ETHICAL PRINCIPLES AND PUBLICATION POLICY
Karya Journal of Health Science adheres to the ethical guidelines established by the International Council of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) and the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). These guidelines serve as a reference for authors, reviewers, and editors to ensure ethical publishing practices.

Karya Journal of Health Science expects all stakeholders, including authors, readers, researchers, publishers, reviewers, and editors, to uphold the following ethical responsibilities to promote the unbiased and accurate advancement of science.
The ethical responsibilities outlined below are based on the guides and policies developed by COPE.
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ETHICAL RESPONSIBILITIES OF AUTHORS
Authors are expected to adhere to the following ethical responsibilities when submitting their work for publication:
• Ensure the originality of the article submitted for publication.
• Avoid submitting the same article to multiple journals simultaneously.
• Refrain from submitting a previously published full-text statement as a new article.
• Guarantee that the article submitted for publication has not been published elsewhere.
• Prevent unjust authorship by ensuring all listed authors have made significant contributions to the work.
• Disclose any potential conflicts of interest in the article submitted for publication.
• Confirm that the research described in the article was approved by the relevant ethics committee and that informed consent and institutional permissions were obtained from participants.
• Obtain signed informed consent for case reports and explain this in the Methods section of the article.
• For research involving animals, comply with the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (www.nap.edu/catalog/5140.html) to ensure animal rights are protected.
• Adhere to accurate citation and referencing practices, ensuring all sources are correctly cited in the references section.
• For any text, tables, figures, visuals, or scales included in the article, obtain written permission from the copyright owners and authors where necessary, and acknowledge this in the article.
• Be prepared to provide requested information and data to the editorial board upon request.
• Avoid requesting changes to the author order, adding authors, or removing authors after the article has been accepted or published.
• Notify the journal editors immediately if ethical violations or errors are detected in the submitted, early-view, or published article, and cooperate with the editors in making corrections or withdrawing the article if necessary.
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ETHICAL RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE EDITORS
The editor and field editors of Karya Journal of Health Science are expected to uphold the following ethical responsibilities, as outlined in the COPE Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors and the COPE Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors, both of which are publicly available through the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).
General Duties and Responsibilities
• Strive to address the scientific information needs of readers and authors.
• Ensure the continuous development and improvement of the journal.
• Work to enhance the scientific quality of the articles published in the journal.
• Uphold and support freedom of expression.
• Maintain academic integrity in all editorial processes.
• Adhere to intellectual property rights and ethical standards without compromise.
• Act transparently and openly regarding issues that require corrections or clarifications.
Relations with Readers
• Editors must make decisions by considering the knowledge, skills, and expectations of all readers, researchers, and practitioners.
• Aim to ensure that published studies contribute meaningfully to the existing literature and maintain originality.
• Consider feedback from researchers and practitioners and provide clear, informative, and constructive responses to their inquiries or suggestions.
Relations with Authors
• Editors should make decisions, whether positive or negative, based on the significance, originality, validity, clarity, and relevance of the submission to the journal’s scope.
• Editors should proceed with the preliminary evaluation stage unless the submission has serious deficiencies.
• Editors should not disregard positive recommendations from reviewers unless the study has significant structural flaws.
• New editors should not alter decisions made by their predecessors unless substantial concerns arise.
• Editors should strive to prevent deviations from the established "blind peer review and evaluation processes."
• Authors should receive clear, explanatory, and constructive feedback.
Relations with Reviewers
• Selecting reviewers with expertise relevant to the subject of the submission.
• Providing reviewers with necessary information and guidance during the evaluation process.
• Monitoring potential conflicts of interest between reviewers and authors.
• Ensuring reviewer anonymity in double-blind review processes.
• Encouraging reviewers to conduct evaluations impartially, scientifically, and objectively.
• Developing policies aimed at improving reviewer performance.
• Preventing unscientific or biased reviews.
• Relations with the Editorial Board
• Ensuring that Editorial Board members comply with established processes, publishing policies, and guidelines.
• Keeping Editorial Board members informed about publishing policies and developments.
• Ensuring that Editorial Board members maintain neutrality and independence when handling submissions.
• Selecting new Editorial Board members based on appropriate qualifications.
• Assigning submissions to Editorial Board members according to their expertise.
• Maintaining regular communication with the Editorial Board.
• Organizing meetings with the Editorial Board to enhance publishing policies and improve the journal.
Relations with the Editorial Board
Editors must ensure that the editorial board members adhere to the procedures outlined in the publication policies and guidelines. Editors are also responsible for keeping the board members informed about the publication policies and any developments related to the journal. Additionally, editors must:
• Ensure that editorial board members review manuscripts in an unbiased and independent manner.
• Select new editorial board members based on their qualifications and ability to contribute to the journal.
• Assign manuscripts for review according to the expertise of the editorial board members.
• Maintain regular communication with the editorial board.
• Organize regular meetings with the editorial board to discuss and develop publishing policies and enhance the journal.
Relations with the Journal Owner and Publisher
• The relationship between editors and the publisher should be grounded in the principle of editorial independence.
• In accordance with the agreement between editors and the publisher, editorial decisions must remain autonomous and free from influence by the publisher or journal owner.
Editorial and Double Blind Arbitration Processes: Editors are required to implement the "Blind Arbitration and Evaluation Process" policies outlined in the journal’s publication guidelines. Therefore, editors must ensure that each article is reviewed in a neutral, fair, and timely manner.
Quality Assurance: Editors must ensure that every article published in the journal complies with the publication policies and international standards.
Protection of Personal Information: Editors are responsible for safeguarding personal data related to the subjects or visuals in the reviewed articles. They must reject submissions if no consent documentation is provided by the subjects. Furthermore, editors must ensure that authors protect the personal information of reviewers and readers.
Ethics Committee, Human and Animal Rights: Editors must ensure the protection of human and animal rights in the studies under evaluation. If there is no ethics committee approval for studies involving experimental research, the editors are responsible for rejecting the study.
Measures Against Possible Abuse and Misuse: Editors are obligated to take precautions against potential abuse or misuse of authority. In addition to conducting a thorough and objective investigation into complaints, editors must share the findings regarding such issues.
Ensuring Academic Honesty: Editors should ensure that errors, inconsistencies, or discrepancies in the studies are promptly corrected.
Protection of Intellectual Property Rights: Editors are responsible for protecting the intellectual property rights of all published articles and defending both the journal’s and authors’ rights against potential violations. Additionally, editors should take the necessary steps to prevent the content of published articles from infringing on the intellectual property rights of other publications.
Clarity in Discussion: Editors should consider well-founded critiques of the studies published in the journal and adopt a constructive attitude toward such criticism. The criticized study should be given the opportunity for a response. Studies presenting negative results should not be disregarded or excluded.
Complaints: Editors should address complaints from reviewers or readers and respond in a detailed and informative manner.
Political and Commercial Concerns: The editors’ independent decision-making should not be influenced by the journal owner, publisher, or any political or commercial factors.
Conflict of Interest: Editors are responsible for ensuring the impartiality and independence of the publication process by considering any conflicts of interest between reviewers and other editors.
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ETHICAL RESPONSIBILITIES OF REVIEWERS
• Reviewers should accept only articles within their field of expertise.
• Reviewers must conduct evaluations impartially and confidentially.
• If a reviewer perceives a conflict of interest during the evaluation process, they must inform the journal editor and decline to review the article.
• Reviewers must destroy the article they have reviewed in accordance with confidentiality principles after completing the review (reviewers may only use the final published version of the article after its release).
• Reviewers must evaluate the content objectively, ensuring that national, gender, religious, political, or economic concerns do not influence their review.
• Reviewers should examine the article in a constructive and respectful manner, avoiding personal comments that could be seen as hostile, defamatory, or insulting.
• Reviewers must complete their reviews on time and in accordance with the ethical standards provided.
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ETHICAL RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE PUBLISHER
The publisher is responsible for all processes related to articles submitted to Karya Journal of Health Science. Within this framework, decision-making is entrusted to the editors, free from economic or political interests.
The publisher respects and accepts the editorial independence of the journal.
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UNETHICAL BEHAVIOR
If you encounter any unethical behavior or content outside the ethical responsibilities mentioned above in Karya Journal of Health Science, please contact us via email at karyajhs@gmail.com.
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PUBLICATION POLICY
Publication Evaluation and Acceptance Process
Every article submitted to Karya Journal of Health Science is first evaluated by the editors in terms of writing quality, scientific value, originality, plagiarism, and ethics. Articles that do not meet these criteria are rejected and not considered further. Articles that comply with these criteria are initially reviewed by the Secretariat for adherence to article formatting guidelines. The text is then sent to statistical and language editors as needed.
Field editors are assigned to articles that pass this stage. These editors send the articles to two independent referees who are experts in the respective fields. The identities of the referees and authors are kept confidential. Referees are given 5 days to confirm their willingness to evaluate the article. The evaluation period for referees who agree to review the article is 15 days. This process is managed and monitored by the field editors. If a referee declines, a new referee is appointed.
For articles with two positive referee reports, the editorial board, along with the field editor, moves forward with the publication process. In cases of conflicting referee reports (positive and negative), a third referee is consulted to determine whether the article will be published. Authors are given 15 days to submit the required corrections. The corrected manuscript must be uploaded to the Dergipark system.
The publication review process is completed within an average of 3 months. All procedures are conducted electronically. The editorial board decides in which issue of the journal the accepted article will be published. During the final layout checks of the accepted articles, the editorial board may correct spelling and grammar errors, but the content will remain unchanged.
Withdrawal
The responsible author may withdraw the article during the preliminary evaluation stage.
Articles cannot be withdrawn during the evaluation or publication stages.
Once an article is published, authors must cooperate with the journal editor in the withdrawal process. If an author wishes to withdraw a published article, they must submit the article title, reasons for withdrawal, and a signed statement from each author via email to karyajhs@gmail.com. The editorial board will provide a response within 15 days upon receiving the withdrawal notification.
Charge Policy
No fees are charged for the evaluation and publication of articles. Authors are not paid for the articles published in the journal.
Copyright
By signing the Copyright License Agreement, authors agree that if their article is accepted for publication in Karya Journal of Health Science, it will be licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND) license, and the copyright will be transferred to Karya Journal of Health Science upon publication.