Publication Ethics

The mission of International Journal of Pharmacy and Analytical Research (An international peer-reviewed quarterly journal) is to provide its readers with up-to-date information relevant to pharmaceutical sciences and other allied sciences. The journal policy is to publish work deemed by peer reviewers to be a coherent and sound addition to scientific knowledge and to put less emphasis on interest levels, provided that the research constitutes a useful contribution to the field. The Journal publishes original research papers, review articles, case studies, reports and technical notes. IJPAR is committed to ensuring ethics in publication and quality of articles. 
Conformance to standards of ethical behaviour is therefore expected of all parties involved: Authors, Editors, Reviewers, and the Publisher.

International Journal of Pharmacy and Analytical Research follows the highest standards of publication ethics and it takes all measures necessary to prevent publication misconduct. Our editorial board does not accept any type of plagiarism.

This means that works replicating another author's work without acknowledging him/her shall be automatically disqualified. All authors submitting their papers to International Journal of Pharmacy and Analytical Research  affirm that their papers are their own creations and have not been copied in whole or in part from other works. Each paper is reviewed anonymously by an independent reviewer to ensure the final high standard and quality of the journal.

If a paper is found to be deficient in any respect, it is returned to the author for rework, or it is refused. The communication between the reviewers and authors is managed by and conducted through the editors. The volume editors and reviewers are the body to ultimately decide which papers are publishable in International Journal of Pharmacy and Analytical Research.  Their decision is based on a number of factors: compliance with formal requirements, topical orientation of the issue and its harmony with the topic of the paper, possession of permits to reprint/republish excerpts in the papers, relevance of the paper in terms of scientific research in the respective field, use of scientific procedures and methods, language quality etc. Unpublished papers shall be returned to the author with a formal statement justifying the refusal. In the reviewing process, the reviewers help the author improve the paper to match the respective requirements, objectify the research findings etc. The papers received/reviewed by the reviewers are treated with confidentiality.

EDITORIAL POLICY

Any manuscript or substantial parts of it, submitted to the journal must not be under consideration by any other journal. In general, the manuscript should not have already been published in any journal or other citable form, although it may have been deposited on a preprint server. Authors are required to ensure that no material submitted as part of a manuscript infringes existing copyrights, or the rights of a third party.

The editor should give unbiased consideration to all manuscripts offered for publication, judging each on its merits without regard to race, gender, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the author(s).

The editor has complete responsibility and authority to accept a submitted paper for publication or to reject it.

The editor may confer with reviewers for an evaluation to use in making this decision.
The editor and the editorial staff should not disclose any information about a manuscript under consideration to anyone other than reviewers and potential reviewers.

The editor should respect the intellectual independence of authors.

Editorial responsibility and authority for any manuscript authored by the editor and submitted to the journal should be delegated to some other qualified person. The editor should avoid situations of real or perceived conflicts of interest. If the editor chooses to participate in an ongoing scientific debate within his journal, the editor should arrange for some other qualified person to take editorial responsibility.

The editor should avoid situations of real or perceived conflicts of interest. Such conflicts include, but are not limited to, handling papers from present and former students, from colleagues with whom the editor has recently collaborated, and from those in the same institution. Unpublished information, arguments, or interpretations disclosed in a submitted manuscript should not be used in an editor's own research except with the consent of the author.

If the editor is presented with convincing evidence that the main substance or conclusions of a paper published in the journal are erroneous, the editor should facilitate publication of an appropriate paper pointing out the error and, if possible, correcting it.

DUTIES OF AUTHORS

Authors of reports of original research should present an accurate account of the work performed as well as an objective discussion of its significance. Underlying data should be represented accurately in the paper.

A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behavior and are unacceptable.

The authors should ensure that they have written entirely original works, and if the authors have used the work and/or words of others that this has been appropriately cited or quoted.

An author should not in general publish articles describing essentially the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently constitutes unethical publishing behavior and is unacceptable. In general, an author should not submit for consideration in another journal a previously published paper. Publication of some kinds of articles (e.g. translations) in more than one journal is sometimes justifiable, provided certain conditions are met. The authors and editors of the journals concerned must agree to the secondary publication, which must reflect the same data and interpretation of the primary document. The primary reference must be cited in the secondary publication.

Proper acknowledgment of the work of others must always be given. Authors should cite publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the reported work.

Authorship should be limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the reported study. All those who have made significant contributions should be listed as co-authors. Where there are others who have participated in certain substantive aspects of the research project, they should be acknowledged or listed as contributors.

The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co-authors and no inappropriate co-authors are included on the paper, and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the paper and have agreed to its submission for publication. When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her own published work, it is the author’s obligation to promptly notify the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with the editor to retract or correct the paper.

The author intends not to use any copyrighted material for the publication or, if not possible, to indicate the copyright of the respective object.

The copyright for any material created by the author is reserved. Any duplication or use of objects such as images, diagrams, sounds or texts in other electronic or printed publications is not permitted without the author's agreement.

If the work involves chemicals, procedures or equipment that have any unusual hazards inherent in their use, the author must clearly identify these in the manuscript. If the work involves the use of animal or human subjects, the author should ensure that the manuscript contains a statement that all procedures were performed in compliance with relevant laws and institutional guidelines and that the appropriate institutional committee(s) has approved them. Authors should include a statement in the manuscript that informed consent was obtained for experimentation with human subjects. The privacy rights of human subjects must always be observed.

All authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial or other substantive conflict of interest that might be construed to influence the results or interpretation of their manuscript. All sources of financial support for the project should be disclosed. Examples of potential conflicts of interest which should be disclosed include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. Potential conflicts of interest should be disclosed at the earliest stage possible.

Authors' responsibilities

1. Authors must certify that their manuscripts are their original work.
    
2. Authors must certify that the manuscript has not previously been published elsewhere.
    
3. Authors must certify that the manuscript is not currently being considered for publication elsewhere.
    
4. Authors must participate in the peer review process.
    
5. Authors are obliged to provide retractions or corrections of mistakes.
    
6. All Authors mentioned in the paper must have significantly contributed to the research.
    
7. Authors must state that all data in the paper are real and authentic.
    
8. Authors must notify the Editors of any conflicts of interest.
    
9. Authors must identify all sources used in the creation of their manuscript.
    
10. Authors must report any errors they discover in their published paper to the Editors.

REVIEW PROCESS

Peer review is intended to improve the accuracy, clarity, and completeness of published manuscripts and to help editors decide which manuscripts to publish. Peer review does not guarantee manuscript quality and does not reliably detect scientific misconduct.

Peer reviewers should be experts in the manuscript’s content area, research methods, or both; a critique of writing style alone is not sufficient. Peer reviewers should be selected based on their expertise and ability to provide high quality, constructive, and fair reviews. For research manuscripts, editors may, in addition, seek the opinion of a statistical reviewer.

Peer reviewers advise editors on how a manuscript might be improved and on its priority for publication in that journal. Editors decide whether and under which conditions manuscripts are accepted for publication, assisted by reviewers’ advice.

Peer reviewers are sometimes paid for their efforts but usually provide their opinions free of charge, as a service to their profession. Editors should require all peer reviewers to disclose any conflicts of interest, financial or otherwise, related to a particular manuscript and should take this information into account when deciding how to use their review. Generally speaking, people with a direct financial interest in the results of the manuscripts should not be reviewers.

To be considered peer reviewed, a journal should have obtained external reviews for the majority of manuscripts it publishes, including all original research and review articles. Some editors request peer review for other kinds of articles, such as opinion pieces (commentaries/ editorials) and correspondence. To have been peer reviewed, a manuscript should have been reviewed by at least one external reviewer; it is typical to have two reviewers and sometimes more opinions are sought.

Editors of peer-reviewed journals need not send all submitted manuscripts out for review. Manuscripts that seem unlikely to be published in that journal may be returned to authors without external review, to allow authors to submit the manuscript to another journal without delay and to make efficient use of reviewers’ and editors’ time.

Editors should state their journal’s peer review policies, including which kinds of article are peer reviewed and by how many reviewers, in the instructions for authors. Editors should also periodically publish statistics describing their journal’s review process, such as number of manuscripts submitted, acceptance rate, and average times from manuscript submission to rejection letter to authors and, for accepted manuscripts, time to publication.

All published articles in International Journal of Pharmacy and Analytical Research  are peer reviewed and all manuscripts submitted follows the procedure outlined below.

Initial Manuscript Evaluation: All manuscripts submitted for publication in Journal are firstly evaluated by the Editorial Board Members. The editors employ double blind reviewing, where both the referee and author remain anonymous throughout the process.

Referee Evaluation: After initial evaluation, the manuscripts are sent to a minimum of two external referees for peer-review. If necessary, the number of referees can be increased by editors. The referees are chosen from referee board according to their expertise. Referees are asked to evaluate the manuscript’s originality, methodology, contribution to the literature, presentation of results and support for the conclusions, and appropriate referencing of previous relevant studies. Referees might accept the manuscript, reject the manuscript or might require a revision for style and/or content.

When a revision is required by the referee or referees, the author(s) are to consider the suggestions offered by the referees, and they should be sent back the revised version of manuscript in one month. Revised manuscripts returned after one month will be considered as a new submissions and peer review process is started from the beginning. Referees may request more than one revision of a manuscript.

Possible decisions on a manuscript are:

• Accepted as it is
• Accepted after minor revision
• Accepted after major revision
• Rejected

If minor revision is required, authors should return a revised version as soon as possible within one week. If major revision is required, authors should return a revised version within two to three weeks.

Final Evaluation: After favorable opinions of referees, editorial board is made the final valuation. The articles accepted for publication by editorial board are placed in an issue sequence.

Time of Peer Review Process: The peer review process that has long time is an important problem.  Naturally, the author(s) wish to take an answer about their submissions. The journal aims to complete the all peer review process within 1-3 weeks after submission. This time, however, may vary depending on the amount of revision work that needs to be completed before the manuscript is acceptable.

DUTIES OF REVIEWERS:

Guidelines to Reviewers

• The unpublished manuscript is a privileged document. Please protect it from any form of exploitation.
• Reviewers are expected not to cite a manuscript or refer to the work it describes before it has been published, and to refrain from using the information it contains for the advancement of their own research.
• A reviewer should consciously adopt a positive, impartial attitude towards the manuscript under review. Your position should be that of the author's ally, with the aim of promoting effective and accurate scientific communication.
• If you believe that you cannot judge a given article impartially, please return the manuscript immediately to the editor with that explanation.
• Reviews should be completed expeditiously, within two weeks. If you know that you cannot finish the review within the time specified, please inform the editor.
• A reviewer should not discuss a paper with its author/s. If you want to consult a colleague or junior please discuss this with us first.
• Please do not make any specific statement about acceptability of a paper in your comments for transmission to the author, but advise the editor on sheet provided.

 

In your review, please consider the following aspects on the manuscript as far as they are applicable:

1. Scientific reliability
2. Importance (clinical or otherwise) of the question or subject studied
3. Originality (truly original or known to you through foreign or specialist publications or through the grapevine)
4. Adequacy of abstract, key words. 
5. Appropriateness of approach or experimental design, adequacy of experimental techniques (including statistics where appropriate, need for statistical assessment). Methods adequately described? Appropriate? Patients studied adequately described and their condition defined? 
6. Results relevant to problem posed? Credible? Well presented? 
7. Soundness of conclusions and interpretation. Interpretation and conclusions warranted by the data? Reasonable speculation? Is the message clear?
8. Relevance of discussion
9. References up to date and relevant? Any glaring omissions?
10. Relevance of the figures and table, clarity of legends and titles.
11. Suitability for the TP and overall recommendations. Appropriate for general readership or more appropriate for specialist journal?
12. If not acceptable can the paper be made so?
13. Ethical aspects
14. Overall presentation (including writing style, clarity of writing) In comments intended for the author's, criticism should be presented dispassionately, and abrasive remarks avoided.