All new submissions are screened for completeness and adherence to the Guide for Authors. Those that pass formal requirements are then transfer to one of the Editorial Board Member for consideration and sending for peer review. Authors of manuscripts rejected at initial evaluation stage will normally be informed within 2 weeks of receipt.

Manuscripts rejected at this stage are insufficiently original, have serious conceptual and/or methodological flaws, or are outside the aims and scope of the journal.

Reviewers are assigned to the paper according to their expertise. Suggestions for reviewers from authors are necessary, though these recommendations may or may not be respected.

Reviewers are asked to evaluate a manuscript on a reviewer sheet (download PDF).

Reviewers are asked to provide anonymous comments to the author and are also given the option of providing confidential comments to the editor. The comments to the author are also made available to other reviewers of the manuscript. This journal uses double-blind review, which means that both the reviewer and author identities are concealed from the reviewers, and vice versa, throughout the review process.

Reviewers are not expected to correct or copy edit manuscripts. Language correction is not part of the peer review process.

If the paper receives 2 positive evaluations, it will be directed sent to the Editor-in-Chief for final approval (at this stage a manuscript rejection is still an option) and publication in the journal. If the reviewers’ evaluations vary in opinion, a third reviewer will be appointed, whose opinion shall be binding on the paper publication. In the case of minor infringements, the corresponding author shall be informed urgently and asked to supplement and/or amend the paper.

The editorial office accepts for publishing only those papers that are positively evaluated by the reviewers and editors for themes and significant contribution to the progress of science and/or clinical practice.