Iranian Journal of Medical Sciences

 


 

Aim and Scope

The Iranian Journal of Medical Sciences (IJMS) is an international peer-reviewed monthly biomedical publication, the aim of which is to provide a scientific medium of communication for researchers throughout the globe. The Journal welcomes original clinical articles as well as basic science research experiences mainly on prevalent diseases in the region and the analysis of various regional problems. Manuscripts are publishable in the form of original articles, review articles (systematic and narrative), case reports, letters to the editor, etc. 

 

Submission Process

Manuscripts should be sent through the online submission system: (http://ijms.sums.ac.ir/contacts?_action=loginForm)

 

Assignment of Authorship Responsibilities

Your article will not be published unless you warrant that “This article is an original work, has not been published before, and is not being considered for publication elsewhere in its final form either in printed or electronic form”. The IJMS Assignment Form (available in the Forms tab of the website) should be signed and dated by all authors and sent along with the manuscript.

 

Article Charges

The payment of fee is mandatory for all types of manuscripts sent to the Iranian Journal of Medical Sciences (IJMS). Invited articles are exempt from the article charges.

Please note that manuscripts submitted to IJMS for review and possible publication, will be processed only when the following conditions are met.

From March 20, 2024, all authors are asked to pay part of the processing and publication fees of their manuscript based on the following Table: 

International Contributors

  Acceptance Fee

   400 US Dollars

Iranian Contributors

  Submission Fee

   4,000,000  Rls

  Acceptance Fee based on the Article Type

     Original Article

     Review Article

   Up to 4000 words: 55,000,000  Rls

   Exceed 4000 words: 65,000,000  Rls

     Brief Report

     Case Report

   40,000,000  Rls

     Photo Clinic

     Letter to Editor

   25,000,000  Rls

 

The fee for Iranian Authors should be deposited in the account number 2305.1.6880910.1 with Identity Code 6274-1219-4010-7907 at Bank Eghtesad Novin.

  • To follow the instructions for the above payments please click on this link

Please make sure that a copy of your payment receipt is attached to your submission as an image file (upload it on to the journal site).

It should be noted that all deposits are non-refundable and a paper may be rejected by the Editors without being sent for review. Furthermore, the article submission fee and acceptance fee are used to support journal related activities and cover editorial service and production of an article.

 

Scientific and Initial Screening

IJMS staff would check the structure and content of manuscripts to ensure compliance with standard structures (based on the type of study), the Journal’s scope, standard guidelines, quality, novelty, and adherence to ethical issues. In this step, articles would be screened and triaged in the shortest possible time. As a result, such screening would assist the editor in making fair final decisions on articles and ultimately improve the final quality of published articles.

 

Peer-Review Process 

Submitted articles are primarily evaluated by our statisticians who check the articles for any methodological flaws, format, and their compliance with the Journal’s instructions. Then, a submission code will be allocated and all the future contacts should be based on this code. Through a -single anonymized review, the articles will be reviewed by at least two external (peer) reviewers. Their comments will be passed to the authors and their responses to the comments along with the reviewers’ comments will then be evaluated by the Editor-in-Chief, and a final reviewer who can be a member of the Editorial Board. The final review process will be discussed in regular editorial board sessions and on the basis of the comments, and the Journal’s standards, the Editors-in-Chief will decide which articles should be published.

It should be noted that articles submitted by the staff and editors of the IJMS will also be subjected to peer review and the editor plays no role in the review or decision.

 

Editorial Independence

Although the IJMS is sponsored financially by Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, it benefits from editorial freedom. The editors evaluate and accept articles based only on significance, originality, validity, and adherence to the aims and scope of the Journal.

Our editorial policy is consistent with the principles of editorial independence presented by the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME).

 

Ethical Considerations

The Journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). COPE’s flowcharts and guidelines are approached in confronting any ethical misbehavior. The Journal also follows the guidelines mentioned in the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals issued by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE).

 

•     Human & Animal Rights Statement:

Research involving human subjects, human material, or human data, must have been performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and must have been approved by an independent local, regional or national review body (e.g., ethics committee, institutional review board), and be prepared to provide documentation when requested by editors.

Manuscripts describing any experimental research on animals should include a statement of approval by the Ethical Committee of the institute where the work was done, mentioning that the study was carried out according to the legal requirements of the relevant local or national authority. Before papers describing animal studies are accepted for publication in the Iranian Journal of Medical Sciences, the authors must convince the editors that the work conformed to appropriate ethical standards. The care and use of experimental animals should comply with acceptable international animal welfare guidelines and policies. Further guidance on animal research ethics is available from the Guideline for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals in Iran. For reports of such studies, authors should refer to the ARRIVE guidelines checklist.

 

•     Informed Consent:

All patients and participants in a research project should be thoroughly informed about the aims of the study and any possible side effects of the drugs and interventions. Written informed consent from the participants or their legal guardians is necessary for any such studies. The Journal reserves the right to request the related documents. Articles that require informed consent should contain related statements in the “Methods” section.

 

•     Authorship:

According to the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, released by the ICMJE, an “Author” is generally considered to be someone who simultaneously meets the following conditions 1, 2, 3, and 4.

1-Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND

2-Drafting the work or reviewing it critically for important intellectual content; AND

3-Final approval of the version to be published; AND

4-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.

From September 1, 2022:
1. Manuscripts submitted to IJMS with co-first authors, will be processed only when the following conditions are met:
a) The manuscript should be original.
b) All contributing authors should qualify for authorship, and should have sufficient participation in the work. (Authorship credit should be met.)
c) The dimensions of work require several authors with different specialty, who provide the same or equal contribution(s) to the research work.
2. With regard to the corresponding Author, IJMS accepts only one corresponding author, who is responsible for all the correspondence with the journal, both before and after the publication of the manuscript.

 

•     Conflict of Interest:

All authors and reviewers must inform us about any kinds of “Conflict of Interest” (such as financial, personal, political, or academic) that would potentially affect their judgment. General institutional support for an author's time on the work should be distinguished from direct overall funding of the work. An appropriate funding statement might be: “This study was funded by A; Dr. F's time on the work was supported by B.” Each author must fill the uniform disclosure form available through the below link and upload it at the time of submission:

(http://www.icmje.org/disclosure-of-interest/)

 

•     Plagiarism:

Authors are not allowed to utilize verbatim text of previously published papers or manuscripts submitted elsewhere. All submitted manuscripts will be checked for possible similarity in any part of the work by iThenticate plagiarism checker. Based on the amount of plagiarism detected in a manuscript, it will be passed to the authors and ask them to rephrase copied phrases or include as direct quotations with references. COPE’s flowcharts and guidelines are approached in cases in which plagiarism is detected.

 

•     Data Fabrication/Falsification:

Falsification is the practice of omitting or altering research materials, data, or processes so that the results of the research are no longer accurately reflected. Fabrication is the practice of inventing data or results and reporting them in the research. Both of these misconducts are fraudulent and seriously alter the integrity of the research. Therefore, articles must be written based on original data and the use of falsified or fabricated data is strongly prohibited. In confronting cases with fabricated or falsified data COPE’s flowcharts and guidelines are followed.

Researchers who perform randomized controlled or clinical trials (RCTs) are advised to keep their original data at hand. The Journal keeps the right to ask for raw data even after publication. 

 

•     Image Manipulation:

The IJMS encourages authors to send their original images. All digital images in manuscripts accepted for publication will be checked for inappropriate manipulation. No specific feature within an image may be enhanced, obscured, moved, removed, or introduced. Adjustments of brightness, contrast, or color balance are acceptable as long as they are applied to the entire image and do not misrepresent any information present in the original, including the background. The editors will request the original data from the authors to compare the manipulated figures in cases suspected of inappropriate manipulation.

 

•     Copyright:

If a manuscript contains any previous published image or text, it is the responsibility of the author to obtain authorization from copyright holders. The author is required to obtain and submit the written original permission letters for all copyrighted material used in his/her manuscript.

 

•   Open Access Policy:

 This journal provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

 

•   Retraction Policy:

The IJMS uses the COPE flowchart for retraction of a published article to determine whether a published article should be retracted.

 

•   Complaints and appeals

The “Iranian Journal of Medical Sciences” responds promptly to complaints and ensures there is a way for dissatisfied complainants to take complaints further by sending an email to editor-in-chief of the journal. We follow the COPE's guidelines and flowcharts for handling  complaints against the journal, its staff, editorial board or publisher.

 

Requirements for Different Types of Articles

Original articles: Should contain a structured abstract, 3-5 keywords, introduction, materials (patients) and methods, results, discussion, conclusion, acknowledgement (if applicable), and references sections, and maximum 4 tables and 4 figures. The length should not exceed 3000-3500 words excluding the references, abstract, figures and tables. 15-40 references should be stated for original articles.

-Clinical trials- The format is similar to original articles. However, the CONSORT flow diagram should be added as a figure. RCTs should be registered at any RCT Registry approved by the WHO and their registration number should be mentioned in the title page. RCTs done in Iran must be registered at www.irct.ir.

Brief reports: Should contain a non-structured abstract, 3-5 keywords, introduction, materials and methods, results, discussion, conclusion, acknowledgement (if applicable), and references sections, and maximum 2 tables and figures. However, the word count should not exceed 2000 words. 10-15 references should be stated.

Case reports: Should contain a non-structured abstract, 3-5 keywords, introduction, case presentation, discussion, conclusion, acknowledgment (if applicable), and references sections, and maximum 1 table and 3 figures. 5-10 references should be stated. Case reports should optimally be accompanied by relevant figures to document findings. Informed consents should be obtained from the patients to report their cases. The Journal keeps the right to ask for original signed informed consents.

Review articles:

-Narrative reviews- Should contain at least 60 references. Abstract should be non-structured. The word count should not exceed 4500 words. Narrative reviews should critically assess the current knowledge of the field.

-Systematic reviews- Systematic reviews of RCTs or Observational Studies will be accepted by the Journal. The protocol of the study should adhere to PRISMA or MOOSE guidelines for systematic reviews of RCTs or Observational studies, respectively. Up to 40 references can be stated. Abstracts should be structured.

Letters to the Editor: Letters should be less than 750 words. Letters discussing articles published in the IJMS should be submitted at most within 4 months after the publication of the main article. Letters will undergo peer review and will be edited for clarity. Up to 5 references should be stated.

Editorials: From September 1, 2022, are mostly commissioned and discuss any important issues in general medicine. Between 700-900 words and up to 10 references can be stated. Only one co-author is permitted.

Photo clinics: Figures that contain a significant medical point can also be accepted. Photo clinics should contain one or two high quality figures and a description of the figures no more than 500 words. Up to 5 references should be stated.

 

Paper Preparations

Cover letter should contain the rationale of performing the research and selecting the IJMS as well as a statement that you will not resubmit your article to another journal until the reviewing process will be completed. Also please indicate whether the authors have published or submitted any related papers from the same study.

 

According to ICMJE recommendations, at submission, the authors should disclose whether they used artificial intelligence (AI)-assisted technologies (such as Large Language Models [LLMs], chatbots, or image creators) in the production of submitted work. Authors who use such technology should describe, in both the cover letter and the submitted work in the appropriate section if applicable, how they used it. For example, if AI was used for writing assistance, describe this in the acknowledgment section. If AI was used for data collection, analysis, or figure generation, authors should describe this use in the methods. Chatbots (such as ChatGPT) should not be listed as authors because they cannot be responsible for the accuracy, integrity, and originality of the work. Authors should carefully review and edit the result because AI can generate authoritative-sounding output that can be incorrect, incomplete, or biased. Authors should not list AI and AI assisted technologies as an author or co-author, nor cite AI as an author. Authors should be able to assert that there is no plagiarism in their paper, including in text and images produced by the AI. Humans must ensure there is appropriate attribution of all quoted material, including full citations.

 

Title page of the article should include 1) the title of the article; 2) authors’ names; 3) name of the institution where the work was done; 4) running title (short form of the main title presented on the top of published pages); and 5) complete mailing address, telephone number, and email address of the corresponding author. This page is not numbered.

 

What's Known and What's New boxes should contain at most 50 words stating the current knowledge on the topic of your article according to previous studies (what’s known), and the novel points/results your article adds to the literature (what’s new).

 

Abstract should be structured for original articles providing the background/objective of the study, methods, results, and conclusion. It should be about 250-300 words altogether. Number this page as page 1.

Abstracts of other types of contributions should be non-structured providing the essential information.

When abstracting a review article, a concise summary of the salient points should be addressed.

Preferably, abbreviations should not be mentioned in the abstract.

Keywords are used for indexing purposes; each article should provide three to five keywords selected from the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH).

 

Introduction should contain a short background of previous studies and possible gaps in the literature, and specify the purpose and objective of the study or observation.

 

Methods section must indicate clearly the steps taken to acquire the data. Be sure that it includes only information that was available at the time the plan or protocol for the study was written. It should be detailed (including: controls, inclusion and exclusion criteria, etc) and may be separated into subsections. Repeating the details of standard techniques is best avoided. Authors who used AI technology to conduct the study should describe its use in the methods section in sufficient detail to enable replication of the approach, including the tool used, version, and prompts where applicable.

For reports of randomized controlled trials, authors should refer to the CONSORT statement (http://www.consort-statement .org/).

Reporting guidelines such as STROBE, STARD, and PRISMA would help you report high quality research and to provide all required information and evidence for related methodology Authors are encouraged to refer to the SAGER guidelines for reporting of sex and gender information in study design, data analyses, results, and interpretation of findings: www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/sager-guidelines/.

EQUATOR Network website would help you in using these guidelines.

 

The software used for statistical analyses and description of the actual method should be mentioned.

 

Results should be presented in a chronological sequence in the text, table, and illustration. Organize the results according to their importance. They should be based on your own findings.

 

Tables and illustrations must be cited in order which they appear in the text, using Arabic numerals. Tables should be simple and should not duplicate information in the text of the paper. Figures should be provided only if they add further information. For radiographic films, scans, and other diagnostic images, as well as pictures of pathology specimens or photomicrographs, send high resolution figures in JPEG or Bitmap format. Type legends for illustrations on a separate page, and explain the internal scale and identify the method of staining in photomicrographs. Arrows should be put in place for specific sections of the pathology figures and radiographs.

 

Discussion should challenge the findings of the study with other available evidence in the format of arguments and counterarguments. It should emphasize the new and important aspects of the study and the conclusions that follow them. Possible mechanisms or explanations for these findings should be explored. The limitations of the study and the implications of the findings for future research or clinical practice should be explored.

 

Conclusion should state the final result and recommendation that the author(s) has (have) reached. Such results and recommendations should be derived from the researcher’s own study and the results of other studies should not be stated in this section.

 

Supplementary materials such as movie clips, questionnaires, etc may be published on the online version of the Journal.

 

Any technical, general, financial, and material support or contributions that need acknowledging but do not justify authorship, can be cited at the end of the text as Acknowledgment. Use of AI for writing assistance should be reported in the acknowledgment section.

 

References should be complied numerically according to the order of citation in the text in Vancouver style. The numbers of references should preferably not exceed 40 for original articles, 15 for brief, and 10 for case reports. References should optimally be prepared with EndNote software.

For the references credited to more than 6 authors please provide the name of the first six authors and represent the remaining authors by the phrase “et al.” 

For various references please refer to “the NLM style guide for authors, editors, and publishers”. 

Listed below are sample references. Moreover, IJMS has its own EndNote style. Authors are advised to prepare their references based on this style. This style is available at this link.

 

Journal Article:

• Gaydess A, Duysen E, Li Y, Gilman V, Kabanov A, Lockridge O, et al. Visualization of exogenous delivery of nanoformulated butyrylcholinesterase to the central nervous system. Chem Biol Interact. 2010;187:295-8. doi: 10.1016/j.cbi.2010.01.005. PubMed PMID: 20060815; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC2998607.

•     Javan S, Tabesh M. Action of carbon dioxide on pulmonary vasoconstriction. J Appl Physiol. In press 2005

 

Complete Book:

• Guyton AC: Textbook of Medical Physiology. 8th ed. Philadelphia, PA, Saunders, 1996.

 

Chapter in Book:

• Young VR. The role of skeletal muscle in the regulation of protein metabolism. In Munro HN, editor: Mammalian protein metabolism. Vol 4. San Diego; Academic; 1970. p. 585-674.

Not: Referencing AI-generated material as the primary source is not acceptable.

References should be made to published articles rather than to abstracts whenever possible.

Language and Style

All submitted manuscripts must be "spell checked" and "grammar checked." Furthermore, the manuscripts should be written in proper English (American or British usage is acceptable, but not a mixture of both). If the Journal feels the submitted manuscript has major grammatical and spelling errors, the Editor may request the author(s) to improve the English of their work to minimize potential grammatical or spelling errors while still conforming to accurate scientific English standards. Therefore, to continue with the article process, the authors should use/ employ the English Language Editing service and provide a valid certificate.

Concerning manuscripts that are in the acceptance process, if the English language of the manuscript is not of publication quality and requires major improvement, the Editor may request the author(s) to use a professional translation and Editing Service.

All materials should be double-spaced and pages should be numbered. Abbreviations should be standard and used just in necessary cases, after complete explanations in the first usage. The editorial office reserves the right to edit the submitted manuscripts in order to comply with the Journal’s style. In any case, the authors are responsible for the published material.

 

Correction of Errata

The Journal will publish an erratum when a factual error in a published item has been documented.

 

Journal Archiving

To guarantee long-term digital preservation, all articles published in the IJMS are archived in the PubMed Central®, the free digital repository of biomedical and life science scholarly publications at the US National Library of Medicine. 

 

For further information, please contact the Editorial Office

7th Floor, Room No. 703, Iranian Journal of Medical Sciences Office, Vice-Chancellor of Research and Technology, Central Building of Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Zand Blvd., Shiraz, Iran.

P.O. Box: 71348-14336

Tel: 

+98 7132122382

+98 7132122347

+98 7132122742

+98 7132122381

You can contact us on social networks at +98 9164395285

 Email: ijms@sums.ac.ir, ijmsjournal@yahoo.com

LinkedIn: Iranian Journal of Medical Sciences