The further ethics principles and statements for Journal «Family medicine. European practices» are based on the COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) Core practices, guidance and the policies journals and publishers need, to reach the highest standards in publication ethics.

The Journal has a policy related to ethical issues such as authorship, author responsibilities, plagiarism, fabrication, duplicate publication, confidentiality etc. The policy is summarized below.

PUBLICATION AND AUTHORSHIP

The Journal accepts for publication original articles, reviews, scientific reports not previously published in scientific journals.

List of references is an obligatory part of a manuscript submitted to the Journal. All citations that appear in a manuscript must be reported in References. Other sources and issues of similar matter must be reported as Other sources below the References.

If research reported in a manuscript submitted to the Journal was supported by a funding agency, University, Government or other institution, financial support must be stated in the manuscript, typically in Acknowledgements. The authors are requested to identify who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the manuscript and to briefly describe the role of funding institution(s) and/or sponsor(s), if any, in study design.

Submission of a manuscript to the Journal is taken by the Journal to mean that all listed authors have agreed to all of the contents. The corresponding author (the submitting one) is responsible for ensuring that such agreement has been reached, and for managing all communication between the Journal and all co-authors, before and after the publication.

PLAGIARISM

Plagiarism is not tolerated in the manuscripts submitted to the Journal «Family medicine. European practices». Plagiarism is an act of fraud. It involves both stealing someone else's work and lying about it afterward when parts of text of other authors are cut-and-pasted into a manuscript without proper citation. Simply acknowledging that certain material has been borrowed and providing the audience with the information necessary to find that source is usually enough to prevent plagiarism. Duplicate publication, sometimes called self-plagiarism, occurs when an author reuses substantial parts of his or her own published work without providing the references. The Journal editors judge any case in which they become aware (either by their own knowledge or when alerted by reviewers) and inform the Editorial Board about that. Submitted articles may be checked with duplication-checking software AntiPlagiarism.NET. Manuscripts showing signs of plagiarism may be rejected from the editorial work and sent back to the corresponding author.

No fraudulent data will be accepted for publication in the Journal.

AUTHOR'S RESPONSIBILITIES

Corresponding authors of a manuscript submitted to the Journal are welcome to suggest suitable independent reviewers when they submit their manuscripts, but these suggestions may not be followed by the Journal.

The corresponding author has to state that all data in the manuscript are real and authentic.

The corresponding author is obliged to check that all authors have significantly contributed to the research reported in a manuscript submitted to Journal.

The corresponding author is obliged to participate in the peer review process and apply the requirements made by the reviewers in order to have their article published.

All authors of a manuscript submitted to Journal are obliged to provide retractions or corrections of mistakes.

All communication between corresponding author and Editor is confidential. Authors must also treat communication with the Journal as confidential. The author´s correspondence with the Journal, reviewers' reports and other confidential material must not be posted on any website or otherwise publicly announced without prior permission from the editors. Authors of published material have a responsibility to inform the Journal Editorial Board promptly if they become aware of any part that requires correcting and prove the consent about this by a signed agreement by all authors.

All authors are requested to disclose any actual or potential conflict of interest including any financial, personal or other relationships with other people or organizations within two years of beginning the submitted work that could inappropriately influence, or be perceived to influence, their work. Each submitted paper should be accompanied by a Conflict of Interest Disclosure Statement signed and scanned. For guidance on conflict of interest statements, please see the ICMJE recommendations. (http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/author-responsibilities--conflicts-of-interest.html)

RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE REVIEWERS

Reviews of manuscripts submitted to the Journal should be conducted objectively according to scientific standards. Reviewers should express their views clearly with appropriate supporting arguments. Reviewers should report their comments, suggestions, as well as weak points clearly in a special letter to the Editor and Corresponding author. The reviewer uses only proper and appropriate language and explanations in relation to the articles, avoiding any personal remarks.

Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. Privileged information of any kind obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage of the reviewer. Reviewers should not consider evaluating manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest.

Any reviewer who has been invited to review the manuscript but feels unqualified to do so or to do so in a reasonable time limit should immediately notify the editor.

Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors.

EDITOR RESPONSIBILITIES

The editors have complete responsibility and authority to reject/accept a manuscript submitted to the Journal. They should have no conflict of interest with respect to the articles they reject/accept.

The editor evaluates the intellectual content of manuscripts regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, origin, nationality, and/or political preferences of the authors.

The editors have a responsibility to inform the corresponding author about the reviewer's opinion as well as Editorial judgement of the manuscript submitted to the Journal and revised manuscript to the reviewer, if he/she is willing to re-evaluate the manuscript. The Editor preserves anonymity of a reviewer.

After acceptance, a proof is sent to the corresponding author, who also deals with the journal on behalf of co-authors. The corresponding author is a person responsible for the accuracy of all content in the proof, in particular that names of co-authors are present and correctly spelled, and that addresses and affiliations are up to date.

When substantial errors are found in a paper, the Editor promotes publication of correction or retraction.

OTHER PUBLISHING ETHICS ISSUES

To handle all sets of publishing ethical issues, the Journal «Family medicine. European practices» follows rules and standards of expected ethical behavior for all parties involved in the act of publishing: the author, the journal editor, the peer reviewer, the publisher and others. The Editor of the Journal uses an online resource The Publishing Ethics Resource Kit (PERK) to handle publishing ethics issues: (http://www.elsevier.com/editors/perk).