The Current Thoracic Surgery is a current periodical, peer-reviewed and open access official e- journal of the Turkish Society of Thoracic Surgery which its funded and published three times annually. In April, August and December.
The language of the journal is English.
The Current Thoracic Surgery is dedicated to publishing clinical research, clinical analysis, laboratory and experimental studies, editorials, invited current reviews, case reports, interesting images and “How to Do It” papers.
The journal is based on independent and unbiased double-blinded peer-reviewed principles. Only unpublished papers that are not under review for publication elsewhere can be submitted. Current Thoracic Surgery does not accept multiple submission and duplicate submission even though the previous one was published in a different language. The authors are responsible for the scientific content of the material to be published. The Current Thoracic Surgery reserves the right to request any research materials on which the paper is based.
The Current Thoracic Surgery encourages and enables academicians, researchers, specialists to publish their valuable research in branches of general thoracic surgery, thoracic disease and thoracic surgery anesthesia. The primary aim of the journal is to publish original articles with high scientific and ethical quality and serve as a good example of medical publications in the World.
The Editorial Board of the Current Thoracic Surgery and the Publisher adheres to the principles of the International Council of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), the Council of Science Editors (CSE), the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the US National Library of Medicine (NLM), the World Medical Association (WMA), the US Office of Research Integrity (ORI), the European Association of Science Editors (EASE), the International Society of Managing and Technical Editors (ISMTE) and Open Access Scholarly Publishing Association (OASPA).
All articles are available in PDF format on our website (www. http://cts.tgcd.org.tr/) and can be downloaded free of charge.
All articles submitted for publication are strictly reviewed for their
originality,
methodology,
importance,
quality,
ethical nature and,
suitability for the journal
The Current Thoracic Surgery uses a well-constructed scheme for the evaluation process.
The overall rejection rate of the Current Thoracic Surgery is 29%.
The average time during which the preliminary assessment of manuscripts is conducted is 4 days.
The average time during which the reviews of manuscripts are conducted is 41 days.
The average time in which the article is accepted for publication is 59 days.
The entire submission process for a manuscript is completed online through the self-explanatory online submission system.. The reviewers can reach their personal pages from the same address with their own passwords.
Manuscripts that comply with the main rules of the journal are sent to at least two external reviewers, and the reviewers are asked for their opinion about the suitability of the paper for publication. The reviewed manuscripts are then re-reviewed by the Editor in Chief and the Editorial Board and a decision of rejection or acceptance is shaped.
If the reviewers have any potential competing interests, they must notify the editor before agreeing to review a submission.
The Current Thoracic Surgery is committed to the highest standards of research and publication ethics. Editors will act in accordance with the relevant international rules of publication ethics (i.e., COPE guidelines, ICMJE Recommendations, CSE White Paper on Publication Ethics, CSE White Paper on Publication Ethics, WAME resources, WMA policies and ORI) if any ethical misconduct is suspected. The Editorial Board of the Current Thoracic Surgery encourages reviewers to comment on possible research or publication misconduct such as unethical research design, duplication, plagiarism, etc.
Plagiarism is a serious problem and the most common ethical issue afflicting medical writing. Current Thoracic Surgery does not allow any form of plagiarism. In accordance with our journal policy, submitted manuscripts are screened with plagiarism software to detect instances of overlapping and similar text (iThenticate and others) at least two times (during the evaluation process and after acceptance). If the reviewers have any suspect, the editors can provide them information obtained by plagiarism screening tools.
During the peer review process, articles with a similarity rate of more than 20% will be returned to the author with a request that they address the issues through appropriate citation, use of quote marks to identify direct quotes, or re-writing. If the similarity between the manuscripts is too extensive for revision, it may be rejected. Text similarity due to the usage of common terminologies and method related details in ‘Methodology’ part of a manuscript should not raise a serious ethical concern.
An approval of research protocols by an ethics committee in accordance with international agreements (“WMA Declaration of Helsinki - Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects (last updated: October 2013, Fortaleza, Brazil)”, “Guide for the care and use of laboratory animals (8th edition, 2011)” and/or “International Guiding Principles for Biomedical Research Involving Animals (2012)” is required for all research studies. If the submitted manuscript does not include ethics committee approval, it will be reviewed according to COPE's guideline (Guidance for Editors: Research, Audit and Service Evaluations). If the study should have ethical approval, authors will be asked to provide ethical approval. If they cannot provide ethical approval, their manuscript will be rejected and also their institutions and when needed, the related bodies in their country will be informed that such studies must have ethics committee approval. If the study does not need ethics committee approval after the editorial board’s review, the authors will be asked to provide an ethics committee approval or a document given by a related independent committee that indicates the study does not need ethics committee approval according to the research integrity rules in their country. If the authors provide either an approval or a document showing that ethics approval is not needed, the review process will continue. If the authors cannot provide either documents, the manuscript will be rejected. For articles concerning experimental research on humans, a statement should be included that shows informed consent of patients and volunteers was obtained following a detailed explanation of the procedures that they may undergo.
Informed consent must also be obtained for case reports. All recognizable photographs of a patient must be accompanied by written permission from the patient for reproduction. Procedures that were performed to eliminate any pain, harm and distress in subjects/animals should clearly be stated. The authors should clearly state their compliance with internationally accepted guidelines and the guidelines issued by the relevant authority of their country. The journal requests a copy of the Ethics Committee Approval received from the relevant authority.
The Current Thoracic Surgery wants reviewers to treat the manuscripts in confidence. The material of the manuscripts must not be used or shared in any way until they have been published. The Current Thoracic Surgery follows the COPE flowchart in cases of suspected reviewer misconduct. Please refer to COPE ethical guidelines for peer reviewers for "Basic principles to which peer reviewers should adhere" and "Expectations from reviewers"
Our reviewers are expected to check that the art icles comply with the SAGER guidelines and encourage authors to do so. Authors should use the terms sex (biological attribute) and gender (shaped by social and cultural circumstances) carefully in order to avoid confusing both terms. Article titles and/or abstracts should indicate clearly what sex(es) the study applies to. Authors should also describe in the background, whether sex and/or gender differences may be expected; report how sex and/or gender were accounted for in the design of the study; provide disaggregated data by sex and/or gender, where appropriate; and discuss respective results. If a sex and/or gender analysis was not conducted, the rationale should be given in the discussion.
The Current Thoracic Surgery uses bibliographic databases and also accepts authors' suggestions to find new reviewers. The journal thanks to the reviewers and publishes the reviewer list every year in the last issue.
Besides the rutine questions given at the reviewers’ comment page, the reviewers can also use the questions below, when reviewing the manuscripts:
1. Please do state if any conflict(s) of interest is present to review this manuscript.
2. Do you suspect any research or publication misconduct?
3. Does the manuscript contain significant information to justify publication?
4. Is the title of the article appropriate?
5. Does the abstract clearly and accurately describe the content of the article?
6. Is the problem significantly and concisely stated?
7. Are the methods of the study described comprehensively?
8. Is the results section clear and satisfactory?
9. Are the interpretations and conclusions justified by the results?
10. If adequate and current references were given?
11. Is the terminology used in the text appropriate for a medical writing?
12. Are the figure/table lagends satisfactory?
13. Is it necessary to shorten/elongate the article sections?