Journal of Sabzevar University of Medical Sciences (JSUMS) is committed to apply double-blind peer reviewing process, based on the COPE’s Code of Conduct and Best Practices. You may find the journal’s Policies and Guidelines for Peer-reviewers, here.
Peer Review Process
Journal of Sabzevar University of Medical Sciences (JSUMS) is committed to apply double-blind peer reviewing process, based on the COPE’s Code of Conduct and Best Practices. You may find the journal’s Policies and Guidelines for Peer-reviewers, here.
Peer Review Process
The decision to publish a paper is based on an editorial assessment and peer review. Initially all papers are assessed by an editorial committee consisting of 2 or more members of the editorial team. The prime purpose is to decide whether to send a paper for peer review and to give a rapid decision on those that are not.
In all cases the decision is to reject the paper or to send it for peer review. Papers which do not meet basic standards or are unlikely to be published irrespective of a positive peer review, for example because their novel contribution is insufficient or the relevance to the discipline is unclear, may be rejected at this point in order to avoid delays to authors who may wish to seek publication elsewhere. Occasionally a paper will be returned to the author with requests for revisions in order to assist the editors in deciding whether or not send it out for review. Authors can expect a decision from this stage of the review process within 1–2 weeks of submission.
Manuscripts going forward to the review process are reviewed by members of an international expert panel. All such papers will undergo a double blind peer review by two or more reviewers, under supervision of the journal editorial team and the editor in chief. We take every reasonable step to ensure author identity is concealed during the review process but it is up to authors to ensure that their details of prior publications etc. do not reveal their identity.
We aim to complete the review process within 2 weeks of the decision to review although occasionally delays do happen and authors should allow at least 4 weeks from submissions before contacting the journal. The Editor-in-Chief reserves the right to the final decision regarding acceptance. You may find the journal’s article reviewing procedure, here.
Reviewers Role
Reviewers are the main members contributing for the benefit of the journal being a peer reviewed (double-blind referee) journal they are insisted not to disclose their identity in any form.
A reviewer should immediately decline to review an article submitted if he/she feels that the article is technically unqualified or if the timely review cannot be done by him/her or if the article has a conflict of interest.
All submissions should be treated as confidential, editorial approval might be given for any outside person’s advice received.
No reviewer should pass on the article submitted to him/her for review to another reviewer in his own concern, it should be declined immediately.
Reviewers being the base of the whole quality process should ensure that the articles published should be of high quality and original work. He may inform the editor if he finds the article submitted to him for review is under consideration in any other publication to his/her knowledge.
There are no hard and fast rules to assessment of an article, this can be done on case-to-case basis considering the worthiness, quality, and originality of the article submitted.
In general, cases the following will check in an article review:
- Structure of the article submitted and its relevance to author guidelines
- Introduction / Purpose and Objective
- Material and methods
- Results
- Discussion and conclusion/ suggestions provided
- References provided to substantiate the content
- Grammar, punctuation and spelling and Plagiarism issues
A reviewer’s comment decides the acceptance or rejection of an article and they are one major element in a peer review process. All our reviewers are requested to go through the articles submitted to them for review in detail and give the review comments without any bias, which will increase the quality of articles in the journal.
Guidance for Peer Reviewers
All manuscripts are double-blind reviewed. At JSUMS we believe that peer review is the foundation for safeguarding the quality and integrity of scientific research.
As a reviewer you will be advising the editors (Editorial team and Editor in Chief), who make the final decision (aided by an editorial committee for all research articles and most analysis articles). We will let you know our decision. Even if we do not accept an article we would like to pass on constructive comments that might help the author to improve it.
All unpublished manuscripts are confidential documents. If we invite you to review an article, please do not discuss it even with a colleague. When you receive an invitation to peer review, you should fill the journal’s reviewing form. You should try to respond to every peer review invitation you receive. If you feel the paper is outside your area of expertise or you are unable to devote the necessary time, please let the editorial office know as soon as possible so that they can invite an alternative reviewer – it as at this stage you may like to nominate an appropriately qualified colleague. And please remember, if an author's manuscript is sent to reviewers who have not responded to the peer-review request, the author will not get a timely decision.
Please read the Aims and Scope and the Author Instruction with care. Consideration should be given to whether the paper is suitable for the journal it is submitted to. The journals' aims and scope is available on “Journal Information” menu and pages.
The essential feature of any review is that it is helpful and constructive and we urge reviewers to be robust but polite when making comments to authors. The Peer reviewers should provide an objective critical evaluation of the paper in the broadest terms practicable. Reviewers need to make a recommendation to the Editor-in-Chief on deciding the manuscript. Review report must contain your detailed answers on the journal questions in the reviewing form. If you believe the paper needs revisions to be made before it is acceptable, please make suggestions on how to improve the paper. Likewise, if you feel that a paper is not good enough and has no real prospects of being improved sufficiently to be published you should recommend rejection.
You should also:
- Number your points and refer to page and line numbers in the manuscript when making specific comments
- If you have been asked to only comment on specific parts or aspects of the manuscript, you should indicate clearly which these are
- Treat the author’s work the way you would like your own to be treated
- Reviewer Score Sheet is seen by the editors only and the comments will be shared with the authors.
You may find the journal’s article reviewing procedure, here.
The process of accepting an article in the journal of Sabzevar University of Medical Sciences
After the author sends the article to the system, in the first stage, the article will be reviewed by the experts of the journal in terms of compliance with the compilation guide (within three days at most). (In order to speed up the refereeing process, before submitting the article, please carefully read the authors' guide section and submit the article accurately based on the editing guide available in the system).
If accepted in the first stage, the article will be initially evaluated in the second stage in terms of the quality of the content and the relevance of the topic by technical Editor. This stage will usually last up to 2 days.
After acceptance in the second stage, the article will be sent to two referees by the specialized editor. The process of judging articles is as follows:
If two reviewers reject the paper, the paper will be rejected.
If the opinion of the two referees is for the general revision of the article, the article will be given to the author for revision.
If the opinion of one reviewer is a general revision and another reviewer rejects the article, the article will be sent to the third reviewer and according to the third reviewer's opinion, a decision will be made based on items 1 and 2.
After the author revises and submits the paper based on the reviewers' comments, the paper will be given to one of the reviewers for peer review.
An e-mail is sent to the referees every week to remind them, and if the article is not refereed after 2 weeks, the article will be withdrawn from the referee and sent to a new referee. Considering the amount of corrections requested and the opinions of the referees and the speed and accuracy of the corrections by the authors, it will take about 3 months to get accepted in this publication (if the referees approve it).