Open Access Policy

Committed to open research, EnPress Publisher offers scholars open access (OA) to journals. It makes research freely available to the public and supports a greater global exchange of knowledge.

• Higher visibility, availability, and citations – Free and unlimited accessibility of publications over the internet without any restrictions, which increases the citation of articles
• Ease of search – Publications are easily searchable in search engines and indexing databases
• Rapid publication – Accepted papers are immediately published online

Peer Review Process

All manuscripts are subjected to a stringent double-blind peer review process. This is to uphold the high quality of papers published in the journals and ensure that the reporting of research work is truthful and precise.

1. A submitted manuscript is firstly handled by the in-house editor, who will check the manuscript for plagiarism, at which stage the manuscript may be rejected if plagiarism is detected in the manuscript.
2. After the plagiarism check is completed and the result is deemed satisfactory, the in-house editor will pass the manuscript to an academic editor. An academic editor will pre-check the article for the sustainability of the follow-up process, e.g., scientific innovation, consistency with the journal’s field, and completeness of the article. Usually, an academic editor refers to the Editor-in-Chief in the case of a regular submission or a Guest Editor in the case of a special issue submission. An academic editor is not allowed to participate in any review process of submissions that may involve a conflict of interest, and the editorial office will appoint an Editorial Board member with no conflict of interest as a substitute. A submission that passes the pre-check stage will be forwarded to the associate editor for the assignment of peer reviewers.
3. A minimum of 2 reviewers will be selected according to their expertise and suitability on the subject matter of the manuscript. Reviewers should return their comments and recommendations (Accept,Revisions Required, Resubmit for Review, or Reject) to the associate editor.
4. Upon recommendations by the reviewers, the Editor-in-Chief will make a final decision on the paper and the managing editor will inform the authors of the decision, adding comments for the authors for improvements of their research or paper.
   • If the decision is to Accept Submission(no amendments required by authors), the manuscript will be sent to the production stage.
   • If the Editor-in-Chief suggests Revisions Required (minor revisions), authors are given a maximum of 2 weeks to revise and resubmit the article.
   • If the Editor-in-Chief suggests Resubmit for Review (major revisions), authors are given a maximum of 4 weeks to revise and resubmit the article for the second round of review.
   • If the decision is to Reject Submission, the authors will be notified, and the rejected manuscript will be archived and the peer review process ends.
5. An accepted paper will be sent for copy editing, layout editing, and proofreading before publication. Correspondence between the authors and editors will be required at this stage in order to improve the language and/or look of the manuscript. After the production stage is completed, authors are required to check the PDF file of the final version before the article is published. EnPress Publisher will register a DOI for the article after publication, and the article is immediately accessible to the public.
6. Authors may appeal for a rejected submission. Appeal requests must be made by writing an email to the editorial office of the corresponding journal with detailed reasons for the appeal and point-by-point responses to the reviewers’ remarks. Decisions on appeals are final and no further consideration will be made.

Note: Authors can recommend reviewers (relevant information should be given, e.g., name, personal link, email address, etc.). The editorial office decides whether to invite the recommended reviewers. Authors also have the right to provide an avoidance list.

 

 

Authorship

The authorship of a scholarly paper should be limited to individuals who have contributed substantially to its intellectual content. Participation solely in the acquisition of funding or general supervision of the research group is not sufficient for authorship. All authors should hold the responsibility of fairly evaluating their respective roles and their co-authors’ roles in the project. This is to ensure that authorship is attributed according to a fixed standard in all publications for which they will be listed as authors. First authors are required to indicate to the Editorial Board the specific contributions of co-authors at the manuscript submission stage.

In order to be listed as an author for a paper, one should have contributed sufficiently to the project. A co-author is expected to have contributed to some component of the work that led to the paper or be involved in the interpretation of its results. All authors should have a say in the final approval of the version to be published, in addition to reviewing the final manuscript prior to submission.

Individuals who do not meet the above requirements, but have provided a valuable contribution to the work, may be acknowledged for their contribution as appropriate to the publication.

Changes to Authorship

Authors should carefully check the list and order of authors before submitting their manuscript. The editorial office considers the authorship list to be definitive by the time the original submission is received.

Any addition, deletion, or rearrangement of author names in the authorship list should be made before the manuscript is accepted for publication. The corresponding author should provide the reasons for the change in the authorship list and proof of written confirmation to the editorial office from all authors (including existing authors and author(s) to be added and/or removed) agreeing with such change.

A request for authorship changes needs to be approved by the editorial office before any changes can be made.

 

Conflict of Interest

Conflicts of interest may exist when professional judgments concerning a primary interest have the possibility of being influenced by a secondary interest (e.g., financial gains). It is to be noted that even perceptions of conflicts of interest are as important as actual conflicts of interest.

Any agreements with study sponsors (for-profit or non-profit), such as those that interfere with the authors’ access to the study data or with the authors’ ability to analyze or interpret the data and publish the manuscript independently according to their own decision, should be avoided by authors at all costs.

A declaration of interest for all authors should be received before an article can be reviewed and accepted for publication.

• For authors:

While submitting an article, authors must list all competing interests relevant to this work, including but not limited to:

• Funding sources
• The role of sponsors in the work design, data collection, and results of the analysis.
• Whether any of the authors serves on the Editorial Board of the journal that they are submitting their article to.

• For editors and reviewers:

Editors and reviewers must declare any possible conflict of interests in connection with the manuscript and, if necessary, they must withdraw from the peer review process. If authors submit an article to a journal of which they serve as Editorial Board members, the editorial office will insist that the authors are recused from the peer review process.

Common reasons for editors and reviewers to be replaced include but are not limited to:

• The editor or reviewer works at the same organization as the authors.
• The editor or reviewer is one of the authors of the work.
• The editor or reviewer is on the avoidance list from the authors.
• The editor or reviewer has a financial or personal relationship with the authors.

 

Publishing Ethics

EnPress Publisher requests all members involved in the journal publishing process to adhere to the Core Practices on publication ethics as stipulated by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

EnPress Publisher strictly adheres to the COPE’s Ethical Oversight Policy and monitors the entire publication process in accordance with the guidelines and best practices, which include Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals from the International Committee of Medical Journals Editors (ICMJE) and the Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA), and World Association of Medical Editors (WAME). The publisher treats all personal information of authors as private and promises to not disclose the information to third parties except as required by law or for necessary purposes of the publishing process. EnPress Publisher promises to oversee the procedures and behavior of authors, editors, and reviewers and to ensure that all participants are without any conflicts of interest for a publication process that is fair and objective. Authors of research works involving humans must provide the ethical approval code or identifiers from the academic ethics committee, and authors should obtain the Informed Consent Statement from the subjects about the publication’s purpose and the consequential impact. If the subjects are vulnerable, informed consent should be obtained from their guardian. For more details on EnPress Publisher’s policies regarding research works involving humans and animals, please refer to “Research involving humans” and “Research involving animals”.

The publisher’s journal editors take all possible misconducts seriously. The editors, authors, or readers can forward their concerns to the publisher if a research work may involve academic fraud, research misconduct, or publication malpractice. Concerns or complaints submitted to the publisher on possible allegations will be dealt with promptly and appropriately according to the procedure set out in the COPE flowchart on complaints. The complainant may direct all inquiries and correspondence to the publisher at editorial@enpress-publisher.com.

EnPress Publisher adopts a zero-tolerance policy concerning any academic misconducts and ethical violations in research and publication regardless of the severity of these issues. Violations include plagiarism, falsification of research, data fabrication, submitting manuscripts of others as one’s own, submission of the same manuscript to different publication venues at the same time, and breached intellectual property rights. In cases of suspected misconduct and ethical violation, a panel will be formed to investigate the allegation. If the allegation is supported by evidence, the submitted manuscript in question will be declined for consideration in the journal and all authors will be informed of the decision. A retraction initiated by authors or by the journal is required to take place if the paper has already been published, and the retraction will be made public. Authors of the work in question will receive the panel’s decision via email and all appeals regarding the decision will have to be made to the publisher via email to editorial@enpress-publisher.com within 30 days of the decision date.

Research Involving Humans

If human subjects were used in the experiment, authors should identify during the submitting process the committee or organization (e.g., author’s Institutional Ethics Review Board) that approved the experiment as well as detailed ethical approval information, such as approval identifiers, i.e., reference numbers. EnPress Publisher’s journals require that authors provide proof of research ethics or ethics statement along with the submission. In the case that ethical approval identifiers are not available, written approval from the granting committee or organization must be provided as a confidential supplemental file.

The manuscript should confirm that the experiment was carried out in adherence to the ethical principles set out in the WMA Declaration of Helsinki and that informed consent was obtained from all human subjects.

For an investigation undertaken on human subjects, the manner in which informed consent was obtained from the study participants should be stated clearly as well.

Authors should inform study participants of the purpose(s) of the publication, the possible risks and benefits as a result of the experiment, and the patient's right to withhold or withdraw consent. Consent should be obtained from parent(s) or legal guardian(s) if the study participant is a minor.

Authors are obliged to declare and clearly specify any restrictions on the availability or the use of human data in the manuscript.

Researcg Involving Animals

The procedures of research involving animals, including insects and husbandry, must be carried out in accordance with national and institutional regulations. For further guidance on experiments involving animals, authors can refer to the Code of Practice for the Housing and Care of Animals Used in Scientific Procedures, Three Rs, The Scientific Basis for Regulation of Animal Care and Use, and EU regulations on animal research. If ethical approval is not required by national laws, authors should provide an exemption from the ethics committee if one is available.

EnPress Publisher endorses ARRIVE guidelines for reporting experiments using live animals. Authors and reviewers can use the ARRIVE Essential 10: Compliance Questionnaire as a checklist. Editors reserve the right to reject submissions based on ethics guidelines or animal welfare concerns.

 

Advertising Policy

All advertisements are subject to approval by EnPress Publisher. Advertisements must comply with relevant regulations in the country where the advertisements appear. Advertisements must not influence the content of each journal and the making of editorial decisions. For more inquiries, please send an email to editorial@enpress-publisher.com.

 

Misconduct Policy

• Duplicate Submission

Manuscripts submitted to EnPress Publisher should:

1) not have been published before

2) not concurrently be submitted elsewhere

If a part of a manuscript has been published or will be published elsewhere, authors must inform the editors in a cover letter. If a duplicate submission is detected during peer review, the manuscript may be rejected. If it is detected after publication, the manuscript may be retracted.

• Plagiarism

Authors are advised to observe high standards in the aspect of publication ethics. Plagiarism is a strictly unacceptable practice in journals published by EnPress Publisher, including duplicate publication of the author’s work without proper citation.

Every manuscript submitted for publication is checked for plagiarism via Crossref Similarity Check (powered by iThenticate) after submission and before being sent to the editor for editorial review. Any detection of overlapping and similar texts in the manuscripts submitted will be investigated promptly and may lead to the manuscript being rejected.

• Fabrication and Falsification

Fabrication involves manipulating the data or analysis to match the desired results. Falsification involves making up data and results without any research work in fact. Fabrication and falsification are both misconducts, and they can result in an unscientific record that does not reflect scientific truth. Fabrication and falsification are serious academic fraudulent behaviors, and they may have a negative impact on the authors’ affiliate, funding sponsor, and employers. EnPress Publisher will not hesitate to reject manuscripts with suspicion of academic fraud.

 

Erratum, Withdrawal, and Retraction Policy

• Erratum

All publisher-introduced changes are highlighted to authors at the proof stage and any errors are ideally identified by authors and corrected by the publisher before the final publication. For any errors in published articles discovered by readers, authors, editors, et al., please contact the journal editor.

It should be noted that errors made by editors are called erratum, and errors made by authors are called corrigendum. However, erratum and corrigendum have no influence on the research logic and the correctness of the results.

EnPress Publisher will only issue an erratum or corrigendum for a published article after receiving approval and instructions from the editor.

• Withdrawal

If authors change their mind and decide not to pursue publication of their paper with the journal, they must write a letter addressed to the journal editors, explaining the reason(s) of the submission withdrawal. Consent of all co-authors must be obtained for author-initiated submission withdrawal. The decision to withdraw a submission will eventually rest with the journal editors, including the Editor-in-Chief.

It is relatively more difficult to withdraw a paper that has been processed for peer review or is undergoing peer review compared with withdrawing a new submission because the editors and reviewers have expended much time and energy in the editorial process and manuscript evaluation, respectively. To withdraw a paper that has been processed for peer review, authors should clearly argue their case on scientific reasons; only valid and sound reasons will be accepted. Authors will also be required to pay a penalty fee (USD200). Authors are advised to keep in mind that an article should only be withdrawn if the authors detect significant errors or flaws, as it is not an acceptable practice to withdraw an article after it has been sent for peer review. Once the approval for submission withdrawal is granted, the submission will be removed from the journal’s online submission system, and a confirmation email of submission withdrawal will be sent to the authors. The withdrawal process is considered to be complete once authors receive the confirmation of withdrawal from the journal’s editorial office.

Submission withdrawal is also possible for accepted papers that have not been formally published, including newly accepted papers and articles in press.

The withdrawal of an accepted paper and article in press is usually editor-initiated. The reasons for withdrawing an accepted paper and article in press are similar to those of retracting a published article (see “Retraction”), and at this stage the article will not be arranged for article production or finalization. A panel will be organized to investigate misconduct allegations. If the allegations are proven true with supporting evidence, the accepted paper or article in press will be marked for withdrawal, and any appeals regarding the panel’s decision will have to be made to the publisher within 14 days of the decision date. In the absence of an appeal from the authors within the 14 days, the submission will be removed from the journal’s online submission system, and a confirmation email of submission withdrawal will be sent to the authors.

• Retraction

Readers can contact the editorial office to report allegations of possible academic misconduct, i.e., ethical violations in research and publication regardless of the severity of these issues. Misconducts and violations include plagiarism, falsification of research, data fabrication, submitting manuscripts of others as one’s own, submission of the same manuscript to different publication venues at the same time, and breached intellectual property rights. Once the suspected misconduct and ethical violation is brought to the attention of the publisher, the journal editors will organize an investigation and authors are required to cooperate in the investigation. A panel will be organized to investigate the allegations. If the allegations are proven true with supporting evidence, the published article will be marked for retraction both in HTML and PDF, and a notification email regarding the panel’s decision will be sent to all authors of the work. Any appeals regarding the panel’s decision will have to be made to the publisher within 14 days of the decision date. In the absence of an appeal from the authors within the 14 days, a confirmation email of article retraction will be sent to the authors.

Authors should note that the paid Article Processing Charges will not be refunded if their article is retracted or withdrawn on the grounds of academic misconduct and ethical violation in research and publication.

 

Copyright and License

Authors shall retain the copyright of their work but allow EnPress Publisher to publish, copy, distribute, and convey the work.

All articles published by EnPress Publisher are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0) or Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0) depending on the journal.

 

Privacy Policy

• Patient Anonymity

Human subjects have a right to privacy that should not be violated without informed consent. Identifying information or patient identifiers, including patient names, initials, date of birth, contacts, medical record numbers, hospital numbers, and geographical location, should not be published in written descriptions, photographs, or pedigrees unless the information is essential for scientific purposes and the patient (or parent or guardian) gives written informed consent for publication. Efforts must be made by authors to at least mask or conceal any identifying information of the patients that appear in writing or in photographs.

Authors are obliged to explain to the patient if revealing the patient’s identity cannot be fully avoided, e.g., an image of an identifiable body part, such as the face, has to be published in the report. The relevant identifying information to be published, e.g., the image, must be shown to the patient, and consent for publication must be obtained for the use of that information in the publication. If the patient has died, then consent should be obtained from the next of kin or a legal representative. Submissions that include identifying patient information without appropriate patient consent will not be considered for publication.

Please refer to ICMJE Privacy and Confidentiality guidelines for more information about patient anonymity and privacy.

• Information Privacy

EnPress Publisher respects and strives to protect the privacy of its users and visitors. Hence, users and visitors are encouraged to read EnPress Publisher’s privacy policy regarding the usage and handling of user information.

(1) User information

Names and email addresses entered in all EnPress Publisher’s journal sites will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of the journals and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party. For submission and peer review, users should register an account for further procedures, including but not limited to name, email, address, interests, affiliation, and postcode, as editors need the information to complete in-house processes (e.g., processing a manuscript).

When users visit the publisher's website, information about the visit is saved in web logs (e.g., device, IP address, time of visit, etc.), which are only used to help improve the structure and content of the website.

(2) User rights

Users have the right to register or update their personal information and contact the publisher to cancel/delete their account if required.

(3) Third-party link

EnPress Publisher is not responsible for private information obtained by third-party websites when users log in via a pop-up screen from third-party software installed on their computer.

When users visit third-party platforms (e.g., LinkedIn, Twitter, COPE, etc.) through hyperlinks from EnPress Publisher’s journal websites, the privacy policy follows the policies of the third-party platforms.

(4) Queries or contact

For any queries about EnPress Publisher’s privacy policy, please contact the editorial office at editorial@enpress-publisher.com.

 

Preprint Policy

Authors are permitted to post their non-peer-reviewed original research manuscripts on community preprint servers, such as bioRxiv, medRxiv, and PeerJ Preprint, before or in parallel with the formal submission to EnPress Publisher’s journals. During submission, authors are obliged to declare in the cover letter if the corresponding preprint version of their submission has been deposited on a preprint server and provide any associated accession numbers or DOIs.

Nonetheless, authors are not allowed to post on a preprint server any versions of articles that have been revised as a result of peer review, accepted for publication, or published in the journal. A manuscript of which its corresponding preprint version has been indexed (e.g., in MEDLINE or PubMed) will not be considered.

This policy applies to original research papers only. EnPress Publisher reserves the right not to consider for publication or publish material that has been formally published in digital media that are not construed as preprint servers.

EnPress Publisher encourages a formal citation of preprints in the reference list, where appropriate.

 

Disclaimer

• For authors: Once authors submit a manuscript, this means that authors are aware of all publishing policies & ethics and will strictly abide by them.
• For reviewers: Once  the request to become a reviewer is accepted, this means that the reviewer must be aware of EnPress Publisher’s peer review policies and that the reviewer will proactively disclose all potential conflicts of interest and guarantee that the article will be judged fairly and objectively. 
• For publisher: The journals of EnPress Publisher are not liable to statements, perspectives, and opinions contained in the published articles. The appearance of advertisements in the journals shall not be construed as a warranty, endorsement, or approval of the products or services advertised and/or the safety thereof. The journals of EnPress Publisher and the publisher disclaim responsibility for any injury to persons or property resulting from any ideas or products referred to in the articles or advertisements.

 

Article Processing Charge Policy

EnPress Publisher publishes all its journals in “gold” open access format. The scientific community and the general public are free of all restrictions on access (e.g., subscription) and free of many restrictions on using the content as soon as articles are published online. EnPress Publisher does not require readers to purchase any form of subscription to view the online version of the journals. In order for EnPress Publisher to defray editorial and production costs, authors of accepted articles are required to pay Article Processing Charges (APCs). The charges will come from authors' institutes or research funding bodies.

 

Waiver Policy

EnPress Publisher is committed to promoting academic development in the world without any financial barrier to knowledge sharing and learning. A waiver policy has been developed especially for authors from low-income countries. Authors who are interested in applying for a waiver may contact the editorial office of the corresponding journal. EnPress Publisher reserves the right to approve or reject any waiver application. APC waivers do not influence editorial decisions.