Ethical Guidelines

Chapter 1: Authorship

Section1.1 ) A person is considered as an author ( or one of the authors ) of the article that meet the following three criteria :

1. Have a significant contribution in at least one of the following activities :

A) Presenting a research idea or study design

B ) Data collection

C ) Analysis and Interpretation

2. Be involved in writing a draft article or its critical review which leads to modification of the content of the paper.

3. Have read and approved the final article.

Amendment 1: In cases where an individual or individuals who have made significant contributions in the research or writing the paper , in a way that their name has competence in appearing as one of the authors , but not all the three criteria above apply to them. Mentioning the name of the person or persons as the author with a written request from the corresponding author and approval of the ethics committee of the University or the institution where the research is being conducted is permissible . The corresponding author is responsible for making sure of the approval of the other authors of the manuscript for adding the name of the person or persons . Amendment 2 : legal entities and research teams are also subject to the standards of this section .

Section 1.2) The name of anyone who has the standards of the authors (in accordance with section 1 of this guide ), should be mentioned as the author in the part related to the authors; even if they discontinued their work with the study.

Section 1.3) People who do not have the writers’ criteria of the article should not be introduced as a writer .

Section 1.4) All authors should take responsibility for the content of the article in all the following areas :

1. The accuracy of the contents of the article

2. Adhere to general and specific ethical guidelines of the country in the protection of human subjects or animals in the study

3. Potential conflicts of interest to declare in writing at the time of submission .

Section 1.5) In large studies that have been conducted by a research team and the role of authors are highly specialized in producing the article , the role and responsibilities of each of the authors may be limited to their specialty area, in these cases, the researcher or researchers , decide on an individual who will have the responsibility for the whole article .

Section 1.6) The names of the authors in the section related to the authors of the study is based on the contribution of each individual and are determined through collective agreements . The person, who has made the greatest contribution to the study and writing of the manuscript , is the first author . Amendment: Position or the authors’ scientific level will have no impact on the order of the author's name Section 1.7) Disagreement about the order of the authors' names of the article will be proposed with the request of any one of them in the research council of the department , research center of the faculty or the institution where the research is performed and a decision will be made.

Section 1.8) The names of all persons who have contributed significantly to the implementation of the study or article but do not have the authors criteria , are given in the Acknowledgement with mentioning their contribution.

Section 1.9) Mentioning false attribution ( formal) of an institution , center or department that does not have any role in the relevant research or the author’s professional activity is incorrect.


Chapter 2: Scientific journal editors

 Section 2.1) Journal editors should have the freedom and authority to make decisions and act independently in performing their functions ( such as the acceptance or rejection of a received manuscript ).

Section 2.2) The editor is bound to respect confidentiality in all aspects of reviewing the manuscript .

Section 2.3) After the announcement of the editor about the rejection or acceptance of a manuscript for publication , the corresponding author should be given one chance to appeal. Each magazine must be scheduled to review the policies of such a request.

Section 2.4) The editor should make every effort to uncover abuse in received papers and to deal effectively with potential applications. Section 2.5) Editor or editorial board should nominate the person or people to judge each of the articles who are as much capable and qualified in the scientific field. The referee (s) chosen should not have any offensive interest in regarding the article being judged. Section 2.6) The editor is responsible for evaluation , selection and prioritization of the manuscripts submitted for publication , in an impartial way only with respect to the scientific and technical characteristics of the manuscript and unaffected by factors unrelated to it .


Chapter 3: Role and responsibility of the judges

Section 3.1) A judge accepts to review a peer manuscripts submitted to the journal , should have impartial judgment only on the basis of scientific and technical characteristics of the manuscript and should not be influenced by personal relationships with author (s) of the manuscript or any other irrelevant factors.

Section3.2) A person who is offered to review a peer manuscript, in case of any conflicts of interest , can refuse to accept the manuscript for judgm ent, o therwise , conflicts of interest must be clearly informed to his/her editor .

Section 3.3) Referee (s) and author (s) of the manuscript should avoid communication with each other ( in relation to the judgment of the manuscript ) during the judging process , without the permission of the editor of the magazine.

Section 3.4) If a judge accepts to review a peer manuscript , does not account him/her self scientifically or technically qualified to accurately judge a part or all of the manuscript, he/she must bring the matter to the editor .

Section 3.5) The text that is sent for peer review , should also be considered as a confidential document by the referee a nd the information contained therein should not be shared with any other person. The referee is not permitted to use the peer review for any other purpose other than for the judgment and maintaining the manuscript should be avoided in any form after the judgment.

Amendment 1: If the referee finds it necessary to consult with someone else for judging, and this consultation involves exposing the contents of the article , this can be done only with the permission of the editor .

 Amendment 2: The content of the above section applies to all manuscripts that are submitted for peer review and ongoing for cases that the judge has refused to accept the review for any reason.

Section 3.6) During the peer review , the referee should consider the strengths and weaknesses of the article and if possible recommend guidelines for solving the available problem to author (s). This should be conducted with respect to the independence of the author (s) intellect .

Section 3.7) After acceptance of a manuscript for peer review , it should be accomplished by the deadline announced by the editor . Amendment: If the deadline announced by the editor is not appropriate for the referee, the referee should avoid accepting the peer review or to come to an agreement for a new deadline with the editor.

 Section 3.8) The referee in addition to scientific and technical studies in the peer review , should inform the editor of any non-compliance with the provisions of this guide.


Chapter 4: Conflict of interest

Section 4.1) Conflict of interest is any financial and non-financial benefits that might affect the author, editor or referee from the expression of honest opinion . Existence of conflicts of interest in itself is not morally wrong for a manuscript .

Section 4.2) Author (s) of a manuscript should reveal clearly any conflict of interests that is hidden from the audience in the text or the following manuscript. Amendment: Contract between the researcher (s ) and sponsor of the research should not involve avoiding declare of any conflict of interest in the manuscript.

Section 4.3) Author (s ) must clearly present the resources for research costs and writing of the research.

Section 4.4) If the members of the editorial board or editorial personnel are effective in the decision of the editor of a manuscript , they should clearly and completely inform the editor about any conflicts of interest .


Chapter 5: Privacy and Confidentiality

Section 5.1) Participants personal identifier information , the study site staff or any other person other than the authors of manuscript and the people who will be appreciated , should not be included in the manuscript text , pictures , family trees or any other area, unless the person in question o r their legal representative has provided a written informed consent for publication of this information .

Amendment 1: regarding the photos of the people, their covering should not result in their identifications and covering their eyes is not enough; unless prior written consent is obtained .

Amendment 2: If the publication of manuscript is not possible without complete confidentiality of all identifying information or information that could lead to the discovery of the identity of the mentioned people in the section above, and obtaining informed consent is not possible , dealing with the allegation of lack of access to the people and the need to disseminate information and decision making for releasing information is up to the regional ethics committee .

Amendment 3: Publishing information that is already available to the public and obtained through correct procedures, does not require informed consent .


Chapter 6: Overlapping Publications

 Section 6.1) If a hand- written or electronic publication before this script is published o r is being considered for publication , sending the manuscript to another journal or redistributing it, is wrong.

Amendment 1: If the author (s) of a manuscript that is under review for publication in a journal decide , for whatever reason , to submit the manuscript for another publication, should first announce their withdraw in writing from the first journal. This is possible before the announcement of the publishing the manuscript in the first journal.

Amendment 2: If the magazine editors decide to simultaneously or in subscription to p ublish a text , if the purpose of this action is to provide community health and the process is clearly announced to the readers of that journal, subject to respect all relevant material and moral rights , it is permissible.

Section 6.2) Sending a text which contains a considerable amount of an article that has been published or is being considered, to be checked for publication as a scientific-research study is incorrect. Even if it is cited to the previous article or the previous article belongs to the authors of this manuscript . Amendment: Repeating the " Materials and Methods " in the next articles related to the same author (s ), if required , is permitted, however, cited reference is required .

Section 6.3) If an article was previously published in print or electronic , sending the translation of the same article into another language to check for publication , in case of approval by the editors of both journals and clearly informing the readers is permitted .


 Chapter 7: Copyright piracy

Section 7.1) Copyright is use of all or part of the material or ideas published or unpublished of a person or persons without citing the source , with an appropriate method or permission where necessary .

Section 7.2) Using the original or the translation of a published text of others in a manuscript should be done according to the following criteria :

a) In the case of using figure , table , questionnaire or a substantial part of the text or its translation , in the same text , in addition to writing the text in quotation marks and citing the source , written permission should be obtained from the first owner .

 b) If using a part of a text or its translation, as using the origin of the text, the text should be given in quotation marks and the source s should be cited .

c) If the text or its translation is used as quoting, summing up, conclusion, or an idea, the source must be mentioned.

Amendment 1: If a part of the text that is used as a component , such as changing a few words or the equivalent or changing the time of verbs, it also includes mentioning the original text ( sections A or B ).

Amendment 2: the contents of this section also apply to the contents published from the same authors.

Section 7.3) regarding part (c) quoting should not be in a way that is incompatible with the author (s ) idea and the general spirit of the text.

Section 7.4) Any claim or statement that is quoted or written in the manuscript or any methods used to achieve results, if not part of the general knowledge and is not clear for the readers should be followed by mentioning the source.


Chapter 8: Advertising

Section 8.1) scientific research publications both printed and electronic, should accept only advertisements for publication that provide information about the event , products or services. And should avoid any attempt to impress the audience with presentations of unscientific and inaccurate information.

Section 8.2) The advertisement site should not be close to the title of the article or the scientific paper, in a way that it relates the article with the advertisement for the readers.

Section 8.3) Ads should be inserted in the magazine in a way that clearly distinct from the contents of the print .


Chapter 9: Special Issue

Section 9.1) Special issues are issues of a publication that usually publish a series of articles on a specific subject or a series of articles of a conference in a way that it is related to the main issues discussed in the paper . Special Issue is often funded by sources other than the publisher .

Section 9.2) The editor has the responsibility of the published contents such as the ordinary issues.

Section 9.3) The editor should maintain the authority of sending any hand-written script for publication of special issue to the independent jury and the right not to accept them , same as the ordinary issues. These conditions must be notified prior to the writers and editors of the special issue .

Section 9.4) The financial support of the special issue, if any, should be clearly specified in the special issue.

Section 9.5) Publishing advertisement in the special issue should follow the policy similar to that in the normal issues. Section

9.6) The editor and the editorial board of the journal should not accept personal or private donations of sponsors of special issues . Section 9.7) re publishing of the special issue should be clearly determined by reference to the original article . A special issue should not re- published the results of a study , however, republishing guidelines or other material published in the interests of public health , with citing primary sources , may be appropriate.

Section 9.8) In the special issues similar to ordinary issues other notes of this guideline should be respected.


Chapter 10: Publishing the results of clinical trials

Section 10.1) In studies that were conducted in collaboration with researchers or centers from abroad, dissemination of results or parts of results of the study in Farsi should be done with respect to the rights of foreigners having the right of authorship and acknowledgment based on this guide. Section

10.2) Editor should accept only the results of clinical trials for publication that is registered in national and international registries and has received the relevant ethics committee approval . To ensure the respect of this principle the editor could request the registration document and committee licence or the relevant ethics committees in written form from the corresponding author .

Amendment: In multicenter studies that are conducted in several countries, if obtaining manuscript contains the study results, the editor can request ethical approval from the author (s) related to all the centers that the study was conducted at, separately. If an article contains the results of one of the centers , the ethical authority of that center ( national) can be requested .

Section 10.3) Regarding publication of the results of clinical trials that has been reached through international cooperation, the editor may , if necessary, request part or the role of each of the authors in the study in writing .


Chapter 11: Deception

Section 11.1) deception is any violation or deviation from accepted ethical principles in writing and publication of scientific-research works that encompasses the following examples :

1. Building ( counterfeiting) data and results that are not based on a real research

2. Manipulate the data from the study 3. Copyright piracy 4. Avoid mentioning the adverse effects in clinical trials

 Section 11.2) The editor can search the possible occurrence of deception in the writings of the research , but if he/she becomes aware of the possibility of deception , it must be investigated . This investigation can be as a request of described from the corresponding author or if necessary, to reflect on the respected institute and request a follow up. Amendment: Prior to the confirmation of the occurrence of deception no unrelated parties should be informed of the raised possibility or the ongoing review.

Section 11.3) If the editor verifies the occurrence of deception , depending on the severity of the fraud one or more of the following measures should be done: 1. Refrain from publishing the manuscript (if still unpublished )

2. Amendments or deny of the publication in the next issue of the magazine (if issued )

 3. Informing the sponsors research institute , chairman or chief of the work place or study of the authors

 4. Avoid accepting future author (s ) articles for a certain time

 5. Removing the previous articles of the author (s ) of the site or publication database

Amendment: number 5 is only applicable if the first section (example a)

section 11.1 was done.


Chapter 12: Other types of publication

Section 12.1) Editors of scientific journals of all publications of the Ministry of Health approved by the health commission and medical education that are printed, printed and electronic simultaneously, or published electronically are subject to all provisions of these guidelines.

Section 12.2) In cases where published simultaneously in print and electronic form , both print and electronic reference must have the same address .

Section 12.3) Writing one or more chapters of the books that are published as textbook are subject to all the sections of this guideline. In this case, editor’s duties are the responsibilities of the corresponding author ( the name that is mentioned on the cover).

 Section 12.4) Publication of the research results , before the publication of peer review, t hrough public media is wrong . Unless for cases that due to special importance for public health , publishing a part or all of a research result by policy makers authorities are considered necessary.

Section 12.5) If a summarized article is sent for a conference that was previously published as abstracts or full papers , it should be delivered to the secretary of the congress .


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