Policies

STATEMENT OF PUBLICATION ETHICS

All policies of Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology are based on high ethical standards for authors, reviewers and editors while conducting research, submitting papers, peer-review process and publication. The Journal follows COPE, ICMJE and WAME Core practices to reach the highest standards in publication ethics including Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.

POLICY MAKING

The editorial board of Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology makes recommendations on all editorial policy decisions. The Editor-in-Chief is the chairperson in all editorial board meetings and is responsible for implementation of policy decisions taken by the editorial board. The editorial board meetings are held quarterly to twice a year.

EDITORIAL FREEDOM

Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology adopts the ICMJE (http://www.icmje.org) and the ‘World Association of Medical Editors’ (https://www.wame.org) policies on editorial freedom which delineates that Editors-In-Chief holds full authority over the entire editorial content of their journal and the timing of publication of that content. Journal owners do not have the right to interfere in the articles selection, editing and time of publishing, either, directly or by indirectly influencing the decisions. Editor’s decisions must be based on the quality of work and its importance to the readers and not on the commercial interests. Editors-In-Chief is free to express critical without fear of retribution, but with full responsibility.

POLICY OF SELECTION OF EDITORS, REVIEWERS, OTHER EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

Human Resource policies in relation to selection of Editors, Reviewers, other Editorial Board members are based upon vision and mission of Ophthalmological society of Pakistan (OSP). Decisions are taken by Central Council, which is an elected body of OSP. The performance of editorial board is assessed using mutually agreed-upon measures and various journal metrics.

 

Selection of Editor in Chief

  • Decisions regarding selection of Editor in Chief are taken by Central Council, (which is an elected body of OSP), according to the constitution of OSP Pakistan.
  • The tenure of Chief Editor shall be for four years
  • The tenure may be extended by the Central Council
  • Chief Editor shall be regular member of the Central Council
  • He/She shall ensure continuity and high standard of the Journal
  • Chief Editor shall submit audited account of the Journal to the Central Council
  • Chief Editor may appoint international editor
  • Shall allocate dues to the Editorial Board.

 

Selection of Editor

Editor is selected for two years renewable term subject to performance review according to the following criteria.

  • Academic rank above Assistant professor or equivalent.
  • Certification/Diploma in medical editing
  • Publications in National or International peer reviewed journals.
  • Expected to know the policies of the Journal and publisher, Author guidelines, Editor Guidelines and Reviewer guidelines as defined in ICMJE, COPE and other international editors committees
  • Experience as editor/reviewer for national and international journals
  • Contribution to OSP

AUTHORSHIP

Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology requires letter of Authorship duly signed by corresponding author, authors and co-authors as compulsory document for publication. Authorship implies responsibility and accountability for published work. The journal also requires information about the contributions of each author. The journal adopts ICMJE criteria for authorship and contributor-ship. It is the collective responsibility of the authors to determine that all people named as authors meet the criteria. If authors request removal or addition of an author after manuscript submission or publication, journal editors will seek an explanation and signed statement of agreement for the requested change from all listed authors and from the author to be removed or added. Editors of Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology will handle the potential authorship dispute according to the COPE flowcharts:   

 

Acknowledgements

All contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed in an ‘Acknowledgements’ section. Examples of those who might be acknowledged include a person who provided purely technical help or writing assistance, or a department chair who provided only general support.

PROCESSING OF MANUSCRIPT

Initial Assessment/Triage: On receiving an article for publication, an acknowledgement letter is sent to the author. After that, the submitted article is initially assessed by a staff editor. It is ensured that manuscript is prepared in accordance with the uniform requirements submitted to bio-medical journal as approved by ICMJE guidelines. It is also evaluated that the article is in accordance with the Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology format, technically correct and falls under the aims and scope of the journal. The staff bibliographer also examines and authenticates the references and checks for plagiarism. The manuscript is assessed for statistical analysis by the Journal’s statistician. Deficiencies found by the editor and statistician are communicated to the author for redressing the article at the initial stage.  

 

Peer Review: After initial assessment and receiving of the redressed article, the selected papers are sent to two reviewers for peer review. Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology follows double blind peer-review procedure. Two weeks' time is given to reviewers for reviewing the manuscript. If reviewers fail to send back their feedback in the stipulated time, reminders are sent. Comments from two reviewers are mandatory for review of a manuscript. Once the reviewed manuscript is received from both the reviewers, their comments/suggestions are communicated to the author for revision. Revisions must be returned to the Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology within two weeks. The Corresponding Author must reply to each point made in the revision request and may state points of disagreement with the reviewer's comments. In case of conflict or disputed articles, the matter is discussed with the Chief Editor and finally to a third reviewer as nominated by him.

 

Editing and proof reading: After receiving the revised article, it is sent for editing and proofreading of text for correct grammar, spelling and medical terminology, ensuring incorporation of all the necessary/relevant minutest details in the article. The final proofs are sent to the corresponding authors for approval of the corrected manuscript. Three days are given to authors to return their feedback failing which the manuscript is processed as final. The Managing Editor checks final proofs at the dummy stage before sending them for printing.

PRIVACY POLICY

The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal.

POLICY ON DATA KEEPING

When a manuscript is rejected, the rejected material is deleted from the editorial systems after one year. When a manuscript is published, the journal keeps copies of the original submission, reviews, revisions, and correspondence for at least three years.

POLICY ON PUBLICATION MISCONDUCT

According to the ICMJE recommendations, scientific misconduct in research and non-research publications includes but is not necessarily limited to data fabrication; data falsification, including deceptive manipulation of images; purposeful failure to disclose conflicts of interest; and plagiarism. The journal deals with such situations by first asking the corresponding author an explanation in view of the available evidence. If the author does not respond or is unable to satisfy the editorial board, the manuscript is dropped from consideration if unpublished and retracted if published. Notice of retraction will be given in print and on the website (as described in the retraction policy of the Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology). The author's institutional Head will be informed of the action.

Plagiarism Policy

Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology observes/follows the ICMJE, Pakistan Medical and Dental Council and Higher Education Commission guidelines/criteria for all types of plagiarism. The same can be accessed at www.icmje.org, www.pmdc.pk and www.hec.gov.pk. All articles submitted to Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology are evaluated for plagiarism and similarity index through ‘Turnitin’.  It is the authors' responsibility to apprise themselves of plagiarism in any form including paraphrasing and self–plagiarism. Following step are taken in case of any plagiarized submission:

  • Dropping of article from processing/consideration of publication
  • The author will give an explanation in this regard.
  • In case of an unsatisfactory reply, the issue will be referred to the disciplinary committee.
  • The disciplinary committee comprises of the staff, editors and the Chief Editorand would deal with such cases. The committee will take decision considering the flowcharts of COPE https://publicationethics.org/search?t=plagiarized+article
  • For a published article, the plagiarized article will be retracted from publication and a notice to the effect will be published in the Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology. HEC, PMDC and author's institute will also be informed.

If a reader wants to report a complaint against misconduct in an article published in Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology, it can be done by email to the Chief Editor at pjoosp@gmail.com. Following information must be provided: 

  • Title of manuscript, author(s), month and year of publication of the issue, in which paper is published.
  • Name, designation, signatures, organization, address, e-mail address and telephone number of the complainant. 

  

POLICY OF DISCLOSURE AND CONFLICTS OF INTEREST OF EDITORS, REVIEWERS AND AUTHORS

  • Editors and editorial board members will not use unpublished information from manuscripts submitted in Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology for their own research work/paper without the authors’ written consent.
  • Editors will not be involved in editorial processing of the manuscripts, in which they have any conflict of interest with any of the authors or institutions related with manuscript. That manuscript will be handled by some other member of the editorial board. 
  • The reviewers will not use or disclose the unpublished material or information acquired through the peer review process. 
  • The invited reviewers will notify the editors about any conflict of interest about the manuscript and their work. The reviewer will decline to review such a manuscript.
  • The authors, at the time of submission of a manuscript, will submit a disclosure form indicating any conflict of interest; which can be either financial or non-financial. The Chief Editor may ask for further information or documents relating to conflict of interests.

STATEMENTS OF PRIORITY POLICY

The statements of priority (such as "we are the first to report...") should be avoided in the manuscripts because of the inability to be familiar with all published works or presentations on a subject. If ever, it is needed, the statement should be "we are unaware of previous reports of this finding and could find no reference to it in a computerized search (include the name of the database)."

POLICY ON HUMAN RIGHTS

Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology strictly adheres to the ethical principles outlined by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) available at: http://publicationethics.org/ and Declaration of Helsinki (https://www.wma.net/what-we-do/medical-ethics/declaration-of-helsinki/). Research involving humans must be approved by an ethics committee. The approval must include the name of the ethics committee and the reference number. Editor has the right to reject the manuscripts if he finds out that the research has not been carried out within an appropriate ethical framework.

Authors should also respect participants’ rights to privacy and to protect their identity. Authors should gain informed consent from participants at the point of recruitment. If this is not possible, authors must demonstrate that publication of such data does not compromise anonymity or confidentiality or breach local data protection laws. Vulnerable populations like prisoners, insane and internally displaced persons require special consent.

Clinical Trials Registration number must be included in the manuscript and Authorship form in cases of RCT.  Guidelines for RCT can be accessed at: http://www.icmje.org/

ETHICAL POLICIES ON RESEARCH INVOLVING ANIMALS

When reporting experiments on animals, refer to guidance on animal research ethics available from the International Association of Veterinary Editors’ Consensus Author Guidelines on Animal Ethics and Welfare (https://accountablejournalism.org/ethics-codes/consensus-author-guidelines-on-animal-ethics-and-welfare-for-editors). Research on endangered species of animals must comply with institutional, national, or international guidelines.  

POLICY REGARDING STANDARDS OF REPORTING

EQUATOR guidelines (available at: https://www.equator-network.org/) must be followed while preparing manuscript. These include and are not limited to:

  • Randomized controlled trials (CONSORT)
  • Systematic reviews and meta-analyses* (PRISMA) and protocols (PRISMA-P)
  • Observational studies (STROBE)
  • Case reports (CARE)
  • Qualitative research (COREQ)
  • Diagnostic/prognostic studies (STARD and TRIPOD)
  • Pre-clinical animal studies (ARRIVE)

POLICY ON ARTICLE CORRECTIONS, ARTICLE WITHDRAWAL, RETRACTION, REMOVAL AND REPLACEMENT

 Corrections: If a correction is needed, Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology publishes a correction notice as soon as possible with detailed changes. The correction is on a numbered print page that is included in Table of the Contents. The journal may, if necessary, also post a new article version with details of the changes from the original version and the date(s) on which the changes were made.

Article withdrawal: If the authors want to withdraw the manuscript during its processing, they should send an email notifying as to their intention with the signatures of all the authors. The withdrawal request must be complete, scanned and sent to the editor. A final letter from the editorial office for withdrawal of the manuscript will then be dispatched. Electronic signatures are not accepted. Without a formal letter of withdrawal, a manuscript is not considered withdrawn and use of such a manuscript elsewhere will be considered as an ethical misconduct.

Article retraction: If an article needs to be retracted because of multiple submissions, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data, a retraction note titled “Retraction: [article title]” is published in the subsequent issue of the journal and listed in the contents list.

Article replacement: In cases where the authors of the original article may wish to retract the flawed original and replace it with a corrected version, the procedures for retraction will be followed and retraction notice will publish a link to the corrected re-published article.

ADVERTISEMENT POLICY

Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology provides an esteemed and distinguished forum for advertising ethical products. However, the editors of Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology hold themselves to high standards and the journal is not dominated by advertisements and advertising agencies. Advertisers are not allowed at any cost to influence editorial decisions. Advertisements are clearly identifiable as advertisements. Editors of the journal have full and final authority for approving print and online advertisements and for enforcing advertising policy. All advertising is related to the practice of ophthalmology. Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology will not advertise the products which are harmful to health.

LICENSE TERMS

Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License allows to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format, adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material as long as the user gives appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, indicate if changes were made and do not use the material for commercial purposes.

COPYRIGHTS

Authors retain full copyrights without restrictions and give non-exclusive publication rights to the publisher.

PROCESSING/PUBLICATION CHARGES

Authors from Pakistan are charged Pakistani rupees 10,000/ for original articles/clinical practice articles/review articles (Non-refundable) and 5000/ (Non-refundable) for case reports/brief communication/Commentary, after the manuscript is accepted for publication. There are no initial processing charges. 

 

Payment mode & Process: Authors can pay the publication fee by online Bank Transfer. Processing fee is not accepted through cheque or Bank Draft. The relevant bank account details are as under:

Title of Account-   Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology

Account Number-  17074001412711

Name of Bank and branch: National bank of Pakistan (Sheikh Zayed hospital branch)  

 

Once a transaction is made, please send a screenshot or copy of the transaction by email. The publication details (Issue Number and date) will be communicated to you as soon as publication charges have been received.

There are no charges other than the publication fee (stated above), which is received only after acceptance of manuscript.

Waiver requests: There is no waiver or discount on publication fee.

JOURNAL ARCHIVING

Long term journal archiving is through LOCKKS and CLOCKSS