Journal Policies

This page outlines the journal-specific policies that govern manuscript evaluation, peer review, publication ethics, research integrity, clinical research reporting, transparency and post-publication responsibilities.

These policies should be read together with ZENTIME’s publisher-level Editorial Policies, Publishing Policies, and Open Access, Fees and Licensing policies. Where journal-specific requirements supplement publisher-level policies, the requirements stated on this journal website apply.

The journal expects authors, editors, reviewers and editorial board members to follow internationally recognized standards of responsible scholarly publishing, including relevant guidance from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), and the EQUATOR Network, where applicable.

The journal operates a transparent peer review process to ensure the quality, integrity and clinical relevance of published content.

All submitted manuscripts are first assessed by the editorial office or a handling editor for completeness, relevance to the journal’s aims and scope, ethical compliance, reporting quality and suitability for further evaluation. Manuscripts that are outside the journal’s scope, do not meet basic reporting standards, lack sufficient originality or raise significant ethical concerns may be declined before external peer review.

The journal uses a single-anonymous peer review model, in which reviewers remain anonymous to authors. Research articles, systematic reviews, clinical studies and other scholarly manuscripts requiring external review are normally assessed by at least two independent reviewers with relevant expertise.

Reviewer comments are advisory. Final editorial decisions are made by the Editor-in-Chief or designated handling editor based on editorial assessment, reviewer comments, methodological rigor, originality, ethical compliance, clinical relevance and suitability for the journal.

Editorials, commentaries, letters, corrections and invited content may be reviewed internally or externally at the editors' discretion, according to the nature of the content.

The journal maintains editorial independence in all editorial decisions. Decisions on individual manuscripts are made by the Editor-in-Chief, handling editors or designated editorial decision-making team in accordance with the journal's policies.

Editorial decisions are based on scholarly merit, originality, methodological quality, relevance to the journal’s aims and scope, ethical integrity and clinical or scientific contribution. Decisions are not influenced by commercial interests, advertising, sponsorship, institutional affiliation, political considerations or the financial interests of ZENTIME, journal owners, editors, editorial board members or any third party.

Editors and editorial board members must maintain confidentiality, declare conflicts of interest and recuse themselves from handling manuscripts where impartiality may be compromised. Manuscripts submitted by editors, editorial board members or journal staff will be handled independently by an editor without conflict of interest and will undergo the same editorial assessment and peer review standards as other submissions.

The journal is committed to maintaining high standards of publication ethics and research integrity. Authors, editors and reviewers are expected to act with honesty, transparency and accountability throughout the submission, review and publication process.

The journal does not tolerate plagiarism, redundant publication, duplicate submission, data fabrication, data falsification, image manipulation, citation manipulation, authorship manipulation, peer review manipulation, paper mills or other forms of research or publication misconduct.

Suspected misconduct will be assessed according to the journal's procedures and ZENTIME’s publisher-level policies. Depending on the circumstances, outcomes may include a request for clarification, manuscript rejection, correction, expression of concern, retraction, article removal or notification of relevant institutions or authorities.

All listed authors must have made substantial scholarly contributions to the work, approved the submitted version and agreed to its submission. The corresponding author is responsible for ensuring that authorship, author order, corresponding author details and required declarations have been agreed by all authors before submission.

The journal requires an author contribution statement and encourages the use of the CRediT taxonomy where appropriate. Contributors who do not meet authorship criteria should be acknowledged with their permission.

Authors must disclose all financial and non-financial competing interests that could influence, or be perceived to influence, the work. If no competing interests exist, authors should state this explicitly.

All funding sources, grant numbers and institutional support should be disclosed. Authors should state the role of funders in study design, data collection, analysis, interpretation, manuscript preparation and the decision to submit for publication.

Changes to authorship after submission require a clear explanation, written agreement from all authors and editorial approval.

Research involving human participants, human data or human tissue must have appropriate ethics approval or exemption. Authors should state the name of the ethics committee or institutional review board, approval number or reference, and any relevant exemption information in the manuscript.

Research involving animals must comply with applicable institutional, national and international ethical standards. Authors should provide details of ethical approval and animal welfare considerations where applicable.

Studies involving perioperative, anesthetic, analgesic, surgical, critical care, device-based, monitoring, diagnostic or other clinical interventions must comply with applicable ethical, regulatory and safety requirements.

Informed consent should be obtained where required. Written consent for publication is required for identifiable patient information, clinical images, videos, case details, monitoring data or other personal information. Patient privacy and confidentiality must be protected, and identifying information should not be published unless essential and properly consented.

Clinical trials should be registered in a publicly accessible registry before participant recruitment begins, where applicable. The registry name and registration number should be included in the manuscript.

Manuscripts reporting clinical trials should include a data sharing statement where required by applicable standards or journal policy. The statement should indicate whether de-identified individual participant data will be shared, what data will be shared, whether related documents such as the study protocol or statistical analysis plan will be available, when and for how long the data will be available, and the conditions for access.

Authors should follow appropriate reporting guidelines according to study design. Relevant guidelines may include CONSORT for randomized trials, PRISMA for systematic reviews and meta-analyses, STROBE for observational studies, STARD for diagnostic accuracy studies, SPIRIT for trial protocols, TRIPOD for prediction model studies, CARE for case reports, ARRIVE for animal studies, AGREE or RIGHT for guidelines, and other EQUATOR Network resources.

Reporting checklists and flow diagrams should be submitted where required by the journal or relevant reporting guideline.

Authors should include a Data Availability Statement where applicable, describing where the data supporting the findings can be accessed or explaining why data cannot be shared.

Data, materials, protocols, software and code should be made available in suitable repositories where possible and appropriate. Restrictions due to privacy, ethics, legal, commercial, intellectual property or security reasons should be clearly explained.

For clinical studies, authors should ensure that shared data are appropriately de-identified and consistent with ethics approval, informed consent and applicable data protection requirements.

Supplementary materials should support the main article and should not replace essential methods, results or data needed to evaluate the work.

AI tools and large language models cannot be listed as authors. Authors remain responsible for the accuracy, originality and integrity of all submitted content, including any content generated or assisted by AI tools.

Use of generative AI or AI-assisted technologies beyond basic language editing should be disclosed in the manuscript according to the journal’s requirements. AI tools must not be used to fabricate, falsify or manipulate data, images, references or conclusions.

AI-generated or AI-assisted images, clinical images, diagnostic outputs or visual materials should not be used unless permitted by journal policy, ethically appropriate and transparently disclosed.

Editors and reviewers must not upload confidential manuscripts, peer review reports, decision letters or related materials to public AI tools unless explicitly permitted by the journal and consistent with confidentiality and data protection requirements.

The journal considers manuscripts that have been posted as preprints, provided that the work has not been formally published and is not under consideration by another journal at the same time.

Authors must disclose any preprint, conference abstract, thesis, report, trial registry record or related prior dissemination at submission. Where applicable, authors should provide the preprint server name, DOI or link.

If the manuscript is accepted, authors are encouraged to update the preprint record with a citation and link to the final published article. Duplicate submission and redundant publication are not permitted.

Open Access

The journal is a Gold Open Access journal. All published articles are freely and permanently available online immediately upon publication.

Authors should review the journal's Open Access and Fees page before submission for information on article processing charges, waiver or discount options, copyright, licensing, article sharing and self-archiving.

Copyright

Authors are required to transfer copyright in their accepted manuscript to the journal upon acceptance for publication.

In exceptional circumstances, including where specific institutional or funder requirements apply, authors may contact the editorial office to discuss alternative copyright arrangements.

Licensing

All published articles are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license.

The CC BY 4.0 license permits others to share, copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon the work for any purpose, including commercially, provided that appropriate credit is given to the original authors and source, a link to the license is provided, and any changes are indicated.

Article Sharing and Self-Archiving

Authors may share, host and self-archive the published Version of Record in accordance with the CC BY 4.0 license.

Articles may be shared through institutional repositories, personal websites, academic networks and other appropriate platforms, provided that appropriate attribution to the original publication is retained and the terms of the CC BY 4.0 license are respected.

Use of Third-Party and Previously Published Material

Authors are responsible for obtaining permission to reproduce or adapt material owned by third parties where permission is required. This includes material previously published by the authors themselves if the copyright is held by another publisher or third party.

Permission may be required for, including but not limited to:

• previously published figures, tables, graphs, charts, schemes, artworks or other content that is reproduced or only slightly modified;

• substantial extracts of text or other material from previously published works;

• photographs, images or other visual materials for which the authors do not hold the necessary rights; and

• the authors' own previously published material where the authors have not retained the relevant copyright or reuse rights.

Authors should obtain all necessary permissions before submitting the manuscript and provide appropriate attribution and permission statements where required.

Authors are responsible for ensuring that the use of third-party material complies with applicable copyright, license and permission requirements. Third-party material may not necessarily be covered by the CC BY 4.0 license applied to the article as a whole.

The journal is committed to maintaining the integrity and transparency of the scholarly record. Post-publication updates may include corrections, expressions of concern, retractions or article removal where appropriate.

Corrections may be issued for significant errors that do not invalidate the article. Retractions may be issued when findings are unreliable, unethical or substantially compromised. Expressions of concern may be issued when serious concerns remain unresolved.

Authors may appeal an editorial decision or submit a complaint by contacting the Editorial Office. Appeals should identify specific concerns, such as a possible error in the editorial process, a misunderstanding of the manuscript or evidence that relevant information was not adequately considered.

Appeals do not guarantee reconsideration, external review or reversal of the original decision. Repeated appeals without new evidence may not be considered. Complaints regarding editorial conduct, peer review, conflicts of interest, confidentiality or publication ethics will be handled fairly, confidentially and in a timely manner.

Related ZENTIME publisher policies:

• Editorial Policies

• Publishing Policies

• Open Access, Fees and Licensing

Related external standards and resources:

• Committee on Publication Ethics

• World Association of Medical Editors

• International Committee of Medical Journal Editors

• EQUATOR Network

• CONSORT

• PRISMA

• STROBE

• STARD

• SPIRIT

• TRIPOD

• CARE

• ARRIVE