Publication Ethics

Consideration of research and publication ethics

            Journal of Health Science and Medical Research (JHSMR) highly values research and publication ethics and considers this issue as its priority in considering any manuscript for publication. Research involving humans, published in JHSMR, needs to follow the ‘Good Clinical Practice’ guidelines (GCP); as provided by the International Conference on Harmonisation (ICH) of technical requirements for registration of pharmaceuticals for human use (ICH GCP), and Human Subject Protection practice; according to the US Office of Human Research Protections. In addition, Declaration of Helsinki for clinical research must be observed. Together with the manuscript, the authors of any article involving human subjects are required to submit a certificate of approval by their corresponding Institutional Review Board, or Human Research Ethics Committee. Short sentences that declare ethical issues are required in the material and methods section. Any articles that fails to declare their research ethics cannot advance to the review stage.  

            Plagiarisms, data fabrication, falsification, citation manipulation and double submission are all regarded as research misconduct. Any suspicion of such misconduct will be investigated by the editorial team. Unexplainable events will lead to rejection of the manuscript, or retraction of the published article.

            Publication in JHSMR strictly observes the Publication Ethics Guideline of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and our following statement.

Responsibility of the editor-in-chief and editorial board members

            The editorial board of JHSMR is elected by the Faculty of Medicine, Prince of Songkla University, through the University Council, with an aim to function in continuously improving the quality of the journal, by responding to international academia. The board must work together with the university to support the quality control of articles published. To do so, the editorial board must actively seek reviewers for each manuscript and provide quick communication with the authors in order to correct, clarify and give feedback. The editorial team gives priority to the new scientific findings, originality, clarity, ethical correctness, validity and relevance to the JHSMR’s scope as criteria for acceptance of publication.

Responsibility of the authors who submit articles to JHSMR

            Authors must read and understand the submission process and ethical standards of the journal. The authors shall provide clear research aims, and describe clear methodology that allows other researchers to confirm the findings; additionally, they must provide clear results and unbiased discussion without data manipulation. The authors must not submit a manuscript undergoing the process of consideration of any other journal or media to JHSMR, as this will lead to immediate rejection along with notification being sent to the other journal. In addition, the authors must sincerely reveal financial support received for any research along with any conflict of interest in publicizing the results.

Responsibility of the reviewers to JHSMR

            Reviewers of JHSMR shall review a manuscript that matches their expertise, and properly assess all manuscripts in a timely manner. In addition to this they should give advice to JHSMR regarding the quality and scientifically correctness of the manuscript. The review is to be pursued under no conflict of interest, and with no knowledge regarding the authors’ identity. Suggestions and comments should be professional, constructive and contain no hostile language, nor derogative, or personal comments. Reviewers must not directly contact the authors during the peer-review process; as this would be considered serious misconduct. All reviewers will be acknowledged by Prince of Songkla University for their service to the university’s academic activities. 

Plagiarism

            Plagiarism is regarded as serious misconduct by JHSMR. Therefore, all information and content that originates from other sources must be properly credited, cited and included in the “References” section.

            On submission, all articles will be screened using the software ‘Turnitin’, which is supported by the Prince of Songkla University. Plagiarism will be suspected if similarities are reported to be higher than 20 percent. Beyond this threshold, the editor-in-chief will be informed. Clear plagiarism (use of large portions of copied text and/or data) will result in immediate rejection. Any similarity of short phrases will lead to an issued notification to the authors, so as they have a chance to provide an explanation, or undertake re-writing. If plagiarism is detected during the reviewing process, by any means, such as notified by the reviewers, all forward processes will be immediately withheld. The editor-in-chief will request an explanation from the authors, and. An unsatisfactory explanation will lead to a decision of rejection. In cases that the misconduct is clearly proven after publication, the article will be retracted from the issue. All authors, including their affiliating institutions, will be contacted to address the retraction and the issue will be officially announced as early as possible in the Journal page and website.