About the Journal
Aim and scope: Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research (ABCR) is the official peer reviewed journal of the University of Mostar, School of Medicine opened to scientists and clinicians dealing with all basic research and clinical studies relating to medical disciplines.
Publication data: Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research is published 2 times a year. Publishing of Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research is supported by the University of Mostar. Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research is an open access journal and all of its content is free and available at journal’s webpage. All editorial and peer-review work is maintained voluntarily. Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research may publish promotional material and advertisements in order to promote sponsorship.
Copyright© and publication license: After a manuscript is accepted for publication, the authors must guarantee that all copyrights to the manuscript are transferred to Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research. The publisher has the right to reproduce and distribute the article in printed and electronic form without asking permission from authors. All manuscripts published on line are subject to Creative Commons Attribution License CC BY-NC-SA which permits users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles in any medium or format. Also, users can remix, transform and build upon the material non-commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and any changes properly indicated. Complete legal background of license is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/legalcode.
Disclaimer: The statements, opinions and data contained in this publication are solely those of the individual authors and contributions and not of the publisher and the editor(s). The appearance of advertisements in the journal is not a warranty, endorsement, or approval of the products or services advertised of their effectiveness, quality or safety. The publisher and the editor(s) disclaim responsibility for any injury to persons or property resulting from any ideas, methods, instructions or products referred to in the content or advertisements.
Article processing charges
Manuscript submission, article processing and publishing is free of charge.
Peer-review policy
Manuscripts that meet the aim and scope of the Journal and are prepared according to Instructions for authors will be sent to peer-review. Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research exclusively use double blind peer-review process. All manuscripts will be reviewed by at least two or more peer-reviewers, and by a statistical reviewer. Each author may suggest up to five relevant reviewers (at least two foreign) who hold a PhD degree and do not work in the authors’ institutions but editors are not obliged to follow author’s suggestions in final choice of reviewers. Possible reviewers should be listed with their affiliation, institution name and email address Guidelines for peer-review process and Reviewer’s Check List are available on the Journal webpage http://www.abcr-mefmo.org.
Research integrity
Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research strongly promotes research integrity. Research integrity may be defined as active adherence to the ethical principles and professional standards essential for the responsible practice of research such as honesty, accuracy, efficiency, objectivity, the golden rule, trustworthiness, and disclosure of conflicts of interest. The Editorial Board will strive to prevent all forms of scientific malfeasance and misconduct such as fabrication, falsification or plagiarism in proposing, performing, or reviewing research, or in reporting research results. All submitted manuscripts will be revised by Research Integrity Editor and checked using Plagiarism Checker X. In resolving any potential scientific misconduct Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research follows flowcharts provided by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and additionally consults COPE for any unclear cases (available at: http://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts).
Authorship
According to International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) (available at: http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html). Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research recommends that authorship should be based on the following 4 criteria:
- 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.
In addition to being accountable for the parts of the work he or she has done, an author should be able to identify which co-authors are responsible for specific other parts of the work. In addition, authors should have confidence in the integrity of the contributions of their co-authors.
All those designated as authors should meet all four criteria for authorship, and all who meet the four criteria should be identified as authors. Contributors who meet fewer than all 4 of the above criteria for authorship should not be listed as authors, but they should be listed in the Acknowledgments section and their contributions should be specified (e.g., "served as scientific advisors," "critically reviewed the study proposal," "collected data," "provided and cared for study patients", "participated in writing or technical editing of the manuscript" “acquisition of funding”, “participated in language editing”, and “participated in proofreading”). All persons named in the Acknowledgments section of the manuscript must give their permission to be named. Statement for such permission is included in the manuscript submission process.
If authors request removal or addition of an author after manuscript submission or publication, journal editors will seek an explanation and signed statement of agreement for the requested change from all listed authors and from the author to be removed or added.
The corresponding author is the one individual who takes primary responsibility for communication with the journal during the manuscript submission, peer review, and publication process, and typically ensures that all the journal’s administrative requirements, such as providing details of authorship, ethics committee approval, clinical trial registration documentation, and gathering conflict of interest forms and statements, are properly completed, although these duties may be delegated to one or more coauthors. The corresponding author should be available throughout the submission and peer review process to respond to editorial queries in a timely way, and should be available after publication to respond to critiques of the work and cooperate with any requests from the journal for data or additional information should questions about the paper arise after publication.
Author Copyright Agreement
Manuscripts must be accompanied by an Author Copyright Agreement signed by all authors. Sample of the ACA can be found on the following link: Author Copyright Agreement
Ethical approval and informed consent
Annals of Biomedical and Clinical Research will not consider for publication manuscripts in which best ethical practice is not used. When reporting trials on human subjects, authors should indicate whether the procedures were in accordance with the ethical standards set by the responsible human experimentation committee (institutional and national) and latest version of the Declaration of Helsinki given by World Medical Association (available at: http://www.wma.net/en/30publications/10policies/b3/). Ethical approval (institutional or national) should be obtained for every study that includes collection of additional patient sample of any biological material (more than those required for the medical evaluation). All subjects should sign an informed consent form and this information should be provided in the manuscript. Signed informed consent forms should be archived by the authors. The authors have to provide a statement that they have received and archived all patient informed consent forms, as required during the manuscript submission process. It should be noted that informed consent to participate in the research does not imply consent to publish personal individual data (names, initials, pictures, hospital identification). Therefore, for publication that includes any individual data, patient must give his written consent. This is especially applied when it is not possible to obtain anonymity of the data without distorting scientific evidence. Regardless of the preserved anonymity, patients presented in case report articles should always sign informed consent. Case reports without patients’ consent are not eligible for publication. Specific types of case reports are not obliged to obtain informed consent as long as there are no patient’s personal data revealed. However, if there is a need to publish a patient’s rare diagnosis or specific demographic or personal data, by which patient’s identity can be implied, then the authors must obtain patient’s signed informed consent.
Conflict of interest
Public trust in the scientific process and the credibility of published articles depend in part on how transparently conflicts of interest are handled during the planning, implementation, writing, peer review, editing, and publication of scientific work. A conflict of interest exists when professional judgment concerning a primary interest (such as patients' welfare or the validity of research) may be influenced by a secondary interest (such as financial gain, personal relationships or rivalries, academic competition, and intellectual beliefs). Purposeful failure to disclose conflicts of interest is a form of misconduct.
All authors are expected to disclosure conflict of interest such as all financial and personal relationships that might bias or be seen to bias their work. Form for disclosure of conflict of interest is available at following link: Disclosure of Conflicts of Interest.
