Ethics and Policies

AUTHOR SELF-ARCHIVING

Article authors have the right to self-archive the submitted ("preprint") version of the manuscript and the published version without any embargo period.

Submitted manuscripts and published versions of articles can, for example, be archived on:

• the author's personal website
• the author's employer’s website and/or institutional repository or archive
• non-profit preprint servers or subject-based archives

PREPRINT POLICY

The Journal's editors allow authors to upload earlier drafts of manuscripts/articles on the condition that authors agree to the following:

• Authors retain all rights to any previously published version and are permitted to submit their updated manuscript to the Journal.
• Authors accept that the Journal's editors cannot guarantee full anonymity in the review process, even if the author anonymizes the manuscript when earlier versions of the manuscript are made available.

If the manuscript is published in the Journal, the author is expected to cross-link, with DOI link, the different versions of the manuscript/article.

ORCID

The Journal's editors strongly recommend that authors submitting manuscripts register an "Open Researcher and Contributor Identifier" or ORCID.

This registration provides a unique and stable digital author identity that ensures that the article is attributed to the correct person and improves the searchability of all the author's publications. This helps to ensure that the author receives recognition for their work. As a person's ORCiD remains the same as long as the account exists, any name changes, change of employment, department affiliation or research field do not affect the searchability of previous publications. This facilitates correspondence between research colleagues.

The Journal's editors encourage all authors to include ORCiD along with other author information when the manuscript is registered in the system. If the article is accepted, this will be published with the article.

OPEN DATA

As research funders' and universities' demands for open research data become increasingly common, some authors may be obliged to make their collected empirical material open and available to everyone.

In cases where this applies to the Journal's authors, the Journal's editors encourage that the material be made available according to the FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable).

The material thus made available must be linked to within the submitted manuscript under a special heading. Research data should then be made public when the article is published. Empirical material obtained from other researchers must be referenced in the same way as other scientific sources. For further questions about guidelines for handling open data and guidelines about how data should be handled and published, please contact your university.

ARCHIVING POLICY

The Journal's current and future content, beginning when the Journal joins Publicera, is made available via Publicera and stored long-term on a secure and central server at the National Library of Sweden.

The Journal's owner and the National Library of Sweden aim for the journal's archive to be transferred and made available via Publicera, and thus the archive will also be stored long-term on a secure and central server at the National Library of Sweden.

In the event that the Journal ceases operations, the Journal's content on Publicera will remain archived at the National Library of Sweden.

CORRECTION AND RETRACTION POLICIES

The conditions of publication with persistent identifiers such as DOIs include that the object published is final and not changed without readers being clearly informed of such changes.

Articles published in the Journal cannot therefore be changed without a) an erratum or b) a change notice being published and linked to the original article.

If a factual error in an article is discovered, this should be reported to the Editor-in-chief, who decides on possible actions and possible corrections.

The Journal encourages post-publication discussion through Letters to the Editor or on an externally moderated website for review and post-publication discussion of research, such as PubPeer.

In order to maintain the highest scientific standards, the Journal follows strict quality standards:

Upon request, authors should be prepared to send relevant documentation or data in order to verify the validity of the results presented. This could be in the form of raw data, samples, records, etc. Sensitive information in the form of confidential or proprietary data is excluded.

If there is suspicion of misbehavior or alleged fraud, the Journal and/or Publisher will carry out an investigation following COPE guidelines. If, after investigation, there are valid concerns, the author(s) concerned will be contacted via their given email address and given an opportunity to address the issue. Depending on the situation, this may result in the Journal’s and/or Publisher’s implementation of the following measures, including, but not limited to:

• If the manuscript is still under consideration, it may be rejected and returned to the author.
• If the article has already been published online, depending on the nature and severity of the infraction:
  an erratum/correction may be placed with the article
  an expression of concern may be placed with the article
  or in severe cases retraction of the article may occur.

The reason will be given in the published erratum/correction, expression of concern, or retraction note. Please note that retraction means that the article is maintained on the platform, watermarked “retracted”, and the explanation for the retraction is provided in a note linked to the watermarked article.

Authors have an obligation to correct mistakes once they discover a significant error or inaccuracy in their published article. The author(s) is/are requested to contact the Journal and explain in what sense the error is impacting the article. A decision on how to correct the literature will depend on the nature of the error. This may be a correction or retraction. The retraction note should provide transparency as to which parts of the article are impacted by the error.

COMPLAINTS AND APPEALS POLICY

In the case of formal complaints, disputes, or appeals, authors should contact the Editor-in-chief, who is responsible for ensuring that a fair, deliberative, and thorough investigation is conducted.

POLICY FOR ETHICAL OVERSIGHT

The journal follows the ethical guidelines and best practices set forth by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). All cases of ethical misconduct will be dealt with in accordance with COPE's recommendations and guidelines.

AUTHORS' RESPONSIBILITIES

A submitted manuscript cannot be under consideration for publication in other journals. All authors are obliged to provide retractions or corrections of mistakes after the review process. The final responsibility for the scientific accuracy and validity of published manuscripts rests with the authors, not with the Journal, its editors, or the publisher (Örebro University Hospital). 

All published material will include the following Ethics Statement:

Ethics Statement

• All the authors named as such in the manuscript have agreed to authorship, read and approved the manuscript, and given consent for submission and subsequent publication of the manuscript.
• The authors declare that they have read and abided by the JEVTM statement of ethical standards including rules of informed consent and ethical committee approval as stated in the article.

Detailed Ethical Guidelines
Maintaining the integrity of the research and its presentation is helped by following the rules of good scientific practice, which are outlined here:

• The manuscript should not be submitted to more than one journal for simultaneous consideration.
• The submitted work should be an original work. Please provide transparency on the re-use of material to avoid the concerns about text-recycling (“self-plagiarism”).
• A single study should not be split up into several parts to increase the quantity of submissions and submitted to various journals or to one journal over time (i.e. “salami-slicing/publishing”).
• Concurrent or secondary publication is sometimes justifiable, provided certain conditions are met. Examples include translations or a manuscript that is intended for a different group of readers.
• Results should be presented clearly, honestly, and without fabrication, falsification, or inappropriate data manipulation (including image based manipulation). Authors should adhere to discipline-specific rules for acquiring, selecting, and processing data.
• No data, text, or theories by others should be presented as if they were the author’s own (“plagiarism”). Proper acknowledgements to other works must be given (this includes material that is closely copied (near verbatim), summarized and/or paraphrased), quotation marks (to indicate words taken from another source) must be used for verbatim copying of material, and permissions secured for material that is copyrighted.
• Authors should avoid untrue statements about an entity (which can be an individual person or a company) or descriptions of their behavior or actions that could potentially be seen as personal attacks or allegations about that person.
• Authors are strongly advised to ensure the author group, the Corresponding Author, and the order of authors are all correct at submission. Adding and/or deleting authors during the revision stages is generally not permitted, but in some cases may be warranted. Reasons for changes in authorship should be explained in detail. Please note that changes to authorship cannot be made after acceptance of a manuscript.

Financial conflicts of interest

Authors need to consistently disclose financial conflicts of interest.

EDITORS' RESPONSIBILITIES

The Editors of the JEVTM have responsibilities toward the authors who provide the content of the Journal, the peer reviewers who comment on the suitability of manuscripts for publication, the Journal’s readers and the scientific community, the owners/publishers of the Journal, and the public as a whole.

REVIEWERS' RESPONSIBILITIES

Peer review assists editors in making editorial decisions and, through editorial communications with authors, may assist authors in improving their manuscripts. Peer review is an essential component of formal scholarly communication and lies at the heart of scientific endeavor.

Any invited referee who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible should immediately notify the editors and decline the invitation to review so that alternative reviewers can be contacted.

Any manuscripts received for review are confidential documents and must be treated as such; they must not be shown to or discussed with others except if authorized by the Editor-in-Chief (who would only do so under exceptional and specific circumstances). This applies also to invited reviewers who decline the review invitation.

Reviews should be conducted objectively and observations formulated clearly with supporting arguments so that authors can use them for improving the manuscript. Personal criticism of the authors is inappropriate. Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that is an observation, derivation or argument that has been reported in previous publications should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also notify the editors of any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other manuscript (published or unpublished) of which they have personal knowledge.

Any invited referee who has conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies or institutions connected to the manuscript and the work described therein should immediately notify the editors to declare their conflicts of interest and decline the invitation to review so that alternative reviewers can be contacted.

Unpublished material disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in a reviewer’s own research without the express written consent of the authors. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for the reviewer’s personal advantage. This applies also to invited reviewers who decline the review invitation. 

The scientific editorial technical team has been created in order to support the authors, the editors and the Editorial Board in quality control of all submissions. The team review all submissions and check for scientific problems, errors/bias and quality. Their work is also aimed at checking the ethical issues of all submissions to the JEVTM.

In an effort to standardize the review process for the Journal of Endovascular Resuscitation and Trauma Management, we ask all reviewers to use our checklist when reviewing a manuscript.

PATIENT ANONYMITY AND INFORMED CONSENT POLICY

It is the authors’ responsibility to ensure that a patient's anonymity is protected, to verify that any experimental investigation with human subjects reported in the manuscript was performed with informed consent and follows all the guidelines for experimental investigation with human subjects required by the institution(s) with which all the authors are affiliated and/or ethical committee processing. Authors are asked to comply with the general guidelines for integrity protection, as listed by the health ministries in the EU, the EU commission, and US Department of Health (see, for example, https://www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-professionals/special-topics/research/index.html). Authors should mask patient's eyes and as well as genital organs, as far as possible, and always remove patient names from figures.

Protection of Human Subjects & Animals in Research

For original articles in the Journal that report research involving animals, the corresponding author must confirm that all experiments were performed in accordance with relevant guidelines and regulations (i.e. IACUC guidelines and federal regulations, or EU guidelines for animal research). One recommended document for animal studies is the ARRIVE reporting guidelines (PLoS Bio. 2010; 8(6), https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1000412). We encourage authors to follow the RRR principles of animal studies in medicine (https://www.feam.eu/wp-content/uploads/FEAM-Forum_Round-table-animals_Report_Final.pdf).

All studies of human subjects must contain a statement within the Methods section indicating approval of the study by an institutional review body (i.e. Institutional Review Board or ethical committee), and, if appropriate, a statement confirming that informed consent was obtained from all subjects if possible. If no legally informed consent can be obtained, such as in research carried out with human subjects receiving emergency treatment, authors should indicate when possible if a waiver of regulatory requirements for obtaining and documenting informed consent applies.

Ethical Approval and Informed Consent

Authors should include information about ethical approval and informed consent, such as “Ethical approval to report these cases was given by XXXXX. Written informed consent was obtained from xxxx.”

Or, in cases where approval and consent were not provided,
“Ethical approval was not required. Informed consent was not possible because XXXX and the information has been anonymized or informed consent was not required.”

All submissions are screened for inappropriate image manipulation, plagiarism, duplicate publication, and other issues that violate research ethics. Depending on the outcome of these investigations, the Journal may decide to publish errata, or, in cases of serious scientific misconduct, ask authors to retract their paper or to impose retraction on them.

General Statement

Patients have a right to privacy that should not be infringed without informed consent. Identifying information, including patients' names, initials, or hospital numbers, should not be published in written descriptions, photographs, and pedigrees unless the information is essential for scientific purposes and the patient (or parent or guardian) gives written informed consent for publication. Informed consent for this purpose requires that a patient who is identifiable be shown the manuscript to be published. 

Identifying details should be omitted if they are not essential. Complete anonymity is difficult to achieve, however, and informed consent should be obtained if there is any doubt. For example, masking the eye region in photographs of patients is inadequate protection of anonymity. If identifying characteristics are altered to protect anonymity, such as in genetic pedigrees, authors should provide assurance that alterations do not distort scientific meaning and editors should so note.