Policies
All submitted manuscripts must comply with the described Policies. Authors of submitted manuscripts are responsible for the content and adherence to the prescribed Publication Ethics.
Publication Ethics Statement
Sqripta adheres to the COPE principles of publication ethics, ensuring authentic and credible research for all journals it publishes.
The journal Ophthalmology and Optometry follows the COPE Core practices in publishing scholarly literature, and COPE Guidelines on publication ethics to secure the integrity of the journal’s management, publication processes and practices, including the conduct of Editorial Board and participants of peer review process, and the originality and credibility of the authorship and published research.
The Editorial Board of the journal Ophthalmology and Optometry is independent of the publisher in its decision-making. In accordance with the COPE guidelines, the Editorial Board makes independent and final decisions on issues such as authorship and contributorship, research ethics, conflicts of interest, plagiarism, data, peer review integrity, misconduct allegations, etc.
The submitted manuscripts that do not comply with Publication Ethics or other implied Policies will be rejected with an explanation from the Editorial Board.
The journal Ophthalmology and Optometry conducts a double-blind (anonymous) peer review with a minimum of two independent experts in the field of the submitted manuscript. In the Conduct policies, the obligations for editors, reviewers and authors are prescribed to ensure the integrity of the publication and review process, and published research.
In the event of an ethical issue or allegation of misconduct, copyright dispute, plagiarism, conflict of interest, data fabrication/falsification, image manipulation, duplicate submission or publication, etc., the party (whistleblowers, authors, reviewers or other users) aware of or denied of any right should immediately contact the Managing Editor of the Resilience and Reuse in the Built Environment at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com.
The Managing Editor will carefully, in confidence, examine all aspects of the reported event and inform the Editor-in-Chief. In case of a serious issue, the Editor-in-Chief will appoint an Ethics and Misconduct Allegations Committee, consisting of 5 members of the Editorial Board, to conduct an impartial and confidential investigation. The investigation and consultation may be extended to other parties and external experts if necessary. After considering all aspects of the case and conducting a thorough investigation, the appointed Committee will inform the Editor-in-Chief of its opinion. The Editor-in-Chief will make the final decision and inform all parties involved.
Research involving human subjects or personal information about an identifiable individuals is not common in Civil engineering. Regardless, if such research is submitted and accepted for publication in the journal, all policies on anonymisation, confidentiality and informed consent will apply.
The Ophthalmology and Optometry requires authors to provide signed informed consent for all submitted manuscripts that report research on or are related to human subjects.
Such manuscripts must not include direct identifiers of a human subject such as name (first or last name), geographic location (place of residence), exact age, identification numbers (ID card or passport number), biometric data (fingerprints, facial geometry, retinal scan, etc.), and photographs or images (including idenfifiable facial features).
Authors are required to anonymise data so it cannot be linked to specific individuals and does not fall within the scope of the GDPR.
The Editorial Board of the Ophthalmology and Optometry protects the confidentiality of all submitted manuscripts and associated data. Access to submitted manuscripts and associated data is limited to the Editor-in-Chief, Managing Editor, the Editorial Board member assigned to the submitted manuscript, the reviewers involved in the peer review, and administrative journal staff involved in the publication process.
All participants in the publication process, including those mentioned above, are bound by a confidentiality agreement (non-disclosure agreement), which protects confidential and sensitive information from disclosure to unauthorised parties before publication.
Editors are required to screen each submitted manuscript for research design, valid methodology and scientific significance, regardless of sex, race, nationality, language, religion, political or other opinion or status of the authors, following the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations.
Editors are required to ensure just and impartial peer review (double-blind peer review with a minimum of two independent experts in the field of the submitted manuscript) within a reasonable timeframe so that all participants (reviewers and authors) have sufficient time to comment and correct, while taking into account timely publication. Editors are required to avoid biased or fraudulent reviewers.
Editors are required to handle submitted manuscripts and all related communication with authors and reviewers confidentially. The disclosure of authors’ or reviewers’ identities to any party inside or outside the peer review process is strictly forbidden.
Editors may not share, adapt or use unpublished content from submitted manuscripts for any purpose without the authors’ explicit consent, whether for rejected or accepted manuscripts.
The Editor-in-Chief makes the final decision on the publication of reviewed articles. In case of doubt, the Editor-in-Chief can consult other Editors, Editorial Board members and reviewers, or conduct a new round of review.
Reviewers are the foundation of the integrity of published research. They have an obligation to conduct reviews ethically and responsibly.
Reviewers may agree to review only if they have the necessary expertise to assess the manuscript and are impartial in their assessment.
Reviewers are required to declare all potential conflicts of interest described in the Conflicts of Interest Policy before they agree to review. If such a conflict is discovered, the Editor handling the review will notify the Managing Editor and the reviewer in question will be dismissed.
Reviewers are required to assess the originality, research design, and scientific relevance of the assigned manuscript, providing objective and constructive feedback within a given deadline.
Reviewers may not use generative AI technology in reviewing or forming an opinion on the assigned manuscript.
Reviewers may not share, adapt or use unpublished content from submitted manuscripts for any purpose without the authors’ explicit consent, whether for rejected or accepted manuscripts. Manuscripts under peer review and all relevant correspondence with authors and Editors are confidential.
Reviewers are required to notify the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com of any ethical issues, inappropriate conduct, copyright disputes, plagiarism, conflicts of interest, figure or data fabrication, duplicate submission, etc.
Authors Conduct Policy
Authorship implies responsibility and accountability for the research presented in the submitted manuscript.
Authors are required to submit the manuscript in compliance with the described journal’s policies and Instructions for Authors.
Authors are responsible for the content of the submitted manuscript and adherence to the prescribed Publication Ethics.
Authors are required to submit a manuscript representing authentic research. Submitted manuscripts must provide a factual and precise description of the conducted research with an unbiased analysis of its importance. An accurate representation of the underlying data is required.
Manuscripts must include adequate information and appropriate references to enable the replication of the research. Deceptive or intentionally incorrect statements represent unethical conduct and are not acceptable.
All information used from other sources should be appropriately credited under the licence it was published. All scholarly literature that influenced the research or was directly used must be appropriately cited.
Authors are required to avoid any kind of plagiarism. The Ophthalmology and Optometry has no tolerance for plagiarism. Each submitted manuscript is checked by plagiarism detection software.
Authors may not submit the same or substantially similar research/manuscript that has been submitted simultaneously to another journal or an already published article. Also, redundant publication is prohibited when basically the same authors submit the same published research with just apparent changes as new research.
Authors are required to disclose any significant conflict of interest that could influence the research results. All sources of financial support have to be disclosed.
The authors listed on a submitted manuscript are required to have substantial contributions to Conceptualisation, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Software, Supervision, Validation, Visualisation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing (Ophthalmology and Optometry uses the Contributor Role Taxonomy – CrediT to describe the key types of contributions made to the production of research articles). Individuals without such contributions must not be listed. Crediting someone without real contributions or leaving out someone with real contributions is not ethical.
The author’s institution stated in the manuscript should be the institution where author was at the time of the research.
The order of authorship should reflect the importance of the contribution, with the principal author listed first. All authors of a submitted manuscript should approve the final version and designate a corresponding author before submission.
The corresponding authors are responsible for and required to cooperate with the Editors and reviewers, providing accurate, argumented and timely responses to their actions and requests during the submission, review and publication process. They can file a complaint to the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com against the assigned Editor or reviewer at any time in case of unethical and unprofessional conduct.
Changes in authorship, in terms of adding new authors to the list, are not allowed, with the exception when review demands extensions in the research and new researchers are required. In that case, an accurate definition of contribution is required. For changes in authors’ names or error corrections, authors should contact the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com with relevant proof.
In case of discovering a fundamental error in the published article, authors are required to inform the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com. After the investigation has been carried out and the error has been proven, the article will be retracted, or an erratum will be published.
All individuals involved in the research, but without direct contribution, may be listed in the Acknowledgements section of the article.
Appeals Policy
Authors may appeal an Editorial decision, but must provide clear reasons demonstrating that the decision is unfounded.
Authors should submit appeals against Editorial decisions to the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com within 30 days of the decision.
The Editor-in-Chief may form an Appeals Committee, consisting of 5 members of the Editorial Board, to consider the appeal. The decision of the Appeals Committee is final and no further objections will be considered.
Plagiarism Policy
The Ophthalmology and Optometry has no tolerance for plagiarism, like direct copying, paraphrasing without attribution, self-plagiarism, mosaic plagiarism, etc. Each submitted manuscript is screened for originality by iThenticate/CrossCheck (plagiarism detection software).
There is no set acceptable percentage of similarity. All cases of similarity will be carefully examined. Similarity does not immediately imply plagiarism, so the Editor will contextualise the amount of similarity for each assigned manuscript and treat it individually. In case of unacceptable similarity, suspicious content or lack of referencing, Editors will contact authors for an explanation. If the explanation is not satisfactory and the questionable parts of the text are not changed in line with ethical standards and protecting intellectual property, the manuscript may be rejected.
The use of any type of generative AI technology in writing a manuscript is prohibited by the Artificial Intelligence Policy. Detection of text compiled by generative AI technology will be treated like plagiarism.
Discovery or reporting of plagiarism after publication will be carefully examined by the Editor-in-Chief or special committee formed to address the issue. If plagiarism is proven, the article in question will be withdrawn and watermarked in archive.
Citation Policy
The Ophthalmology and Optometry has no tolerance for citation manipulation.
Authors are advised to properly cite the sources they used in their research. Excessive self-citation to increase personal overall citation rate is prohibited.
Editors and reviewers are prohibited from requiring authors to cite their articles without an objective reason, to influence their overall citation rate.
Ethical Research Policy
Following COPE guidelines, the Ophthalmology and Optometry holds the right to reject any manuscript that editors decide does not meet ethical standards, regardless of any ethical approval authors obtained from a third party. Authors are encouraged to follow Declaration of Helsinki, Belmont Report and Common Rule for designing human subject research, and the ARRIVE guidelines for animal research.
If human subjects were used in the research, it must be clearly stated. Such research must be supported by a statement following listed relevant guidelines and regulations, or informed consent to participation.
If animal subjects were used in the research, it must be clearly stated. Such research must be supported by a statement following international laws or listed relevant guidelines and regulations.
Any kind of unusual or unstandardised hazards of procedures, equipment and chemicals used in research must be clearly identified.
Artificial Intelligence Policy
The use of any type of generative AI technology in writing a manuscript is not acceptable due to the possibility of using non-scholarly or non-reviewed sources. This also applies to images, figures, and graphs that could inaccurately reflect the presented data.
Conflicts of Interest Policy
Any potential conflict of interest affecting the publication process from submission to publication, especially peer review, must be disclosed.
Editors, reviewers, and authors must not have any family, friendship, partnership, affiliation, financial, business, academic rivalry, or any other relationship that could compromise their judgment, decisions, or actions.
Authors are required to disclose any potential conflict of interest before submitting a manuscript to the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com.
Reviewers are required to disclose any potential conflict of interest before accepting to review a manuscript to the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com.
Editors are required to disclose any potential conflict of interest before accepting to handle a manuscript to the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com.
Authors and reviewers are free to contact the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com if in doubt about what to disclose.
If the reported conflict of interest exceeds the authority of the Managing Editor, the Editor-in-Chief will be notified so the case can be resolved.
The Editor-in-Chief holds the right to investigate and make a final decision on discovered conflict of interest and competing interest at any time and any stage of publication or post-publication of the manuscript in question.
Funding Policy
Any source of financial support that research has received should be disclosed with all available details. This includes full titles and identification (numbers) of funding organisations, grants and projects.
Peer Review Policy
The Ophthalmology and Optometry is dedicated to the integrity of peer review and compliance with the highest peer-review standards.
The Ophthalmology and Optometry conducts a pre-publication, double-blind (double-anonymous) peer review process.
Editors mediate all interactions between reviewers and authors. Peer reviews are not published before publication. Review is facilitated by the journal.
The review is the property of the reviewer, but it must not be disclosed before the publication of the manuscript being reviewed, as described in the Confidentiality Policy.
Each submitted manuscript will be assessed by the assigned Editor to determine suitability for the aim and scope of the journal and arrangement according to the template and Instructions for Authors. If any of the criteria are not met, the handling Editor will reject the manuscript with an official opinion. Authors are required to improve the manuscript accordingly and resubmit it.
Suitable manuscripts will go under the Editorial review, where handling Editor will evaluate originality (plagiarism detection software – iThenticate/CrossCheck), research design, valid methodology, appropriate presentation of results, and scientific significance of the manuscript. In case of doubt handling Editor may consult with a relevant expert from the Editorial Board. Manuscripts lacking these qualities will be rejected. All other manuscripts will be either sent to the authors with suggestions for improvement or will be directly sent under double-blind (double-anonymous) peer review by a minimum of two independent experts in the field of the manuscript. Each submitted manuscript will likely require revision, regardless of its quality, before it is accepted for publication.
If the manuscript presents interdisciplinary research, then the number of reviewers will reflect the number of disciplines covered by the research. In general, the handling Editor will ensure that each manuscript has the number of reviewers necessary to cover all aspects of the research presented.
Under the supervision of the handling Editor, several rounds of peer review will be conducted to satisfy reviewers’ suggestions and for authors to improve the manuscript. Manuscripts that do not meet the objective and argumented reviewers’ criteria will be rejected. The Editor will ensure that the rights and obligations of authors and reviewers are respected.
After receiving positive opinions and acceptance to publish by the reviewers, the handling Editor will inform the Editor-in-Chief of relevant details of the whole process, and the manuscript will be published as an article.
The review process implies a minimum of one round of reviewer suggestions and author improvements, up to as many rounds as necessary for the manuscript to be accepted under objective and professional conditions.
There is no guarantee that a submitted manuscript will be accepted. Acceptance of a manuscript for publication depends solely on the professional opinions of the reviewers and the authors’ willingness to improvement. A submitted manuscript may be rejected at any time during the review process for a variety of objective reasons, which will be communicated to all parties involved before a final decision is made. The time from submission to publication depends on the quality of the manuscript and the responsiveness and receptiveness of the authors and reviewers. The average time from submission to publication is approx. 7 weeks.
Open Access Policy
Ophthalmology and Optometry is an open access journal. All published articles are available to users free of charge. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, remix, adapt, build upon, or link to full texts of the published articles in any medium or format, even for commercial purposes, without asking prior permission from Sqripta, Ophthalmology and Optometry or the author.
All published articles are available for free and open access without delay. There is no embargo period or requirement for users to register to read the content. Full-text articles are available in PDF and HTML.
Licensing
Resilience and Reuse in the Built Environment applies the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY-SA 4.0) license to all published articles. This license is applied to all users of published articles.
This license requires users to give credit to the authors. It allows users to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the content of articles in any medium or format, even for commercial purposes. When users remix, adapt, or build upon the content of articles, they must license the modified material under identical terms.
Authors publishing articles in Ophthalmology and Optometry agree to have the CC BY-SA 4.0 license applied to their article, enabling the freedom of reuse and ensuring that the published articles can be used without barriers for research purposes.
The terms of the CC BY-SA 4.0 license do not apply to authors, as they are the copyright holders. The license applies to all other users, such as readers and the publisher, Sqripta.
Copyright
Authors retain the copyright of their published articles without restrictions, while granting Ophthalmology and Optometry the right of first publication and other non-exclusive publishing rights.
Author Charges/Fees
Ophthalmology and Optometry does not charge article processing charges (APC) or any other publishing fees for submitted or accepted manuscripts. Authors publish their articles completely free of charge, which is why there is no waiver policy.
Repository (self-archiving) Policy
The Ophthalmology and Optometry promotes open access and encourages authors to share their research widely, while ensuring proper attribution and access to the final published version of the research.
Authors retain the copyright to the published articles.
Authors may archive the submitted version of the article and the Author Accepted Manuscript, which is the peer-reviewed and accepted version of the article, into institutional or public repositories and websites. A statement accompanying the deposit should indicate that the article has been submitted or accepted for publication in the Ophthalmology and Optometry. After publication, authors must link these versions to the final version of the published article with a DOI on the journal’s website.
Authors are encouraged to self-archive the final version of their published articles (Version of Record) into institutional or public repositories and websites. For this purpose, authors are strongly encouraged to use the final PDF version published on the website of the journal. The final version is a peer-reviewed, accepted, copyedited, and formatted article assigned with a DOI and published on the journal’s website.
There is no embargo period for the deposit of the submitted, accepted or published version of the article.
Self-archiving permissions and conditions are presented at Jisc search (Sherpa Romeo).
Archiving Policy
Sqripta ensures long-term digital preservation and accessibility of the content published in the Ophthalmology and Optometry.
All articles published on the Ophthalmology and Optometry website are archived and permanently stored at Croatian Web Archive HAW as part of the Digital Collections of the National and University Library in Zagreb.
The DOI (Digital Object Identifier) is assigned to each published article as a means of persistent identification, increased discoverability, preservation and long-term access.
Complaints
All complaints outside the Allegations of misconduct and Appeals Policy about journal policies and procedures, specific content, etc. can be directed to the Managing Editor at managing.editor.oo@sqripta.com. Each complaint will be reviewed and resolved with a final Editorial decision.
If the seriousness of the case goes beyond a simple complaint, the Editor-in-Chief will be notified and a special committee may be formed to address the issue.