KUST Medical Journal

• RESPONSIBILITIES OF REVIEWERS

I. The first responsibility of reviewers is to

evaluate manuscripts critically but constructively

and to prepare detailed comments

about the research and the manuscript to

help authors improve their work. The reviewers

have to assess the manuscript according

to the reviewers proforma sent to each

reviewer along with the manuscript. The

evaluation should include

• assessments of the originality and importance

of the research;

• the design of the study;

• the methods of study, including analytic

and statistical methods;

• the presentation of the results;

• possible confounding; the strength of

the conclusions; and

• the overall quality of the manuscript.

II. The second responsibility is to make recommendations

to the editor regarding the suitability

of the manuscript for publication in

that journal. Reviewers may be asked to write

some narrative comments about the manuscript

that support their recommendation to

the editor regarding acceptance or rejection.

They also can be asked to grade some characteristics

of the manuscript, such as originality,

quality, accuracy, readability and interest

to readers, or to complete detailed

questionnaires about these qualities and

III. Reviewers should declare to the editor any

potential conflicts of interest with respect to

the authors or the content of a manuscript

they are asked to review, and in most instances

when such conflicts exist should

decline to review the manuscript.

IV. Other responsibilities of reviewers include

treating the manuscript as a confidential

document and completing the review

promptly. Reviewers should not show the

manuscript to anyone else without the express

consent of the editor.

V. Reviewers should not make derogatory

comments about the manuscript in their comments

for the authors. If reviewers do make

such comments, the editor may choose to

edit the comments or even withhold all the

reviewer’s comments from the authors.

VI. Reviewers must not make any use of the

work described in the manuscript.

VII. Reviewers should not communicate directly

with authors or even identify themselves to

authors, except by signing their reviews.

VIII. The editor should provide guidance to the

reviewers, particularly new reviewers, regarding

how the editor wishes the reviewers

to evaluate the manuscript and how the

reviewers should meet their dual responsibility

of providing constructive comments for

the author and advice to the editor.

VIII. Reviewers should meet the agreed-upon

deadline (usually 4 weeks) for manuscript

review and should respond to the reminders

if sent any.

• IDENTIFICATION AND EVALUATION OF

REVIEWERS

I. The editor will establish a reviewer database

that includes information about the expertise

of each reviewer as well as addresses

and other contact information.

II. Fifty percent of reviewers will be from Pakistan

and 50% will be selected from abroad.

III. The editor may identify potential reviewers

on the basis of personal knowledge of the

topic or from among the authors of references

in the manuscript, the membership of

the society that publishes the journal, or

computer searches of databases such as

PubMed, Medline or by asking for names

from reviewers who decline to review the

manuscript (see below).

IV. Authors may suggest reviewers for their

manuscript, whether invited to do so by the

editor or not. The editor may choose to use

one or more of these reviewers, but are under

no obligation to do so. (Authors may ask

that certain people not be asked to review

their manuscript, but editors are not obligated

to accept these requests either.)

V. The editor should ask reviewers, by telephone,

fax or e-mail, if they are willing to

review a particular manuscript, and give

them a date that the review is due at the

editorial office (usually 3 to 4 weeks), rather

than simply sending the manuscript to the

reviewer. As the same time, the editor can

ask for the names of others who might review

the manuscript should the person initially

contacted decline.

VI. The editor is responsible for keeping track

of reviewers, and taking steps to make sure

reviews are completed in a timely manner.

Each peer review is rated by the editor assigned

to the manuscript and stored with the

reviewer’s profile in the Rapid Review reviewer

database. This rating becomes part

of the reviewing history of each peer reviewer,

and can be viewed by the editors as

they select potential reviewers for future

manuscripts. The reviewer database also

contains information on the reviewers’ areas

of expertise; the number of previous invitations

to review and number accepted;

dates of submitted reviews, and days taken

to produce reviews. Reviewers who consistently

decline invitations or who write brief

unhelpful reviews are eventually removed

from the database.

VII. To avoid overworking reviewers, each reviewer

will be asked to evaluate no more

than one manuscript per month.

VIII. If a reviewer does not complete a review on

a timely basis, the editor should proceed with

evaluation of the manuscript. He can make

a decision to accept or reject the manuscript

based on the comments and recommendations

of another reviewer(s) or his own evaluation

of the manuscript, or by seeking additional

review.

• REWARDING REVIEWERS.

• Each reviewer may be rewarded by being publicly

thanked for reviewing in the journal each year and

will be given free copies of journal.