can access the Copyright Transfer Form from the link below (Sending is mandatory).
https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/journal-file/25767
During the article upload process, the "plagiarism report/similarity report" taken from the plagiarism program (Turnitin / iThenticate) where plagiarism is evaluated must be attached. The similarity rate should not exceed 20%.

Author(s) who submit articles to the journal are expected to comply with the following ethical responsibilities:
• It is the responsibility of the authors to ensure that the articles comply with scientific and ethical rules.
• Articles submitted for publication in the journal must not have been previously published or accepted for publication anywhere.
• All authors must have direct academic and scientific contributions to the articles. Author(s) should participate in the acquisition of article data, analysis or interpretation, conceptualization, design, writing of the article or critical review of it for content, planning and/or revising the work in the article. Providing funding/grants for the article and collecting data alone do not grant authorship rights. In this case, individuals who do not meet the sufficient criteria for authorship but contributed to the article should be listed in the "acknowledgments" section, indicating their contributions.
• Authorship contribution information must be reported in the article before the references section. In multi-author articles, the authors' contributions to the research (idea formation, design, statistics, article writing, etc.) must be explained and signed.
• If there is a direct or indirect commercial connection in the article or an institution that provides financial support for the study, the authors should list the commercial product, drug, pharmaceutical company, etc. used under the Conflict of Interest heading before the references section. He must state that he has no commercial relationship with the company or, if so, what kind of relationship he has (consultant, other agreements).
• In all studies conducted on humans, the Declaration of Helsinki, Good Clinical Practice Guide, Good Laboratory Practice Guide and T.R. It accepts the principle of compliance with the relevant regulations of the Ministry of Health. It should be stated in the Materials and Methods section of the article that ethics committee approval has been obtained (including number and date), the patients and/or volunteers on whom the study was conducted should be informed and their written consent should be obtained, and it should be written in the Materials and Methods section of the article.
Ethics committee approval form must be uploaded to the system during the article upload process. In studies for which ethics committee approval is not obtained, the justification must be explained in the article.
•In studies conducted on animals, it should be stated in the Materials and Methods section of the article that the study was conducted in accordance with the principles of the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (www.nap.edu/catalog/5140.html) and that ethics committee approval was obtained from the relevant institution.
• A copy of the ethics committee approval must be uploaded to the journal system.
• In case reports, an informed consent document must be obtained from the patient or, if necessary, his/her legal representative, and
It should be stated in writing within the article.
• Studies presented at the congress and symposium should be stated as footnotes on the title page.
• Authors must check the plagiarism rate in the analysis program before submitting an article to the journal, and the similarity rate of the article must be at most 20%.
• The Publication Rights Transfer Agreement on the journal website must be filled out in handwriting, signed by all authors, and scanned and uploaded to the system. No copyright is paid to the articles submitted to the journal.
•If the author(s) notices a mistake or error regarding his/her published work, at the early appearance or evaluation stage, he/she has the obligation to cooperate with the editor in informing, correcting or retracting the journal editor or publisher.

ETHICAL RESPONSIBILITIES OF REFEREES
Referees who submit articles to the journal are expected to comply with the following ethical responsibilities:
- Referees should not contact authors directly.
- They must make their evaluations impartially and confidentially.
- If he/she thinks that he/she is faced with a conflict of interest during the evaluation process, he/she should not accept to review the study and should inform the journal editor.
- Must complete the evaluation objectively and use constructive and courteous language.
- If they deem necessary, they should exchange opinions with the editor during the evaluation process.
ETHICAL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF EDITORS
Editors who submit articles to the journal are expected to comply with the following ethical responsibilities:
— Must make efforts to meet the information needs of readers and writers.
— The author should carefully examine feedback from referees or readers and respond in an enlightening and explanatory manner.
— Must contribute to the development of the journal and carry out processes to improve the quality of the studies.
— Journal processes must be completed fairly, impartially and on time, in accordance with ethical principles.
- Editor and editorial board members can also send articles to the journal and publish in the journal.
The journal uses the DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals) Open Access Journals Guide (https://doaj.org/apply/transparency/). Transparency principles are taken as reference in scientific publishing. Although the publication language of the journal is Turkish, articles in English with Turkish abstracts can also be included in the journal.
Balkan Journal of Health Sciences attaches importance to ethical rules in terms of protecting the rights of both the journal and the authors. The provisions of the "Higher Education Institutions Scientific Research and Publication Ethics Directive" (https://www.yok.gov.tr/Sayfalar/Kurumsal/mevzuat/bilimsel-arastirma-ve etikyonetmeligi.aspx), relevant legislation and the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) ) takes into account the ethical rules and responsibilities published by https://publicationethics.org/
Article submission and evaluations by Scientific Advisory Board Members are carried out electronically. Manuscripts sent to the journal are first examined by the typesetting team in terms of the journal's basic rules. Articles that do not comply with the basic rules of the journal may be rejected by the editorship or revision may be requested. Manuscripts that are determined to comply with the basic rules of the journal are first evaluated by the journal editorship and sent to the field editor. After being reviewed by the field editor, it is sent to at least two members of the Scientific Advisory Board (double-blind peer review) and these members are asked to give their opinions within 4 weeks about whether it is suitable for publication.
In order for the article to be published, at least two referees must express positive opinions. If one of the two referees expresses a negative opinion, the Journal Publications Commission may review the referee reports and decide to appoint a third referee for the article or to return the article to the author. Referees evaluate articles in areas such as scientific quality and contribution to national/international science and practice. After review by the referee, the article is sent to the journal editor with a recommendation regarding rejection, revision or acceptance of the article.
The journal editorship makes a decision in line with the referee recommendations, which will be notified to the author. The article is sent back to the author along with the referee reports. Authors revise the article in line with the recommendations given by the referees and upload all revisions to the system as a response letter to the referee. The final revised version of the articles that pass this review is re-evaluated by the journal editorship and field editors, and the issue in which they will be published is decided. An acceptance letter is sent to the relevant author and the article is placed in the printing queue.
After the article is sent to the journal for publication, none of the authors can be deleted from the author list without the written permission of all authors, and no name can be added as an author and the author order cannot be changed.
The evaluation process for the article takes approximately 3 months.
Process for Retraction of an Article
• For unpublished articles
Articles can only be retracted if they have not been officially published. To retract a manuscript, authors must write a clear and concise letter explaining why the manuscript should be retracted, and the letter must be signed by all authors. The journal reserves the right to withdraw an article due to plagiarism, fraudulent use of data, or other violations of ethical rules.
• For published articles
Articles published on the journal website may be withdrawn. In its place, a note signed by the authors titled “Retraction: [article title]” will be published on the website as part of the next issue. The HTML version will be removed.

There is no fee for article submission or processing of processes.