The Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics, the official journal of the Philippine Orthopaedic Association, Inc. is an open-access, English language, web-based, medical science journal published by the Association.  The operations of the Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics are guided by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) “Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals.”

 

FOCUS AND SCOPE

The Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics shall advance the art and science of orthopaedics in the country by publishing high-quality original clinical investigations, epidemiological studies, case reports, review articles, evaluations of diagnostic and surgical techniques, and the latest updates on management guidelines. The journal’s target audience is local and international practitioners, clinicians, and other scientists, researchers.  It shall accept manuscript submissions from consultants, fellows, residents, and other allied medical professions and specialties, not only from the Philippines but also from Asia and the rest of the world as long as these are within scope and relevant to the practice. Non-members of the Association may submit scientific manuscripts to the journal. 

EDITORIAL PROCESS

Submissions that have passed initial check for general manuscript requirements shall be screened by the Editor if these shall proceed to peer review.  The Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics implements a double-blind peer review policy, after which the Editor-in-Chief shall make the final decision on articles to be published.  Additional reviews by subject matter experts and other relevant disciplines (such as imaging, diagnostics, and statistics) may also be invited.

For manuscripts that undergo peer review, authors can expect an initial decision within sixty (60) days or less.  When the final decision will take longer, the Editorial Coordinator shall update the authors. Editorial decisions may be one of the following: (1) Acceptance without further revision, (2) Acceptance with minor revisions required, (3) Acceptance with major revisions required, or (4) Manuscript rejection. All accepted manuscripts are subject to formatting and edits to conform with the journal’s style guide and branding.

EDITORIAL INDEPENDENCE

The Editorial Board of the Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics is responsible for all editorial decisions on the journal’s scientific content.  Its editorial decisions are independent of financial, commercial, and other competing interests, and shall be based on: (1) scientific rigor, and (2) internationally accepted scholarly publication standards  

PUBLICATION FREQUENCY

The Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics is published by the Philippine Orthopaedic Association two times a year (June and December).

OPEN ACCESS POLICY

The Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics believes in making scientific data available and accessible to all.  It is 100% open access and shall not charge author processing fees, or other fees for subscribing and downloading of its contents. 

COPYRIGHT AND CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSE

The authors shall keep copyright and intellectual rights for the journal article published and shall grant publishing rights to the journal through a Creative Commons License.  The Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0) which allows sharing, copying, and redistributing the material in any medium or format, under strict terms of giving appropriate credit to the authors and this journal.

ARCHIVES

All published content in The Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics are deposited into the PKP Preservation Network.

PUBLICATION ETHICS

Editor and Reviewer obligations

All editors and reviewers are bound by confidentiality and non-disclosure of all manuscripts undergoing review and deliberation, and are also obliged to declare any conflicts of interest with any of the authors, companies, or institutions associated with the submitted manuscripts, in order to keep the editorial process objective and unbiased.  If there are conflicts of interest, the editors and/or reviewers should excuse themselves from the editorial process. The Editorial Board shall be guided accordingly by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines when dealing with publication ethics and malpractice issues.  

Author obligations
All authors shall be required to accomplish and submit the Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics Author Form which includes certification of fulfillment of authorship criteria for all authors listed, author publishing agreement, and declaration of conformity to ethical standards for experiments on human/animal subjects and approval by the appropriate ethics committee.  For case reports/case series, the authors shall submit the written/informed consent for publication from the involved patient/subject.  In case the involved subject/s and/or relative/guardian can no longer be contacted after all means have been undertaken by the author, the author should state so in his declaration. 

All authors should ensure that they have written and submitted original work. When the authors use or reference other materials, sources should be cited appropriately following the journal’s instructions.  Authors should not submit the same manuscript concurrently to more than one journal.  Plagiarized works and duplicate submissions shall be promptly rejected.    

All contents in the manuscript, such as photographs, images, figures, diagrams, tables, or other proprietary items that are not owned or co-created by the authors shall be declared to be in the public domain/open access. Otherwise, authors should secure from the owner of the content a written permission to use and publish them in the Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics. 

WITHDRAWAL OF SUBMISSIONS

Submitted manuscripts may be withdrawn by the author at any time prior to publication but only upon the formal written request of the author addressed to the Editor-in-Chief stating the reason for the withdrawal. 

RETRACTIONS

Retraction is obligatory in two (2) instances: (1) when there is a need to correct critical scientific or technical errors in the original published article; and (2) when there are violations of publication ethics, such as multiple submissions, plagiarism, falsification of data, which are detected after publication. Critical errors refer to those which invalidate the article’s results and conclusions. 

A Retraction Notice signed by all authors shall be published in the subsequent issue. The article shall remain in the database and published issue but a notation shall be conspicuously placed indicating that the article has been retracted. Each page of the retracted article shall be edited to bear the watermark: “RETRACTED” and replace the original version uploaded in the online platform.        

CORRECTIONS

Errors that do not change or invalidate the article’s results and conclusions (spelling, labeling, numbering, formatting) shall undergo correction. If there are items for correction in a published manuscript, the authors shall submit a formal letter to the Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics. 

A Correction notice/Erratum shall be published in the subsequent issue of the journal. The notice shall include details of the changes from the original version and the dates on which the changes were made. All prior versions of the article shall be archived by the Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics with a notation that there is a corrected version. All citations shall be ascribed to the corrected version.

APPEALS, COMPLAINTS AND DISPUTES

All appeals, complaints or disputes regarding editorial decisions should be communicated formally to the Editor-in-Chief.  The editorial board shall be guided accordingly by the ICMJE as well as guidelines set forth by the Committee on Publication Ethics in dealing with these issues.

DISCLAIMERS

All statements and opinions expressed in the articles and communications herein are those of the author/s and not necessarily those of the editor/s or the publisher. The editors of Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics and the Philippine Orthopaedic Association assume no responsibility for any injury and/or damage to persons or property arising from use or operation of any methodologies, commodities, diagnostics, or medical products cited or discussed in any article published.  

ADVERTISEMENTS AND PROMOTIONS

The Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics shall accept advertisements and promotions for a standardized fee to support its operations.  It reserves the right to approve or decline for publication all advertisements submitted, to modify advertisements submitted to bring them in conformity with the journal's style, to conspicuously place the term "Advertisement" on the submitted material, and to update its advertisement rates at any time. All payment should be made within thirty (30) days on the date of invoice to the Philippine Orthopaedic Association. All advertising inquiries may be addressed to: The Editor-in-Chief, Philippine Journal of Orthopaedics.