Ethical oversight
Ethical oversight
Ethical considerations for the author
- In the cover letter, authors should confirm by writing that the submitted work has not been previously published, nor is it before another journal for consideration, and it is an original work.
- All authors must provide evidence in the authorship and contributorship part for the eligibility of authorship.
- Whenever a copyrighted material is used in the manuscript, authors should submit reprinting rights from copyright holders.
- Authors should avoid plagiarism by properly quoting or paraphrasing another work.
- For research conducted with human subjects, the author(s) must include a statement that the study was approved by the local Institutional Review Board (IRB) or ethical committee. For those who do not have IRB or formal ethics review committees, the principles outlined in the Declaration of Helsinki should be followed. An electronic copy of the permission letter, from the institution that granted permission to conduct the research study may be requested by PoEM. If the Ethical Statement is not in English, an English translation may also be requested.
- For research conducted with human subjects, subjects should sign an informed consent, and their privacy rights should be protected. Besides, photographs of identifiable persons, must be accompanied by signed releases, whether the involved persons are patients or staff. Concerned persons should state that they give the author permission to use the photograph of them in our journal.
- Authors should ensure that writing is free from bias, for example by using 'he or she', 'his/her' instead of 'he' or 'his'
- Authors should participate actively in the peer review process and provide suitable responses on time to the comments raised by peer reviewers.
- Authors should notify the journal of any error they have identified in their article after publication.
Ethical Considerations for the editors/reviewers:
- Ethical considerations:
- PoEM team abide by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines (http://publicationethics.org//resources/guidelines) and flowcharts https://cope.onl/flowcharts-3 when dealing with any ethical misbehavior. The COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers are embedded in the reviewer’s guidelines. Below are some highlighted ethical guidelines:
- Conflict of interest:
- Editors / reviewers should have no conflict of interest that influences their work for example, in terms of rejection or acceptance of articles.
- When an editor submits a manuscript or when an editor has a conflict of interest in terms of a submitted article, the manuscript will be processed by another editor.
- Respect the right of human subjects in research by:
- Make sure the research was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki
- Use the right to secure a copy of the Institutional Review Board (IRB) or the Research Ethics Committee (REC) approval of where the research was conducted, in order to be assured that an informed consent was obtained from participants, participants were given the right to withdraw from the research, and data on subjects was treated confidentially.
- Identify and deal with allegations and research misconduct:
Plagiarism
- There is strict policy in case of plagiarism in PoEM within its purview. PoEM follows the COPE Plagiarism Different types of plagiarism are explained based on extent, originality of the copied material, context, referencing, intention, author seniority and language. The Journal responses to plagiarism include educating authors, sending the manuscript for revision, contacting authors’ institutions, rejecting a manuscript, issuing corrections or retractions, based on the extent of plagiarism and the reason behind it.
- Not only we may reject but also pursue identified cases. Start by seeking clarification from concerned persons, and if needed ask a responsible or regulatory body to investigate, and ensure that an investigation is done.
- If the authors are found guilty of plagiarism, PoEM will not consider the author’s submissions in the future for a period of 2 years.
- The sanction of the plagiarism, the supporting materials and the outcomes remain confidential and are known to only those who are involved in the review process.
Manipulations of citations
- Check the justification for the cited articles in the bibliography
- When in doubt, ask for the rationale
- Concerning figures, the author may be asked to provide the original ones, when manipulation is suspected
Post-publication discussions and corrections
- Correction:
- Corrections are made at PoEM’s discretion; errors that do not affect the content and require minor corrections, such as typographical errors, formatting, … may not be taken into consideration, in order to maintain the integrity of our record.
- A correction notice will be added at the end to say what has been changed since it was first published and publish an erratum.
- Withdrawal, retraction or removal from publication:
- PoEM may find it necessary to withdraw an article that has not been published yet or to retract an article from publication in case of infringements of ethical codes such as plagiarism, multiple submissions, false claim of authorship, data fraud, ... For retraction, PoEM uses the COPE flowchart for retraction. When an article is being retracted, the HTML version of it will be removed. However, the pdf version pages will be identified with a watermark containing the retraction note.
- A published article may be removed from websites when it is defamatory, subject to court order, harmful to health if acted upon, … In such case, the electronic text will be replaced with a screen indicating the article has been removed for legal reasons while the Title and Authors will be retained.
- An author may request to correct, withdraw, retract or remove their published article.