Anatolian Current Medical Journal (ACMJ) is an unbiased, peer-reviewed, and open access international medical journal. The Journal publishes interesting clinical and experimental research conducted in all fields of medicine, interesting case reports, and clinical images, invited reviews, editorials, letters, comments, and related knowledge.
Anatolian Current Medical Journal (ACMJ) is committed to maintaining a fair, independent, confidential, and scientifically rigorous peer-review process.
All manuscripts submitted to ACMJ must be original, approved by all listed authors, and not simultaneously under consideration by another journal.
Initial Editorial Screening
All submissions undergo an initial technical and editorial screening before external peer review.
During this stage, manuscripts are evaluated for:
Submitted manuscripts may also be screened using plagiarism-detection software such as iThenticate.
Manuscripts that do not meet the Journal’s basic requirements or fall outside its scope may be rejected without external peer review.
Passing the initial screening does not guarantee that a manuscript will be sent for external review.
Double-Blind Peer Review
ACMJ uses a double-blind peer-review model for research manuscripts.
Under this model:
Authors must therefore ensure that the blinded manuscript does not contain names, institutional affiliations, acknowledgments, or other information that could directly identify the authors.
The Journal will make reasonable efforts to preserve anonymity throughout the review process; however, complete anonymity cannot always be guaranteed, particularly in highly specialized fields or when study details have previously been made publicly available.
Reviewer Selection
Manuscripts selected for external review are normally evaluated by at least two independent reviewers with relevant scientific or clinical expertise.
Reviewers may be selected from national or international institutions.
Reviewer selection is based on factors including:
Additional reviewers, statistical reviewers, methodological experts, or other specialist reviewers may be invited when considered necessary by the Editor.
Author-Suggested and Opposed Reviewers
Authors may be permitted to suggest potential reviewers during submission.
Suggested reviewers must be appropriately qualified and should not have relationships with the authors that could reasonably be perceived as compromising the independence of the review.
The Journal is under no obligation to invite author-suggested reviewers.
Authors may also identify individuals whom they prefer not to review their manuscript and may provide a brief justification for the request.
The final selection of reviewers remains entirely at the discretion of the Editor.
Reviewer Conflicts of Interest
Reviewers must disclose any financial, professional, academic, institutional, personal, or other relationship that could influence, or reasonably be perceived to influence, their evaluation of a manuscript.
Potential conflicts may include, but are not limited to:
Reviewers who believe that a conflict may impair their objectivity must decline the review or promptly inform the Editor.
The existence of a relationship does not automatically constitute misconduct; however, transparency and appropriate recusal are required where impartiality may be affected.
Reviewer Responsibilities
Reviewers are expected to provide objective, constructive, evidence-based, and respectful assessments.
Reviewers should evaluate, where applicable:
Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been appropriately cited when this is important to the scientific evaluation of the manuscript.
If a reviewer suspects plagiarism, data fabrication or falsification, duplicate publication, inappropriate image manipulation, unethical research practices, or other potential misconduct, the reviewer should confidentially notify the Editor.
Reviewer Confidentiality
Submitted manuscripts and all related materials are confidential and privileged communications.
Reviewers must not:
Reviewers who wish to involve a trainee, colleague, or other individual in the review must obtain prior permission from the Journal and ensure that all individuals involved comply with the same confidentiality requirements.
The use of artificial intelligence or AI-assisted technologies during peer review must comply with ACMJ's Artificial Intelligence and AI-Assisted Technologies Policy. Confidential manuscript material must not be uploaded into third-party AI systems when confidentiality and data security cannot be assured.
Reviewer Competence and Timeliness
A reviewer who believes that they do not have sufficient expertise to evaluate a manuscript should decline the invitation.
Reviewers should also decline or notify the Editor when they are unable to complete the review within the requested timeframe.
Peer-review reports should be submitted within the deadline specified by the Journal whenever possible.
Editorial Evaluation and Decision
Reviewer recommendations are advisory.
The Editor-in-Chief or an authorized handling editor evaluates the reviewers' reports together with the manuscript and is responsible for the editorial decision.
Possible decisions may include:
The Editor is not required to follow the majority recommendation of reviewers and may seek additional review when reviewer opinions are substantially divergent or when further expertise is required.
Editorial decisions are based on scientific quality, originality, methodological rigor, ethical compliance, relevance to the Journal's scope, and contribution to the literature.
Revised Manuscripts
When revision is requested, authors should submit:
Authors are not required to accept every reviewer recommendation; however, any recommendation that is not followed should be addressed with a clear scientific justification.
Revised manuscripts may be returned to the original reviewers or evaluated directly by the Editor, depending on the extent of the revisions and the nature of the reviewer comments.
Editorial Board Members and Editors as Authors
Manuscripts submitted by the Editor-in-Chief, Associate Editors, Editorial Board members, Journal staff, or individuals directly involved in the Journal’s editorial decision-making are subject to the same scientific and ethical standards as other submissions.
Such manuscripts are handled independently.
Any editor or editorial board member who is an author of, has contributed to, or has a conflict of interest regarding a submitted manuscript must have no access to the editorial decision-making process for that manuscript.
An independent editor without a relevant conflict of interest will oversee the peer-review process and make or coordinate the final editorial decision.
The identity and role of the submitting editor or board member must not influence reviewer selection or editorial evaluation.
Editorial Conflicts of Interest
Editors must disclose relationships or activities that may affect, or reasonably appear to affect, their impartiality.
Editors with a relevant conflict of interest must recuse themselves from handling the manuscript.
The manuscript will then be assigned to another qualified editor who has no relevant conflict.
Reviewer Misconduct
Allegations of reviewer misconduct, including misuse of confidential information, plagiarism, undisclosed conflicts of interest, inappropriate appropriation of ideas or data, manipulation of the peer-review process, or serious breaches of confidentiality, will be investigated in accordance with ACMJ's publication ethics procedures.
Where misconduct is confirmed, appropriate action may include:
Appeals of Editorial Decisions
Authors may appeal an editorial decision when they believe that a substantial scientific, methodological, ethical, or procedural issue has been overlooked or misunderstood.
An appeal must provide a clear and evidence-based explanation of the grounds for reconsideration.
Appeals based solely on disagreement with the editorial decision, without substantive scientific or procedural justification, may not be considered.
Appeals are evaluated by the Editor-in-Chief or, where a conflict of interest exists, by another independent senior editor.
The Journal may seek additional expert review when necessary.
The outcome of the appeal represents the Journal's final decision unless exceptional circumstances justify further review.
Editorial Independence
Editorial decisions are based on the scientific merit, methodological quality, ethical integrity, relevance, and suitability of the manuscript.
Commercial considerations, advertising relationships, sponsorship, institutional relationships, or the identity, nationality, gender, ethnicity, religious beliefs, political views, or other personal characteristics of the authors must not influence editorial decisions.
The Editor-in-Chief retains final responsibility for the editorial content of ACMJ.
Article in Press Policy
Anatolian Current Medical Journal (ACMJ) may make accepted manuscripts available online as Articles in Press before completion of the final typesetting and production process. For the purposes of ACMJ, an Article in Press is an accepted version of a manuscript that has successfully completed editorial evaluation and peer review and has been formally accepted for publication, but has not yet undergone final typesetting, layout, pagination, or assignment to its final issue.
1. Definition and Status of the ACMJ Preprint
A ACMJ preprint:
The preprint is made available to facilitate early access to accepted scientific content while final production processes are being completed.
2. Scientific Content
The scientific content of the preprint corresponds substantially to the accepted manuscript.
However, the preprint may not yet include final:
Readers should therefore be aware that minor changes may occur between the preprint and the final published version.
3. Citation of Preprints
Because ACMJ preprints have not yet been assigned a DOI or final bibliographic information, they should be cited as accepted manuscripts or preprints using the bibliographic information available at the time of access.
The citation should clearly indicate that the article is a preprint or accepted manuscript and has not yet been published as the final Version of Record.
Once the final article has been published, the final citation and DOI should be used instead of the preprint citation.
4. DOI Assignment
ACMJ does not assign a DOI to the preprint version.
A DOI is assigned only after the article has completed the Journal's final production and publication process and the Version of Record has been published.
The final published article will replace the preprint as the authoritative version for citation and scholarly reference purposes.
5. Transition to the Final Published Version
After completion of copyediting, typesetting, proofreading, and final production checks, the article will be published in its definitive form.
The final published article will include the appropriate bibliographic information, including DOI and other publication details.
Where technically possible, the preprint record will be linked to or replaced by the final Version of Record to prevent confusion between versions.
6. Corrections Before Final Publication
Errors identified during the preprint stage may be corrected as part of the normal production and proofreading process before publication of the final Version of Record.
Substantive scientific changes after acceptance are not permitted unless approved by the Editor.
If a significant issue affecting the validity, ethics, authorship, or integrity of the article is identified after acceptance but before final publication, ACMJ may suspend publication, request clarification, or take other appropriate editorial action.
7. Author Responsibilities
Authors are responsible for carefully reviewing the accepted manuscript and subsequent proofs provided by the Journal.
Authors must promptly notify the Editorial Office if they identify:
8. Version of Record
The formally published and typeset article issued by ACMJ constitutes the Version of Record.
The Version of Record supersedes the preprint for citation, indexing, archiving, and scholarly reference purposes.
Questions concerning ACMJ preprints may be directed to:
ACMJ Editorial Office
E-mail: [email protected]
Trial Registration Policy
Anatolian Current Medical Journal (ACMJ) supports prospective registration of clinical trials in accordance with the recommendations of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE).
For the purposes of this policy, a clinical trial is defined as a research project that prospectively assigns individuals or groups of individuals to one or more health-related interventions in order to evaluate the effects of those interventions on health-related outcomes.
Prospective Trial Registration
All clinical trials submitted to ACMJ must be registered in a publicly accessible clinical trial registry before or at the time of first participant consent or enrollment.
Registration performed only after participant enrollment has begun or at the time of manuscript submission is considered retrospective registration and does not normally satisfy the Journal's requirements.
Acceptable registries include:
The trial record must be publicly accessible and contain the minimum registration information required by the relevant registry.
Approval by an ethics committee, institutional review board, or other regulatory authority does not replace the requirement for prospective clinical trial registration.
Registration Information in the Manuscript
For manuscripts reporting clinical trial results, authors must provide:
The registration number should be stated at the end of the abstract and in the Methods section.
Where applicable, authors should also provide a direct link to the publicly accessible trial registration record.
The information reported in the manuscript should be consistent with the information contained in the trial registry. Any material changes to the study protocol, primary or secondary outcomes, eligibility criteria, sample size, intervention, or statistical analysis plan made after registration must be transparently reported and justified.
Late or Retrospective Registration
ACMJ expects prospective registration of clinical trials.
Manuscripts describing trials that were not prospectively registered may be considered only in exceptional circumstances at the discretion of the Editorial Board.
In such cases, authors must:
Acceptance of a retrospectively registered trial is not guaranteed. The Editorial Board may reject a manuscript when delayed registration raises concerns regarding selective reporting, outcome modification, or research integrity.
Clinical Trial Data Sharing Policy
Manuscripts reporting the results of clinical trials must include a Data Sharing Statement.
The Data Sharing Statement must clearly indicate:
A statement indicating that the authors are “undecided” regarding data sharing is not acceptable.
Clinical trials that began enrolling participants on or after January 1, 2019 should include a data sharing plan in the trial registration record. If the data sharing plan is modified after registration, the change should be reflected both in the trial registry and in the Data Sharing Statement included with the manuscript.
Authors are not necessarily required to make all clinical trial data publicly available. Where sharing is restricted because of patient confidentiality, privacy, informed consent limitations, ethical restrictions, legal requirements, contractual obligations, or other legitimate reasons, these restrictions must be clearly explained.
Where data are deposited in an appropriate repository, authors should provide a persistent identifier, such as a DOI, accession number, or permanent repository link.
Secondary Analyses of Shared Clinical Trial Data
Manuscripts based on secondary analyses of previously shared clinical trial data must:
Compliance
Compliance with trial registration requirements does not replace the need for ethics committee approval, informed consent, adherence to the appropriate reporting guideline, or compliance with other ACMJ editorial and publication ethics policies.
The Editorial Board reserves the right to verify trial registration records, request protocol documents and statistical analysis plans, and investigate discrepancies between the registry record and the submitted manuscript.