About the Journal

Focus and Scope

Focus and scope The MediCiego journal is an electronic publication of an open access scientific nature, whose main purpose is the dissemination of medical science results. Its objetive is to disseminate scientific experiences and advances in biomedicine, medical education, organization and management of health systems and services, and other related areas, based on the development of health sciences at the local, national, and international levels.

This journal had its remote antecedent in El Eco Científico (1917-1926), a monthly, printed publication on medicine, surgery and physical-chemical sciences. MediCiego was founded 78 years later, in January 1995.

The target audience for MediCiego is made up of national and foreign professionals, academics, researchers and students linked to public health, basic biomedical, preclinical, clinical and surgical sciences, nursing, stomatology, health technology, health psychology, education medical and history of medicine; among other knowledge areas.

MediCiego uses peer review in open and double-blind modalities with external arbitration. Authors are responsible for the opinions they express in their work. There are no charges for processing or posting articles.

The journal edition is carried out according to the ISO 216-75, 999-75, 214-76, 8-77, 18-81, 5966-82, 4-84, 215-86 and 3297-86 standards and the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) recommendations.

This journal does not accept advertising materials, or works that have been previously published or are under consideration by the Editorial Committee of another journal. Unpublished works and documents previously deposited in recognized preprint servers (SciELO Preprints, PMC, MedRxiv, among others) are accepted.

The submission of manuscripts, their processing and publication do not generate costs for the authors. The journal has no embargo period. The journal has no embargo period and is published under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC 4.0), https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

Before submitting a manuscript to the journal, authors should consult the general instructions for all articles and the specific requirements for each type, established in the guidelines for authors.

Each article must be accompanied by an attached file with the affidavit. In this document, the authors declare under oath their responsibility regarding originality, revision modality, authorship roles, conflicts of interest and assignment of rights; It must be signed by all the authors and must be answered in all its parts.

The Editorial Committee reserves the right to introduce style changes or delimit the texts that require it and undertakes to respect the original content.

The accepted manuscripts remain the property of MediCiego, therefore, their partial or total publication in another journal must be authorized by its editor.

The following types of articles are accepted: Editorial, Original articles, Brief communications, Case report, Review articles, Letter to the editor, Outstanding images in medicine

MediCiego will give priority to original articles, especially those that present analytical designs (cross-sectional, cases and controls, and cohorts), as well as experimental designs. Other types of communications such as portraits, obituaries and event summaries may be included, according to the Editorial Committee's consideration.

Peer Review Process

MediCiego adopts two peer review modalities: double blind and open. In the double-blind variant, the reviewers will not receive any identifying data of the origin of the article and the authors will not know who is evaluating their manuscript either. In the open modality, the evaluators know the identity of the article authors and the authors have references from the reviewers, to promote direct communication between them. The reviewers will be able to publish their evaluations about the articles. In the affidavit, the authors must choose the modality to which they accept. The evaluation period will take no more than 90 days.

The reviewers will be selected for their scientific, academic and professional level, as well as for their experience and knowledge on the subject to be evaluated. All articles submitted to arbitration are treated confidentially. Peer reviewers must disclose any conflict of interest when responding to an invitation to review a manuscript, as well as when sharing common results with the manuscript.

In cases of conflicts of interest, for example, when the reviewer has recently collaborated with the author at the same institution, or when they are in direct competition with the author, reviewers may not review that author's manuscript.

Upon receiving the submission, the executive editor reviews and verifies if the article meets the basic requirements of the journal. If it is accepted, define and assign, with the Editorial Committee, two referees according to the subject matter.

Throughout the review process, the following aspects are taken into account: selection of external reviewers; verification of the absence of conflicts of interest; use of the review form (arbitration guide); appointment of a third reviewer, if the criteria of the initial two do not match; and compliance with the 30-day term for recording the results of the evaluation.

In conjunction with the arbitration guide, it is recommended to use the versions of the following verification guides: STROBE for observational studies (descriptive and analytical: cross-sectional, case-control, and cohort); CONSORT (for randomized clinical trials), PRISMA and PRISMA-E 2012 (for systematic reviews and meta-analyses), CARE (for case reports) and SQUIRE (standards for excellence in reporting quality). MediCiego supports international initiatives to increase the quality of medical reports and accepts the recommendations and guidelines available on the website of the EQUATOR (Enhancing the QUALity and Transparency Of health Research), available at: http://www.equator-network.org/

Final decision: after the review, the Editorial Committee analyzes the criticisms and suggestions made to the author and will make the decision that will be communicated by email to the author for correspondence, which may be:

Submission Acceptance. With this decision, the manuscript will go to the editing process.
Publishable with modifications. The authors will have 30 days to prepare a new version of the manuscript, taking into account the recommendations of the review process and will replace the previous version through their user account in the same submission, for which they must notify the editor. Once the new version is received, it will move on to the second round of review. If after 30 days the corrected work is not received, the Editorial Committee can make the decision to extend the date for another 30 days, or archive it, which will be communicated to the first author. If the article is archived and the authors maintain their desire to publish in the journal, they must resubmit it as a new manuscript and they will make the comment to the editor in the corresponding space in the first step of the submission.
Not publishable. It refers to manuscripts that lack the necessary quality, are not considered of interest, incur in plagiarism or present ethical violations. If for any reason the author decides to withdraw the article during the review process, he must notify the journal management in writing.
Appeal: Authors can email an appeal letter to the Executive Editor, in case of disagreement with the outcome of the review process. This letter should contain their concerns regarding the issues identified by the reviewers and editors. Upon receipt of the appeal, the editors can confirm their decision to reject the manuscript or do additional peer review.

Open Access Policy

MediCiego provides immediate open access to its content, based on the principle that providing the public with free and unrestricted access to research helps a greater global exchange of knowledge. Its content can be freely and universally accessed, at no cost to the reader, through the Internet. More information at: https://www.budapestopenaccessinitiative.org/read/spanish-translation/

According to this open access policy, MediCiego is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license (CC BY NC) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ that allows sharing (copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format) and adapt (remix, transform and build upon the material), under the conditions of acknowledging authorship and not making commercial use of the materials.

Authors should share their database with other competent professionals seeking to verify their results after publication. The provided data will keep the confidentiality of the participants and will protect the legal rights of authorship regarding the study.