Ethical Guidelines for Reviewers

Reviewer must give objective valuation of the article compliance with the high literary and scientific standards.

If personal or professional ties between author and reviewer can make influence on review, reviewer should abstain from making the review.

If reviewer has a feeling that his is not qualified to make appropriate judgment on the study, the article should be immediately returned to the editors.

Reviewer should take into consideration possible conflict of interest, if own reviewer’s article on related topics is going to be or has been published. It is better to abstain from reviewing in this case. As an option, a detailed commentary on the article can be written and possible conflict of interest should be noted, this commentary can be sent to the author by the editors.

Intellectual independence of the authors should be respected.

Reviewer should respect confidentiality and handle the manuscript as a confidential document. The manuscript should not be shown to other persons or be discussed with, the only exception is special cases when consultation is needed; in this case, the names of colleagues, to whom reviewer turned for advice, should be given to the editor.

No unpublished information, arguments or interpretations contained in the manuscript can be disclosed without author’s permission.

Reviewer should explain and argue their opinions, for the basis of the comments should be clear to authors and editors. The statement that observation, conclusions or argument has been previously published, should be confirmed by an appropriate reference. Unjustified statements of reviewer (or refutation of author’s statements) should be avoided.

Reviewer should note any cases of insufficient citation of other scientists’ works directly related to the article, but it must be taken into account that complaints about the lack of citation of reviewer’s own works can be considered as biased. Reviewer should notify the editor of any substantial similarity between the manuscript and any other already published article.

Reviewer should act promptly and shall submit a review. If the reviewer cannot give a review in a short time, he should notify the editor or return the manuscript to the editor immediately.