Publisher Policies

Editorial Policies

Pacini Editore endorses the COPE Core Practices about editorship, authorship and peer-review. We encourage all our journals to follow COPE guidance and develop compliant policies. All manuscripts submitted to our medical journals should comply to the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals and/or the DOAJ Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing.

Peer-Review

Pacini Editore requires that all journals are aware of the importance and the principles of the peer-review process, which is fundamental to the scientific publication process and the dissemination of sound science. All manuscripts submitted to our journals are therefore critically assessed by the experts designated by the journal editors, according to each journal peer-review policy.

The Editors of each journals are responsible for the final selection of referees to conduct the peer-review process for that journal. Everyone is strongly invited to read each journal policy about reviewers’ role.

For more information, see the peer-review policies of each individual Journals.

Authorship and Contributorship

All of our journals endorse the ICMJE criteria for defining the roles of Authors and Contributors to justify authorship:

• Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
• Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
• Final approval of the version to be published; AND
• Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Non-Author Contributors

Those who do not meet all four criteria should not be listed as authors, but they should be acknowledged. Those whose contributions do not justify authorship may be acknowledged individually or together as a group under a single heading.

Changes in authorship

If authors request removal or addition of an author after manuscript submission or during the peer-review process or at article acceptance, the journal editors should receive a letter clearly explaining the reason for the change. No changes to the Authors or Corresponding Author can be made after publication of the article, either as an “Online First” or in the regular issue. Instead, a corrigendum may be considered by the journal editor.

Pacini Editore requires written confirmation from all authors that they agree with any proposed changes in authorship of already submitted manuscripts.

Ethical Approval / Protection of Human Subjects and Animals in Research

Pacini Editore requires that all manuscripts submitted to its journals include a statement that ethical approval has been granted, including the name of the ethics committee and the reference number where appropriate. In case a study has been granted an exemption from requiring ethics approval, this should be detailed in the manuscript, together with the name of the ethics committee that granted the exemption.

Manuscripts may be rejected if the journal Editor(s) considers that the research has not been carried out within an appropriate ethical framework.

For more information, see the policies of each individual Journal.

Informed Consent

Pacini Editore encourages its journals to strictly follow the ICMJE Protection of Research Participants policy.

For all research involving human subjects, Pacini Editore requires all its medical journal to obtain from participants (or their parent or guardian in the case of children under 16) , informed consent to participate in the study and for the publication of details, images, or videos relating to individual participants and a statement to this effect should appear in the manuscript or in the authorship statement form.

In cases where images are entirely unidentifiable and there are no details on individuals reported within the manuscript, consent for publication of images may not be required. The final decision on whether consent to publish is required is at the journal Editor(s)’ discretion.

For more information, see the policies of each individual Journal.

Publication Ethics

Pacini Editore meets and upholds ethical behavior at all stages of the publication process, by following the standards for best practices by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICJME) and the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME).

As a publisher, Pacini Editore expects its in-house employees and external collaborators to:

• adopt, support and promote the publisher’s policies and best practices;
• respect individual journals’ policies;
• act in a balanced, objective and fair way during editorial and publishing services, without bias towards the journal, the editors, the authors or any other individual involved in the publishing process and without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy;
• be aware of any potential conflict of interest and to alert the publisher;
• maintain the confidentiality of any information disclosed during the editorial and publishing services.

We also encourage all our journals to follow the same standards and best practices. Following a summary of duties of editors, peer-reviewers, and authors we expect our journals to comply with.

Editors are expected to:

• act in a balanced, objective and fair way while evaluating manuscripts, considering solely their intellectual merit without regard to authors’ race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy.
• handle submissions for sponsored supplements or special issues in the same way as other submissions, so that articles are considered without commercial influence.
• adopt and follow reasonable procedures in the event of complaints of an ethical or conflict nature, in accordance with the policies and procedures of the Journal, where appropriate.
• give authors a reasonable opportunity to respond to any complaints. Documentation associated with any such complaints should be retained.
• not disclose any information about a manuscript that is submitted to the journal to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate.

Reviewers are expected to be professional, honest, courteous, prompt, and constructive. They should:

• assist in improving the quality of the published paper by reviewing the manuscript objectively, in a timely manner.
• comment on major strengths and weaknesses of the manuscript as a written communication, independent of the design, methodology, results, and interpretation of the study.
• maintain the confidentiality of any information supplied by the editor or author and not retain or copy the manuscript.
• alert the editor to any published or submitted content that is substantially similar to that under review.
• be aware of any potential conflicts of interest (financial, institutional, collaborative or other relationships between the reviewer and author) and to alert the editor to these.

Authors have an ethical obligation to submit creditable research results for publication. They should:

• confirm that the manuscript as submitted is not under consideration or accepted for publication elsewhere.
• confirm that all the work in the submitted manuscript is original and to acknowledge and cite content reproduced from other sources. To obtain permission to reproduce any content from other sources.
• declare any potential conflicts of interest.
• maintain records of data associated with their submitted manuscript, and to supply or provide access to these data, on reasonable request.
• ensure that any studies involving human or animal subjects conform to national, local and institutional laws and requirements and confirm that approval has been sought and obtained where appropriate. Authors should obtain express permission from human subjects and respect their privacy.
• notify promptly the journal editor or publisher if a significant error in their publication is identified.

Procedures for dealing with misconduct / unethical behavior

• Misconduct and unethical behavior may be identified and brought to the attention of the Journal editors or Pacini Editore at any time, by anyone.
• Whoever informs the Journal editors or Pacini Editore of such conduct should provide sufficient information and evidence in order for an investigation to be initiated.

Investigation

• An initial decision should be taken by the Journal editors, who should consult with or seek advice from Pacini Editore, if appropriate.
• Evidence should be collected, while avoiding extending any claims beyond those who need to know.

Outcomes

Minor misconduct might be dealt with without the need to consult more widely. In any event, the author should be given the opportunity to respond to any allegations.

Serious misconduct (scientific misconduct in research and non-research publications includes but is not limited to data fabrication; data falsification including deceptive manipulation of images; purposeful failure to disclose conflicts of interest; and plagiarism) will entail that the Editor(s):

• Inform or educate the author or reviewer where there appears to be a misapplication of acceptable standards or a misunderstanding occurred.
• Notify readers of the outcome if appropriate.
• Impose a formal embargo on contributions from an individual for a defined period.
• Report the case and outcome to a professional organization or higher authority for further investigation and action.
• Formal retraction or withdrawal of a publication from the journal, in conjunction with informing the head of the Author’s or Reviewer’s department, Abstracting and Indexing services and the readership of the publication.

Clinical Trials

Pacini Editore endorses the ICMJE’s clinical trial registration policy and encourages all its journals to consider a condition for publication the registration of clinical trials in a public trials’ registry – such as a primary register of the WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP) or in ClinicalTrials.gov – at or before the time of first patient enrollment.

Plagiarism and Misconduct

Any manuscript submitted to a Pacini Editore journal must be original and must not be under consideration by any other journal. Pacini Editore requires the Editor(s) of the journals to immediately screen all articles submitted for publication in that journal and encourages journal to check manuscripts for plagiarism by using online available tools.

Pacini Editore takes seriously all claims of potential misconduct. In cases of suspected research or publication misconduct, Editors of our journals may have to contact and share manuscripts with third parties, e.g., authors’ institutions and/or ethics committees.

Article withdrawal

Pacini Editore endorses COPE policy concerning withdrawal, retraction, removal and replacement of published articles and encourages all its journals to follow COPE guidelines and develop compliant policies. The final decision on article withdrawal, retraction, removal or replacement lays with the journal Editor(s), according to each individual journal policies. Pacini Editore supports Editors of all our journals in the process of notification, communication, publication of such decisions.

Article withdrawal or retractions: in the case of an article being retracted by the authors’ or by the Editor in Chief of the Journal concerned, the article in question will be removed and a declaration to this effect, signed by the authors and/or the Editor in Chief, will be published in its place. This declaration will be clearly presented in the Table of Contents of the Journal with a link to the original article. The text of the retraction will explain why the article is being retracted and include a complete citation reference to that article. Retracted articles will remain in the public domain and be clearly labelled as retracted.

The validity of previous work by the author of a deceitful paper cannot be assumed.

Editors may ask the author’s institution to assure them of the validity of other work published in their journals, or they may retract it. If this is not done, Editors may choose to publish an announcement expressing concern that the validity of previously published work is uncertain.

Article removal: this may apply to articles that, once published, are later subjected to legal restraints imposed on the publisher or on the authors’ or the copyright holder. On the Pacini Editore website, the text of the article will be replaced by a declaration confirming that the article has been removed in response to legal concerns.

Article replacement: authors may wish to replace an article that is recognized as containing incorrect or misleading data such as to pose a serious threat to public health. A link will be provided to access the corrected article with confirmation of the paper status. A request for an article to be replaced may also be made by the publisher.

Advertising Policies

Pacini Editore business models to generate the income needed to offset its operating expenses is based on three main revenue sources: editorial services, publishing products sales and advertising.

These revenue sources may vary for each individual journal. Most of our medical journals are Open Access.

In compliance with COPE Principles of Transparency, when accepting advertising from companies, societies or other organizations, Pacini Editore applies the following procedures:

1. all advertising must first be approved by the publisher. Pacini Editore may refuse to accept sponsorship from any commercial enterprise, company or industry and will not be bound to offer any justification for its decision to do so;
2. all advertising is handled separately from editorial content. Sponsors don’t have control over the editorial decision, and more specifically:
   • editorial and advertising sales administration are completely separate operations;
   • editorial decisions are never influenced by potential advertising or reprint revenues.

For more information, see policies of each individual Journal.