General obligations and responsibilities of the Editor

The Editor of the journal Acta de Otorrinolaringología & Cirugía de Cabeza y Cuello is committed to satisfy the needs of readers and authors; as well as to work for the journal seeking the quality of the material published, to protect the academic integrity of its content, to not allow commercial interests to compromise the intellectual criteria and to be willing to publish corrections, clarifications, retractions and apologies when necessary.

Responsibilities to readers

Readers should be informed about who has financed the research and about the role of the financial entity in the research; as well as information about the literature reviews (narrative literature review) or analysis of specific topics. This must comply with an adequate collection of information, updated and properly analyzed, on topics of interest to readers.

Responsibilities with the authors

The journal Acta de Otorrinolaringología & Cirugía de Cabeza y Cuello is committed to ensure the quality of the material it publishes, leaving a record of the objectives and standards of the journal, as well as its different sections (research articles or also called original papers, systematic reviews of the literature, meta-analysis, preliminary reports of research papers, systematic reviews of the literature, meta-analysis, etc.), preliminary reports of research papers, editorials, letters to the editor, narrative literature reviews, reflective articles or reflective analysis, case series, case reports, management or clinical practice guidelines, surgical techniques, technological updates and innovations, and photographs whose subject matter is considered relevant and useful by the editorial board. The editor's decisions to accept or reject an article for publication are based solely on the relevance of the work, the methodological quality, its originality and clarity, as well as the relevance of the study in relation to the line with the journal's editorial policy.

The journal includes a description of the processes followed in the peer review of each paper received, and undertakes to record and justify any information required about them. For this purpose, the journal Acta de Otorrinolaringología & Cirugía de Cabeza y Cuello has guidelines for the authors that include everything that is expected of them. These are updated regularly. Authors have the right to request clarification of editorial decisions. The editor will not change his decision in accepting submissions, unless irregularities or extraordinary situations are discovered. Any change in the members of the editorial team will not affect decisions already made except in exceptional cases involving serious circumstances.

Responsibilities to peer reviewers

The journal Acta de Otorrinolaringología & Cirugía de Cabeza y Cuello makes available to peer reviewers a guideline about what they are expected to do in the process. This document will be updated regularly. The identity of the evaluators is protected at all times to ensure their anonymity.

Human and animal rights

The journal Acta de Otorrinolaringología & Cirugía de Cabeza y Cuello requires that all research involving human subjects strictly comply with the Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects established by the World Medical Association in the Declaration of Helsinki in its latest version of 2013. All work submitted for consideration for publication must have the prior approval of a Research Ethics Committee of the Institution or Institutions where the study is performed and in the required cases of having given informed consent to the persons under investigation.

The journal Acta de Otorrinolaringología & Cirugía de Cabeza y Cuello reserves the right to request from the authors the letters of ethical approval of the projects, or in some cases, the consent of the research subjects in which they authorize the publication related to their case.

Studies with patients or volunteers require Ethics Committee approval and informed consent, which should be documented in the article. Appropriate consents, permissions and authorizations should be obtained when an author wishes to include details of the case or other personal information or images of patients and others as appropriate.

Written consents should be retained by the author, but copies should not be provided to the journal. Only if specifically requested by the journal in exceptional circumstances (e.g., if a legal problem arises) should copies of consents or evidence that consents have been obtained be provided.

Reviewed and approved animal studies, as well as the name of the organisms, should be included in the methods section of the article. Authors should adhere to animal research reporting standards, e.g., ARRIVE reporting guidelines for reporting study design and statistical analysis, experimental procedures, experimental animals, and housing.

The names of the patients, their initials or clinical history numbers, or in general data that would allow in certain circumstances their identification, including diagnostic images in which the name or the document or clinical history of the patient frequently appears, should not be mentioned. Research on animals must include the approval of a research or ethics committee.

A signed permission statement should be included for each person identified as a source of information in a personal communication or as a source of unpublished data, and the date of communication and whether the communication was written or oral. Personal communications should not be included in the list of references.

Although the degree of specificity needed will depend on the context of what is being communicated, specific ages, race/ethnicity, and other demographic or other details should be presented only if they are clinically or scientifically relevant and important.

Cropping of photographs to remove identifiable personal features that are not essential to the clinical message may be permitted as long as the photographs are modified using masks of the patients; as well as publishing photographs where physical features of the patients are displayed, as long as they authorize the use of the photographs.

Registration of Prospective Clinical Studies

The journal Acta de Otorrinolaringología & Cirugía de Cabeza y Cuello adheres to the policies of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the ICMJE on the registration of clinical studies. Any publication that prospectively evaluates interventions in humans, to be considered for publication in the journal, must show registration of the research protocol prior to the start of patient recruitment, in any of the international registry systems accepted for clinical studies by the WHO and ICMJE. Authors must specify the registration site of the project.

Experiments with animals

For animal studies, authors should be guided by the principles established in the document "International Guiding Principles for Biomedical Research Involving Animals" of the Council for International Organization of Medical Sciences (CIOMS), a joint organization of WHO and UNESCO. For research conducted in Colombia, it must comply with Resolution No. 008430 of October 4, 1993 of the Ministry of Health, which establishes the Scientific, Technical and Administrative Norms for Health Research, Title V of which explicitly refers to Biomedical Research Involving Animals and Law 84 of 1989, which adopts the National Statute for the Protection of Animals. The authors should specify which guidelines or regulations have been followed to guarantee the protection of the animals used in the experimentation process.

The authors should indicate whether the experiments were conducted in accordance with the relevant institutional and national guidelines for the care and use of laboratory animals.