Research and Publication Ethics

Journal of Health Sciences and Medicine (JHSM) and MediHealth Academy strictly adhere to internationally recognized ethical guidelines, including those set forth by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), the Council of Science Editors (CSE), the European Association of Science Editors (EASE), the World Medical Association (WMA), and the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM).

Ethical Approval
All research studies submitted to JHSM must comply with the ethical principles outlined in:

• The WMA Declaration of Helsinki – Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects.
• The Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (8th Edition).
• The International Guiding Principles for Biomedical Research Involving Animals (CIOMS/WHO).

Required Documentation:

• For Human Studies: An ethics committee approval document stating the name of the committee, approval number, and date of approval is required.
• For Animal Studies: A statement confirming compliance with animal welfare regulations and approval from an Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) is required.
• For Retrospective Studies: An ethics committee opinion or exemption letter must be provided. The lack of individual informed consent must be justified in the manuscript, consistent with institutional and national regulations.
• Ethics Approval Reporting: For all manuscripts involving human or animal subjects, the following statement must appear in the Methods section: “This study was approved by the [Name of Ethics Committee], Approval Number: [XXX], Date: [DD/MM/YYYY].” If ethics approval is deemed unnecessary, authors must explain this with appropriate institutional documentation. The ethics approval date must precede the manuscript submission date. 

Ethics committee approval must be obtained before the initiation of the research when such approval is required.

The approval must be valid for the study described in the manuscript and must include the name of the ethics committee, approval number, and approval date.

The date of ethics approval should precede the start of participant recruitment, data collection, intervention, or other research procedures requiring ethical oversight, as applicable.

Retrospective or post hoc ethics approval is generally not acceptable unless specifically permitted by applicable institutional or national regulations and supported by appropriate documentation.

If the timing, scope, or validity of an ethics approval raises concerns, JHSM may request additional documentation or clarification from the authors and, where necessary, may contact the relevant institution or ethics committee.

The manuscript must clearly report ethics approval information in the Methods section.

Informed Consent

• For case reports and clinical images, written informed consent must be obtained from the patient. In the case of minors or individuals unable to consent, written informed consent must be obtained from the parent(s) or legally authorized representative, as required by applicable law and institutional policy.
• Authors must explicitly state in their manuscript whether informed consent was obtained. JHSM reserves the right to request copies of consent forms.
• For studies involving human organs or tissues, evidence must be provided that these were procured in accordance with the WHO Guiding Principles on Human Cell, Tissue, and Organ Transplantation. Manuscripts must include a declaration that organs/tissues were not sourced from executed prisoners or prisoners of conscience.

Authorship
All authors must meet ICMJE authorship criteria, having made substantial contributions to:

1. The conception and design of the study, acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data.
2. Drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content.
3. Final approval of the version to be submitted.

Authors are accountable for all aspects of the work. Practices such as guest, ghost, or gift authorship are strictly prohibited.

Changes to Authorship
JHSM generally will not consider changes to authorship after a manuscript has been submitted. Any request for addition, deletion, or rearrangement must be made before acceptance, submitted by the corresponding author with a written explanation and confirmation from all authors. Only in exceptional circumstances will changes be considered after acceptance, which may result in a corrigendum.

Declaration of Competing Interests
All authors must disclose any financial and personal relationships with other individuals or organizations that could improperly influence or bias their work. Examples include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications, and grants.Authors with no competing interests must include the following exact statement: "I have nothing to declare." The completed declarations form must be uploaded during submission.

Funding Sources
Authors must disclose any funding sources that provided financial support for the research. The role of sponsors, if any, should be declared. If no funding was provided, the following exact statement must be included: "This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors."

Reporting Sex- and Gender-Based Analyses
JHSM provides the following guidance for reporting sex- and gender-based analyses (SGBA):

• For studies involving humans, animals, or eukaryotic cells, authors must assess whether sex- and/or gender-based analysis is applicable to the study design.
• When applicable, sex and/or gender must be defined and addressed in the study design, analysis, and reporting.
• If sex- and/or gender-based analysis is applicable but has not been performed, this must be explicitly acknowledged in the Limitations section.
• The definitions of sex and/or gender applied should be explicitly stated.
  Authors should follow the Sex and Gender Equity in Research (SAGER) guidelines where applicable.
• Sex generally refers to a set of biological attributes.
• Gender generally refers to socially constructed roles, behaviors, and identities.

Jurisdictional Claims
JHSM respects authors' designations of territories and institutional affiliations. MediHealth Academy adopts a neutral stance regarding territorial disputes.

• Maps: Study areas shown within maps should be identifiable using common mapping platforms and must include the note: "Map lines delineate study areas and do not necessarily depict accepted national boundaries."
• Institutional Affiliations: Authors must use the full, standard title of their institution or its standard abbreviation.

Submission Declaration
By submitting an article, the author(s) imply that:

• The work has not been previously published (except as a preprint, abstract, thesis, etc.).
• The article is not under consideration for publication elsewhere.
• Publication has been approved by all authors and responsible authorities.
• If accepted and published, any subsequent reuse or republication of the article must comply with the applicable Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) and must appropriately acknowledge JHSM as the original place of publication. Uses outside the scope of the license require permission from the copyright holder.

To verify compliance, manuscripts may be screened using appropriate tools.

Ethical Misconduct
The editorial board evaluates all research for ethical compliance prior to peer review. Manuscripts failing to meet ethical standards will be rejected. Suspected cases of unethical authorship, falsified approvals, or fabricated peer review will be investigated in accordance with COPE procedures, including corrections, expressions of concern, and retractions when necessary.

Copyright and Licensing
Journal of Health Sciences and Medicine (JHSM) follows an open access publishing model. Authors retain copyright ownership of their published articles. Upon acceptance for publication, authors grant the Journal of Health Sciences and Medicine a non-exclusive, worldwide license to publish, reproduce, distribute, display, archive, and make the article publicly available in all media and formats.

All published articles are distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). Under the terms of this license, third parties are permitted to copy and redistribute the article in any medium or format for non-commercial purposes, provided that appropriate credit is given to the authors and the Journal of Health Sciences and Medicine as the original place of publication, a link to the Creative Commons license is provided, and the article is not modified, adapted, translated, transformed, or distributed in an altered form.

JHSM recognizes authors as the copyright holders of their published work and retains only the necessary publishing rights to disseminate, preserve, and identify itself as the original publisher of the article.