Peer Review Policy

Last change 1/1/2025

Peer Review Policy

The Review Process

The peer review process at the Pakistan Armed Forces Medical Journal (PAFMJ) is explicit and sufficiently detailed to ensure transparency, fairness, and objectivity in the evaluation of submitted manuscripts. The journal follows a double-blind peer review process.

Guidelines: The initial assessment of the selected manuscript is subjected to peer review by two external peer reviewers belonging to the subject specialty as identified by the editorial team. The editorial team then makes a decision based on the reviewers' suggestions, from among the following possibilities:

• Accept after editorial revisions--inviting the authors to revise their manuscripts and address specific concerns before a final decision is reached.
• Reject, but indicate to the authors that further work might justify a resubmission.
• Reject outright, typically on grounds of lack of novelty, insufficient conceptual advance or major technical and/or interpretational problems.

Reviewers are welcome to recommend a particular course of action; however, the editors may have to make a decision based on the conflicting advice from time to time. Editorial decisions are not a matter of counting votes or numerical rank assessments, and the majority recommendation is not always followed. The strength of the arguments raised by each reviewer and by the authors is evaluated by the editors, and it is ensured that the information is not disclosed to any party. The editors take reviewers' criticisms seriously; in particular, the technical criticisms are rarely disregarded. In cases where one reviewer alone opposes publication, other reviewers may be consulted as to whether he/she is applying an unduly critical standard. Occasionally additional reviewers are also brought in to resolve disputes, but this is usually avoided unless there is a specific issue, for example a specialist technical point, on which we feel a need for further advice.

These guidelines are available in detail for the authors as well as reviewers.

Selection of Reviewer:Reviewers are matched to the paper according to their expertise from our  constantly updated database.

Reviewer Report: Reviewers are asked to evaluate whether the manuscript is original, methodologically sound, follows appropriate ethical guidelines, has results which are clearly presented and support the conclusions and the references are relevant to the study. Language correction is not part of the peer review process, but reviewers may, if they so wish to, suggest corrections to the manuscript. Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors, any contradictory observation, derivation, or argument should be accompanied by a relevant citation. Reviewers should not consider manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships with any of institutions connected to the unpublished papers. link

Duration of Review Process: The time required for the first round of the review process is dependent on the response of the reviewers. Reviewers should meet the agreed upon deadline (usually 4 - 6 week) for manuscript review and should respond to the reminder if sent any. The manuscript with the editor’s decision is sent to the author with recommendations made by the reviewers, which usually includes verbatim comments by the reviewers. The revised article is then subjected to subsequent rounds of review till it reaches a final correct form finalizing the decision.

Rewarding Reviewers: Acknowledgement and appreciation email along with the online reviewer certificate is sent on completion of the review through online review system.

Names of reviewers are published in the December issue every year.

Editor’s Decision is Final: Reviewers advice the editor, who is responsible for the final decision to accept or reject the article.

Continuous Improvement:

PAFMJ is committed to continuous improvement in its peer review process. Feedback from authors, reviewers, and editorial board members is actively sought and analyzed to enhance the transparency and effectiveness of the peer review system.

This comprehensive Peer Review Policy outlines the key steps, principles, and ethical standards that guide the peer review process at PAFMJ, emphasizing transparency, impartiality, and continuous improvement.