AOT mainly concerns the promotion of dentistry in Turkey (see: Aim & Scope for the details). The intended population is mainly those involved in the dental profession, including researchers, dentists, dental educators, and students.

This journal does not charge any money under article processing or submission. No Article Processing Charge (APC) or fee is required in this journal.

The journal provides article-download statistics for the published articles in their relevant metadata pages.

The journal has been indexed by TÜBİTAK/ULAKBİM National Database (TR Dizin), Türkiye Citation Index, Turk Medline, Sherpa/Romeo, Ebsco, CrossRef, J-Gate, Google Scholar, OpenAire, ProQuest, and DOAJ, and credited by TDB Continual Dental Medicine Education High Commission.

Ethical Review Board Approval

In this journal, institutional ethics committee / ethical review board approval is required for all kinds of research using human subjects, human-derived material, and data (including extracted teeth). Informed consent signed by the patient is also required, where applicable. Concerning the medical research involving human subjects, AOT adheres to the ethical principles stated in the Declaration of Helsinki.

For studies using animals, AOT seeks the approval of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee. It is recommended that the animals are treated according to the National Research Council’s Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals. (http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12910) 

Review Process

Provided that manuscripts comply with the manuscript preparation guidelines, they go through a reviewing process:

The manuscript is first seen by the Editor-in-Chief and/or the Editor (1). If the content or the quality of the manuscript is not suitable for this journal, the manuscript may be rejected at this stage immediately.

Depending on the topic, the manuscript may be consulted to an Editorial Board member for eligibility and consideration for further scientific evaluation (the list is provided in the Journal Cover and on the Journal website) (2).

If the manuscript is not recommended for review by the consulted Editorial Board member, the reasons why the manuscript was rejected are passed on to the author.

If the manuscript is recommended for review by the consulted Editorial Board member, first, it is checked by the Statistical Editor for the appropriateness of the statistical analyses (3), then by the Technical Editor for the technical standardization (4). Afterward, an editor is assigned to carry out the scientific evaluation process (Editor-in-Chief or Editor or Associate-Editor).

At this stage, the manuscript is sent to at least two blinded-peer-reviewers chosen by the assigned editor (5). The reviewers give recommendations to the editor as ‘accept the article as it is’, ‘minor or major revisions required’, or ‘reject’. In case there is a disagreement between reviewers, the manuscript may be sent to (an) extra reviewer(s). The article can be published only after the required revisions are fulfilled by the author. However, taking into consideration the recommendations of the reviewers, the final decision belongs to the editor.

Note that a double-blind peer review system is adopted in this journal; the reviewers and the author remain anonymous to each other.



‘Conflict of interest’ and our management policies

According to the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME) the definition and scope of conflict of interest (COI) are as follows: “In the context of medical publishing, COI exists when a participant in the publication process (author, peer reviewer, or editor) has a competing interest that could unduly influence (or be reasonably seen to do so) his or her responsibilities in the publication process. Among those responsibilities are academic honesty, unbiased conduct and reporting of research, and integrity of decisions or judgments. The publication process includes the submission of manuscripts, peer review, editorial decisions, and communication between authors, reviewers, and editors”.

Various types of COI may exist. The most frequently seen types of COI include: financial ties, academic commitments, personal relationships, political or religious beliefs, and institutional affiliations (http://wame.org/conflict-of-interest-in-peer-reviewed-medical-journals). The existence of COI for particular submission does not necessarily mean that the article cannot be published in the journal, but requires effective management and that the Editors let readers know of it. In this journal, conflict of interest disclosure is obligatory.

Evaluation of a manuscript when a personal relationship exists (work partnership, friendship, superior-subordinate relationship, etc)
This is the most frequently encountered COI type in our journal. In this case, the Editor, having the COI, withdraws from the editorial process (WAME; abstaining from decisions where COI might arise).

Then, another editor (Editor-in-Chief, or Editor, or Associate Editor) who has no COI in that particular case takes over and carries out the routine editorial process.

In case all Editors have COI, the manuscript is consulted double-blinded to an Editorial Board member for eligibility. If the Editorial Board member does not recommend further evaluation of the manuscript, a rejection letter undersigned as ‘Editorial Board’ is delivered to the author. However, if the Editorial Board member recommends further evaluation of the manuscript, an editor is assigned, and the manuscript is taken to scientific evaluation. The final decision is given based on the reviewers’ recommendations. For an “accept” decision, positive recommendations of all or most of the reviewers are required, and the vice versa for a “reject” decision.



Evaluations of submissions from the Editor-in-Chief, the Editor or the Associate Editors
In this journal, the editors are actively involved in research, and all are potential authors. In case, one of the authors in a submission is the editor of this journal, then that person is excluded from the editorial process for that particular submission, and cannot attend editorial board meetings concerning their submission (WAME; exclusion of those with COI from the process; e.g., reviewer or editor).

In this case, the manuscript is consulted double-blinded to an Editorial Board member for eligibility. If the Editorial Board member does not recommend further evaluation of the manuscript, a rejection letter undersigned as ‘Editorial Board’ is delivered to the author. On the other hand, if the Editorial Board member recommends further evaluation of the manuscript, an editor is assigned, and the manuscript is taken to scientific evaluation. The final decision is given based on the reviewers’ recommendations. For an “accept” decision, positive recommendations of all or most of the reviewers are required, and the vice versa for a “reject” decision.



Publication Frequency

This journal is published 3 times per year.

The order of the publication of the articles is decided according to the date of the acceptance.



Open Access Policy

The journal is Open Access according to the Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI) definition. By this we mean that the journal's articles have "free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself."



Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement

Acta Odontologica Turcica aims to carry out the publishing task to high standards. This requires a universally accepted set of ethical principles to be adopted as the starting point. In this sense, our main reference is the Guidance (Flowcharts & Guidelines) published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

Corrections, Retractions, and Editorial Expressions of Concern

Corrections: In case a mistake not grossly affecting the findings is detected in published material (e.g. incorrect authors list, a missing image, a wrongly presented formula), a correction will be published in the next issue. The correction will be in the form of an Erratum (for author’s error) or a Corrigendum (for publisher’s error). Erratum and Corrigendum will be published on a numbered page and listed in the Issue Content list and will cite the original paper.

Retractions: If there is a big scientific mistake that would affect the conclusions of the article or infringement of professional ethical codes, the article can be retracted by the Editor and/or author. These mistakes include, but are not limited to, multiple submission, redundant publication, plagiarism, data fabrication, honest error (e.g. calculation errors, experimental errors). In this case, a retraction note with a page number will be published in the next issue with a title: “Retraction: [article title]”. This note will be listed in the Issue Content list. The text of the retraction will explain why the article is being retracted and will give a link to the original article. The original pdf article will be retained on the journal’s website, but a watermark reading ‘Retracted’ will be added on each page of the article.        

For submissions under review or accepted but not published articles, authors can ask for a retraction. In this case, a request letter explaining the reason for retraction, agreed and signed by all authors must be sent to the Editor-in-Chief.

Expression of Concern: An editorial Expression of Concern can be published in the journal if there are well-grounded concerns about the contents of a published article, and the editor wants to warn readers of potentially misleading information contained in it.

Article removal: Exceptionally, due to conditions such as defamation, infringement of others’ legal rights, court orders, serious health risks that the article content might pose, etc., an article can be removed from the online database. In this case, the title and authors’ names (the metadata) will be retained on the web page, and a notification will be placed indicating that the article has been removed for legal reasons.



Plagiarism Check

In this journal, manuscripts are controlled for plagiarism (iThenticate) at the pre-review stage.



Appeals

Authors may submit a formal appeal for rejected submissions (e.g. if they believe that a technical error was made during review, or a pertinent point was misunderstood/overlooked by the reviewers, etc). Appeal letters must be electronically sent to: gudisdergi@gazi.edu.tr. The editorial office is the only address for the appeals, and no means of communication other than e-mail is allowed. The authors must provide detailed reasons for the appeal and point-by-point responses to the reviewers' and/or Editor's comments. At this point, a revised manuscript must not be sent.


Decisions on appeals are final without exception. Priority is given to new submissions, so the appeal process may take longer than the original submission process.



Inquiries

Any inquiry regarding the editorial process should be directed in written form to the Editorial Board through e-mail: gudisdergi@gazi.edu.tr

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