Instructions to Reviewers

Please DO NOT conduct any review before you read Editorial Policies | Peer Review and Publication Process | Publishing Policies and Instructions to Authors

Instructions to Reviewers: Fundamental Principles | Conducting a Review | For all articles types | For Original Articles | Writing your report

Fundamental principles and standards during the peer-review process for Reviewers

Peer reviewers play a central and critical part of the peer-review process. We request that all reviewers adhere to a set of fundamental principles and standards during the peer-review process in research publication; these are set out below. Please read them carefully before you submit a review, as, by agreeing to be a reviewer for the Turkish Journal of Emergency Medicine, you are acknowledging that you agree to and accept these conditions. These conditions are based on the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers, which provides further information on how to be objective and constructive in your review.

Conflicts of interest

During the review process, we ask you to declare any potentially conflicting or competing interests (which could be personal, financial, intellectual, professional, political, or religious) so that editors can assess these and factor them into their decisions. Please refer any significant concerns over potentially competing interests to the editorial office before beginning your review. Besides, you should not agree to review a manuscript to gain sight of it with no intention of submitting a review.

Confidentiality

Manuscripts submitted to journals are authors' private, confidential property; reviewers should keep manuscripts and the information they contain strictly confidential. If you do choose to discuss the manuscript or your review with a professional colleague whose input you request as part of your review process, you are responsible for ensuring that they are made fully aware of the confidential nature of the discussion and that they must not disclose any information about the manuscript until the article is published. Any co-reviewer's identity and any potentially conflicting or competing interests they may have must be declared when submitting your review. Reviewers should not retain the manuscript for personal use and should destroy copies after submitting their review.

Timeliness

If you feel qualified to judge a particular manuscript, you should agree to review only if you can return a review within the proposed or mutually decided timeframe. If you cannot review, it is helpful to make suggestions for alternative reviewers if relevant, based on their expertise, and without any influence of personal considerations or any intention of the manuscript receiving a specific outcome

Scientific misconduct

If you have concerns that misconduct occurred during the research or the writing and submission of the manuscript or noticed a substantial similarity between the manuscript and a concurrent submission to another journal or a published article, please do let the journal Editor know.

Appropriate feedback

As a reviewer, you must provide a fair, honest, and unbiased assessment of the manuscript's strengths and weaknesses. For example, be specific in your critique, and provide supporting evidence with appropriate references to substantiate general statements. Be professional and refrain from being hostile or inflammatory and from making libelous or derogatory personal comments. If the work is not precise because of missing analyses, the reviewer should comment and explain what additional analyses would clarify the work submitted. It is not the job of the reviewer to extend the work beyond its current scope.

Ownership of your review

You will remain the owner of the review you submit to us. It is your responsibility to ensure that you obtain the consent of any co-reviewer or other third party who may have contributed to your review.

Who reads your reports?

TJEM does not publish peer reviews. Depending on a journal's editorial policy, you may be offered the opportunity to make additional confidential comments to the editor. Unless the reviewer has been offered confidentiality, reviews will usually be passed on in full to authors and other reviewers when an editorial decision is made. Reviews should be civil and constructive, and editors reserve the right to edit or remove any comments felt to be inappropriate.

Transfer of your reports

Authors are given the option if they would like their manuscript passed to the Anatolian Journal of Emergency Medicine if it is rejected for publication by the Turkish Journal of Emergency Medicine. If the author of the manuscript you reviewed has taken up this option, your review will be passed on to the editor(s) of the nominated journal(s) along with the manuscript, and you might be invited to review a revised version

Restrictions on your use of your review

We do not restrict the use you make of your review once the manuscript has been published. However, an author’s manuscript remains confidential until it is published, and you must not disclose any information about an unpublished manuscript, including your review of it. Please note that if the article is NOT published, you may refer to the journal which requested your review and the fact that you have reviewed an article for it. However, you may not post any details of the article which was reviewed or any part of the review that would breach the confidentiality under which the article was provided to you for review. 

Your registration details

We hold your details on the database for the journal. We also ask your permission to store your information on the reviewer databases.

Conducting a Review

  • We ask reviewers to help us to ensure that any studies published in the Turkish Journal of Emergency Medicine were conducted properly, scientifically credible, reported according to the appropriate guidelines (e.g. CONSORT, STARD, STROBE), and ethical.
  • We do not ask reviewers to judge on importance or breadth of appeal. Also, we do not need you to comment on the work's importance to general readers. Please do consider it for scientific reliability and ethical conduct.
  • The managing editor is responsible for the final decision to accept or reject a manuscript, based on the reviewers' comments.
  • Before writing your review you may find it helpful to browse our instructions for authors.

For All Articles Types

  1. Quick Summary
    • Although it is not obligatory, it is helpful to provide a quick summary of the article at the beginning of your report. This serves the dual purpose of reminding the editor of the details of the report and also reassuring the author and editor that you have understood the article.
  2. Presentation, Documentation and Language
    • The text must be well-written and easy to fullow.
    • Check if the vocabulary is appropriate. If an article is poorly written due to grammatical errors, while it may make it more difficult to understand the science, you do not need to correct the English. You should bring this to the attention of the editor.
    • Authors are required to adhere to the journal's Instructions to Authors, which includes manuscript presentation. If the difference is extreme and the editor has not mentioned this issue in the request to review, you may wish to contact your editor to discuss it.
  3. Title
    • The title should be informative, clear enough to describe the article, representative of the content and breadth of the study (not misleading), and should capture the importance of the study and the attention of the reader.
    • Generally nondeclarative, not a question, begins with main concept if possible, and without causal language, eg, "effect of," unless the study is an RCT
    • Study design in subtitle (ie, after culon)
  4. Abstract
    • The abstract should be complete (thorough); present essential details and must reflect the content of the article.
    • All of the information in the abstract must be present in the text. There must be no inconsistencies in detail between the abstract and the text.
    • Abstracts section should be structured for research articles and unstructured for the rest of manuscript types.
    • The results in the abstract should be presented in sufficient and specific detail.
    • The conclusions in the abstract must be justified by the information in the abstract and the text.
  5. Figures, Pictures and Tables
    • Please check the specifications for Figures and Tables from Instructions to Authors before reviewing them.
    • Where these are included, please check the content and if possible make suggestions for improvements.
    • Do the figures and tables inform the reader, are they an important part of the story?
    • Do the figures describe the data accurately?
    • Are they consistent, e.g. bars in charts are the same width, the scales on the axis are logical.
    • If the picture or figure depicts a person, face, or imaging of a patient, check if it is clearly inpersonized and sensitive information is removed.
  6. Previous Research
    • If the article builds upon previous research does it reference that work appropriately?
    • Are there any important works that have been omitted?
  7. References
    • Please check the specifications for References from Instructions to Authors before reviewing them. Reviewers are expected to check the referenced articles for appropriate referencing.
    • Are the references accurate?
  8. Explain your judgement
    • Providing insight into any deficiencies is important. You should explain and support your judgment so that both editors and authors are able to fully understand the reasoning behind your comments. You should indicate whether your comments are your own opinion or are reflected by the data.
  9. Revision Requests
    • If possible, make specific recommendations for revisions.
  10. Classify your recommendation
    • When you make a recommendation regarding an article, you should classify your recommendation for the article by selecting from the drop-down menu at the end of the reviewer checklist.

For Original Articles

  1. Abstract
    • The background should provide the context of why the study question is important. The study question should be clearly stated.
    • The methods should include study design, population and setting, number of participants, years of study, length of fullow up, and main outcomes measures. For RCTs, who if anyone was blinded to the intervention/contrul should be specified, the intervention and contrul conditions should be defined, the number in each group should be specified, statewhether the analysis was based on intention to treat, and provide the number lost to fullow up. For systematic reviews/meta-analyses, see PRISMA for abstracts, must include years of search, data sources, number of studies included, types of study designs included, eligibility criteria, for synthesis/appraisal methods. Surveys should include the response rate.
    • Main results should be quantified (with 95% CIs if possible), the important dependent variables that are adjusted for listed, the actual results and/or absulute risk(s) provided, and the results should match what is presented in the main paper. Provide major limitation(s) as appropriate.
    • Conclusions should interpret the study based on the results presented, emphasizing what is new and potential implications.
  2. Introduction
    • Normally, the introduction should summarize relevant research to provide context, and explain what other authors' findings, if any, are being challenged or extended.
    • Indicate how the literature was searched to determine whether the hypothesis had been addressed previously and, if it was addressed previously, why the current study was performed.
    • Results or conclusions should not be provided.
    • Should end with the research question which must be (research hypothesis where applicable) clear, concise, and complete.
  3. Materials and Methods
    • Should define study design, population and setting, number of participants, sampling, randomization technique, years of study, length of fullow up, and outcome measures.
    • Numbers of patients, samples, etc, should be reported and accounted for. Check that numbers add up. "Lost to fullow-up" should be defined. Reasons for exclusion should be defined. Inclusion criteria must be well reported.
    • Does the author accurately explain how the data was cullected?
    • Does the article make it clear what type of data was recorded?
    • Has the author been precise in describing measurements? The measurement instrument must be appropriate given the study's variables; the scoring method must be clearly defined.
    • Is the design suitable for answering the question asked?
    • Is there sufficient information present to replicate the research? The research design and data analysis procedures should be defined and clearly described, and must be sufficiently detailed to permit the study to replicated.
    • Does the article identify the procedures?
    • Is this information presented in an algoritmic and meaningful way?
    • If the methods are new, are they explained in detail?
    • Have the equipment and materials been adequately described?
    • Commercial Name, Version, Producer, City, Country information of the devices, kits, tests and statistical packages used must be provided.
    • Human studies: There should be an explicit statement of approval by an institutional review board (IRB) for studies directly invulving human subjects or data about them. Written vs oral informed consent should be specified (with rare exception informed consent should be written). If authors do not have access to an IRB, research needs to be conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. Animal studies: Report handling fullowing ARRIVE guidelines.
  4. Statistics
  5. Results
    • This is where the author(s) should explain in words what he/she/they discovered in the research. It should be clearly laid out and in a logical sequence.
    • Raw data/actual numbers for outcomes, not just percentages or ORs, should be presented. Numerators and denominators should be presented for percentages, at least in tables.
    • Comparison groups should be specified, for, eg, OR, HR, etc.
      1. For adjusted analyses, all factors adjusted for should be provided. Unadjusted or minimally adjusted analyses should be presented in addition to fully adjusted analyses.
      2. 95% CIs should be provided.
    • Interpretation of results should not be included in this section.
  6. Discussion
    • Are the claims in this section supported by the results, do they seem reasonable?
    • Have the authors indicated how the results relate to expectations and to earlier research?
    • Does the article support or contradict previous theories?
    • Does the conclusion explain how the research has moved the body of scientific knowledge forward?
  7. Limitations
    • Limitations of the article should be presented in a separate paragraph, should be concise, brief and unbiased.

Writing Your Report

Accessibility of reviewers comments: An author will only see the comments you have made that are specific to the author; sometimes the editor will edit them.

Electronic submission and review system:

  • You are expected to write your report in 2 separate sections present in the electronic submission and review system. It is for your benefit to write your reports (comments to the editor and author) in a word processor on your computer and copy-paste them to these sections.
  • If you wish to write them into these sections online, be sure to save it in every 5-10 mins. After 15 mins of inactivity, the system logs you out for security reasons and you may lose all unsaved work. Writing text is not accounted for online activity by the system.
  • Despite the option to upload the report as a word processor document, we strictly request you to paste your report to the appropriate sections.
  • In confidential comments to the Editor: Summarize your reasons for your recommendations. Explain your judgment.
  • In comments to the Author: The comments to the author should not include any statements that indicate to the author your judgment as to the acceptability of the paper for publication. These comments should be stated in a constructive and helpful way. The reviewer should discuss the shortcomings and/or strengths of a study. Include in your critique your judgment of all aspects provided in the Conducting a Review section above

References to this section