Publication Ethics and Best Practices

Life Sciences, Medicine and Biomedicine is committed to publishing reliable, accurate, and honest science. It is the responsibility of the publisher, the journal and the stakeholders, including the editors, authors and reviewers to uphold and build the confidence in the literature we publish. The journal adopts guidelines and procedures detailed by ICMJE and the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) as the core of our publication ethics and best practices policies.

As part of our commitment to the greater scientific community:

Life Sciences, Medicine and Biomedicine conforms, and adapts valuable resources from the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors.

You may view the recent publication by ICMJE here. LSMB’s official listing on ICMJE site can be found here LSMB in ICMJE. Authors are encouraged to read and comply with the following guidelines extracted and adopted from the ICMJE’s recommendations in addition to the Author’s Guide of the journal.

Ethics Approval

Authors will need to confirm during manuscript submission that appropriate approvals for research conducted involving human or animal subjects from the authorized local, regional or national institutions or agencies have been obtained. All research involving human research must be in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration. For experiments involving animals, authors must show that the necessary approvals from the institutional or national committees have been obtained including indication that the accepted standards and guidance are used in the research.

Authorship

The recommendations are meant to ensure that individuals who have made extensive intellectual contributions to a paper are given credit as authors. It is also important that the authors fully understand that being part of the paper’s authorship also means that they take full responsibility of what is being published and are accountable for it. Authors are also responsible for any corrections and retractions during anytime of the peer review process, including post-publication. Authors are also reminded that submitting for peer review and publication of the same data in more than one journal is strictly prohibited.

Contributorship Policy

Starting from 1 July 2021, newly submitted manuscripts and publications will be required to state the contributions of each person named in in the study.

The criteria adopted that can be used by authors during submission are as follows: 

• 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
• Other contributions can include research management, funding acquisition and student supervision and actively participating in the final approval of the manuscript; AND
• Agree 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 well addressed.

The journal welcomes and encourages collaboration and co-authorship. It is the collective responsibility of the authors that all authors who meet the general guidelines are included in the authorship list. The journal or the editor does not decide or recommend authorship or arbitrate authorship conflicts, but leave it to the discretion of the authors or their respective institutions to facilitate this.

 

Addition or removal of author(s)

 

While this is not encouraged, any application for the addition or removal of author(s) after manuscript submission must be submitted to the editor with supporting justification, evidence and signed by all the listed authors, including from the author (s) to be added or removed.

 

Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest

 

The journal has made in mandatory for authors to provide a disclosure statement at the end of the manuscript and declare any possible conflicts of interests in the study. The disclosures will assist readers to derive their own judgments regarding whether an author’s relationships and activities are pertinent and whether it may or may not introduce bias to the overall study.

 

It is also mandatory for peer reviewers to declare any potential conflicts of interests and decline the review invitation during peer review. The same applies to editors and editorial office staffs, and when a potential conflict is disclosed, the respective individuals must be recused. To know more, please refer to the ICMJE’s recommendations on Diclosure and Conflicts of Interest.

 

Confidentiality

Manuscripts submitted to the journal are confidential documents and will be processed in accordance to the policies of the journal, including for peer review. Peer review guidelines require reviewers to keep manuscripts, all supplementary files and additional information strictly confidential. Information and materials are shared between the authors and the editor. As the policy of the journal is to blind authors to the identity of the reviewers, the reviewers’ identity will not be revealed to the author or to any other individuals.

 

Malpractice Policies

Scientific Misconduct: Scientific misconduct or malpractice includes data fabrication, data falsification, deceptive manipulation of images, purposeful failure to disclose relationships and activities and plagiarism. As mentioned above, authors are once again reminded that submitting for peer review and publication of the same data in more than one journal is strictly prohibited.

Plagiarism: Authors are also reminded that the journal gives considerable attention to the authenticity of the submitted manuscripts. Plagiarism is a serious scientific misconduct. The journal uses plagiarism softwares where necessary.

Starting 1 July 2021, all manuscripts submitted to Life Sciences, Medicine and Biomedicine will be processed using Crossref Similarity Check provided by iThenticate. 

Authors may find the report uploaded in the author’s dashboard after the initial checks by the editorial office. The editors may also request for additional information from authors during any stage of submission, review or proofreading, and even post-publication if there are any concerns of plagiarism. 

Copyright Infringement: Authors are also reminded not to include any images, resources or content in any form that will infringe the intellectual property rights, trademarks and copyrights of any individual, companies, institutions and/or organizations.

The Process: The journal adopts procedures detailed by ICMJE and the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines to handle scientific misconduct.

When a misconduct is reported or found, a committee comprising of the Editor in Chief and the Senior Editors, guided by the process and procedures provided by ICMJE and COPE, and after detailed investigations and careful considerations will initiate a number of actions. These include requesting for responses and comments from the author(s), may include informing the authors' institutions, notify readers where necessary and if needed publish a correction or a retraction of the article. Every care will be taken to ensure the process is conducted fairly and systematically based on guidelines of Life Sciences, Medicine and Biomedicine, ICMJE and COPE.

Life Sciences, Medicine and Biomedicine strongly encourage authors to browse through the complete list of Recommendations on Best Practices and Ethical Standards of ICMJE at the following link: ICMJE