The University of Health Sciences Journal of Nursing (UHSJN) publishes clinical and experimental (original) research, systematic reviews, case reports and review articles, editorial comments, and letters to the editor in all fields of nursing and health sciences.

Open Access Policy

Due to the role of sharing information in the advancement of science, UHSJN provides open access to the full text of all articles published within the journal which can be read and downloaded free of charge via the DergiPark Directory. Authors(s) are not charged for any process, including article evaluation and publication process.
Access link: https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/pub/sbuhemsirelik

Article Withdrawal Process

In accordance with the publishing policy of UHSJN, the author(s) may withdraw their manuscript in the preliminary evaluation process; the author(s) who want to withdraw their manuscript during the evaluation process or the publishing process, should fill out the "Manuscript Withdrawal Form" containing the withdrawal justification and the wet-ink signed approval of the responsible author. It is obliged to convey the form to the Editorial Board via e-mail to sbu.hemsirelikdergisi@sbu.edu.tr. The Editorial Board will return to the author within 15 days latest by examining this request. The Editorial Board will review this request and return it to the author in fifteen days or less. During the manuscript submission phase, the manuscript cannot be sent to another journal for evaluation unless the withdrawal request is approved since the publishing rights have been transferred to UHSJN by the author(s). Author(s)’ withdrawal requests for a published article will not be considered.
All of the articles submitted to the University of Health Sciences Journal of Nursing (UHSJN) are checked by using the iThenticate plagiarism program. In line with the similarity report, the Editorial Board decides whether the article will be accepted for peer review or directly rejected. In case copyright problems and plagiarism are detected, the follow-up of the process is carried out in accordance with the COPE (Code of Conduct for Journal Editors) guidelines.
The UHSJN Editorial Board is obliged to initiate an investigation regarding the manuscript, in case of suspicion of copyright violation and/or plagiarism regarding a manuscript under evaluation or a published article. As a result of the investigation, if the Editorial Board detects copyright violation and/or plagiarism in the manuscript, the manuscript will be withdrawn from evaluation and returned to the authors. If the article has been published, the "Withdrawn" phrase will be appended to the title of the article in an electronic display.
In case of detecting an error in a published article, the request for correction by the author (s) will be evaluated by the Editorial Board and if deemed appropriate, the content of the correction will be published in the next issue by appending the phrase "Correction" to the article title.

Article Evaluation and Acceptance Process

Articles submitted to the University of Health Sciences Journal of Nursing (UHSJN) are examined by double-blind peer review. The peer-review process aims to improve the quality of the articles to be published. All articles submitted to the UHSJN are evaluated by the Editorial Board and the reviewers using the evaluation procedure are listed below.
1. All articles are evaluated by the Editorial Board in terms of the topicality of the topic, suitability of the content, and the contribution of the article to nursing practice.
2. In accordance with the opinion of the Editorial Board, it is decided whether the reviewer evaluation process will start or not.
3. Articles that do not comply with the journal’s writing rules but are determined to be suitable for evaluation are sent back to the author by the journal secretariat for corrections (in terms of writing rules) without the need for further review.
4. The file edited by the author(s) is sent to at least two independent reviewers who are experts in their field, working in two different institutions by extracting identifying information about the author(s).
5. Approximately 15 days are given to the reviewers for evaluation.
6. Reviewers are required to fill out the Reviewer Evaluation Form during the article evaluation process and to upload the file containing correction suggestions on the text to the system.
7. Reviewers are required to make one of the decisions: “minor revision”, “major revision”, and “acceptance” or “rejection”.
8. If one of the reviewers decides to "reject" and the other to, "accept" the article is assigned to the third reviewer.
9. In order for an article acceptance decision to be made, at least two reviewers must make an "acceptance" decision.
10. Reviewer evaluations are sent to the authors by the Editorial Board via the DergiPark system in accordance with the double-blind reviewer evaluation.
11. In accordance with the recommendations of the reviewer, the author(s), after making changes to the documents, upload the final version of the documents to the DergiPark system along with the file named “Author's Response to Editor and Reviewer Corrections”.
12. The author(s) are expected to indicate the corrections separately done by each reviewer by highlighting (emphasizing) them.
13. Corrections from the author(s) are evaluated by the corresponding assistant editor.
14. The edits made by the author(s) are sent back to the reviewers to make the evaluation.
15. The final decision on the acceptance status of the article (“acceptance” or “rejection”) is made by the Editorial Board.
16. The evaluation process takes about 3 months.

Ethical Principles

UHSJN publishes qualified articles produced with scientific methods to contribute to the development of nursing science in accordance with ethical principles and rules. It is important that the Editorial Board, reviewers, authors, and readers, which constitute the components of the publication process, comply with the principles and responsibilities of publication ethics throughout this process. These responsibilities include the recommendations of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) http://www.icmje.org/recommendations) and the international standards of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) (https://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines) and presented below:

Ethical Responsibilities of Authors

• The author(s) should not send a manuscript for publication to UHSJN which are previously, completely, or partially published or under consideration for publication elsewhere with similar content, in Turkish or in a foreign language.
• The names of persons who did not contribute to the manuscript should not be written as the authors. After the manuscript is submitted to the journal for evaluation, any author name should not be added, deleted, or the order of authors should not be changed.
• The author(s) are responsible for the accuracy of the references used in the manuscript. The author (s) should cite the references used in the manuscript and at the end in accordance with ethical principles.
• The author(s) should notify the editors if they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or common interests with anyone about the manuscript they send for publication to UHSJN.
• If information or raw data is requested from the author(s) regarding their manuscripts in the evaluation process, they should submit the requested information to the Editorial Board.
• The author(s) should document that the necessary permissions have been obtained for the data they use in their manuscripts and that they have obtained informed consent from the research participants.
• The author(s) should state that they have received ethics committee approval for their research manuscripts, in a separate title in the method section of the manuscript with the board name, date, and number, and upload the document showing the ethics committee decision to the system at the first submission of the manuscript. The case studies should be stated in the method section that the “informed consent form” was taken from the volunteers.
• The author(s) should state that the manuscript complies with research and publication ethics and copyright regulations for intellectual and artistic works. If the research was carried out on human and animal subjects, it should be reported that the research was carried out in accordance with international notifications and guidelines (Helsinki declaration, etc.).

Obtaining Legal / Special Permit Certificate

• The author (s) must specify the approval of the Ethics Committee, the permission of the institution, and the information about informed consent under the heading of the ethical aspect of research in the method section.
• It is the responsibility of the authors to protect the confidentiality of patients.
• The permission documents of the patient or their legal representative must be attached for photographs that can reveal the identity of the patients and reported under the title of the ethical aspect of the study in the method section.

Ethical Responsibilities of Reviewers

• Reviewers should only agree to evaluate manuscripts related to their field of expertise.
• Reviewers should refuse to evaluate manuscripts they consider to be a conflict of interest and should inform the Editorial Board.
• Reviewers should make the assessment objectively in order to contribute to the editor's decision-making process. Reviewers should provide guidance that will help to increase the quality of the manuscript to be published and should carry out this process confidentially.
They should make their evaluations away from personal comments, in accordance with academic rules and with constructive language.
• Reviewers should indicate their suggestions on the evaluation form and/or text and submit it to the Editorial Board through the journal management system to be forwarded to the author(s).
• Reviewers should evaluate the manuscript within the given time.

Ethical Responsibilities of Editors/Editorial Board

• Editors/Editorial Board aims to meet the information needs of reviewers, author(s), readers, and practitioners according to the transparency principle and be ineffective communication.
• Editors/Editorial Board refuses the manuscript if it does not comply with the journal's policy and publication priorities.
• Editors/Editorial Board decides on the publication of articles according to their content and pays attention to the authenticity and scientific contribution of the articles, and does not show any privileges to any author.
• Editors/Editorial Board takes the necessary precautions to prevent infringement of intellectual property rights and check the similarity of each article.
• During the evaluation process of the articles submitted to the journal, the Editors/Editorial Board applies double-blind policies between the reviewers and the author(s), and considers whether there is a conflict of interest or a common interest.
• Editors/Editorial Board sends the articles taking into account the expertise of the reviewers. They ensure that every article is evaluated impartially and on time.
• Editors/Editorial Board ensures the protection of personal data in reviewing articles.
• Editors/Editorial Board evaluates whether the reviewer evaluations are scientific and in accordance with academic etiquette.
• Editors/Editorial Board takes into account the consistent criticism of the articles by the reviewers, they ask the author(s) for responding to the comments of reviewers for the article.
• Editors/Editorial Board ensures that the advisory board is up to date and very comprehensive.
• Editors/Editorial Board follows developments in publishing policies and ensures that journal publishing processes are operated in accordance with current policies and guidelines.
• Editors/Editorial Board ensures that errors, inconsistencies, or misinformation in the articles are corrected.
• Editors / Editorial Board reviews requests and complaints submitted to the journal and makes the necessary explanations.

Notification to the Editor of the Situation Not Complying with Scientific Research and Publication Ethics

When faced with a situation that is considered to be against the scientific research and publication ethics of reviewers and authors (such as non-compliance with ethical rules in research on humans and animals, plagiarism, forgery, distortion, republishing, slicing, unfair authorship), the person who encountered this situation needs to inform the editorial board about this alleged contradiction via electronic mail to sbu.hemsirelikdergisi@sbu.edu.tr.

Update Date 27.05.2022