All articles are immediately available for free online at omjournal.org.

The OMJ uses a peer-review process using double-blind method to evaluate manuscripts for scientific accuracy, novelty, and importance. The careful editing process often requires extensive revisions and assures detailed checking for accuracy. Authors will be responsible for checking the accuracy of the final edit.

All submitted manuscripts are read by the Editor-in-chief and at least one other board member. Only those papers that seem most likely to meet our editorial criteria are sent for formal review. Those papers judged by the Board Members to be of insufficient general interest or otherwise inappropriate are rejected without external review.

Manuscripts judged to be of potential interest to our readership are sent for formal review, typically to two or three reviewers. The editors then make a decision based on the reviewers' advice, from several possibilities:

• Accept for publication without alteration.
• Accept after revision/extensive revision. Authors are invited to revise their manuscript to address specific concerns before a final decision is reached.
• Reject, but indicate to the authors that further work might justify a resubmission.
• Reject outright, typically on grounds of relevance, lack of novelty, or major technical and/or interpretational problems.

Reviewers are welcome to recommend a particular course of action, but they will be considered along with other reviewers who may have different technical expertise and/or views. Typically, the Board Members make decisions based on conflicting advice and their understanding of the research. It can be the case that we do not always follow the recommendations of reviewers. We do not send details of the final decision to reviewers.

In cases where the authors have been asked to revise their manuscript, we may return to reviewers for a second review. When reviewers agree to assess a paper, we consider this commitment to review subsequent revisions.

We do not edit reviewers' reports; any comments that were intended for the authors are transmitted. Therefore, we asked that reviewers remain respectful in their comments avoiding statements that may cause needless offense.

Manuscripts will be edited for brevity, clarity, grammar, spelling, and style. When the editing is extensive, with the possibility of altered meaning, queries are sent to the corresponding author by email. When a manuscript has been edited and prepared for publication, these will be sent to the author along with any final queries from the Copy Editor. Authors are expected to check the proof carefully, paying particular attention to the accuracy of equations, tables, illustrations, other numerical matter and references (which have been corrected for style but not checked for accuracy, which remains the responsibility of the author), and answer any queries. With page proofs, we request that the authors make the fewest possible alterations other than corrections of errors, and wherever a change is essential, only substituting as few words as possible occupying an approximately equal amount of space. If no corrections are received, the Editors reserve the right to correct the proof themselves. Equally, the Editors reserve the right to dismiss any changes that do not follow OMJ style or introduce errors in language. Corrections are generally not made to a manuscript once it has been published unless there is a significant error.

The Editorial Board is a group of individuals committed to helping the OMJ produce an excellent multidisciplinary scientific publication of the highest quality. The publisher/editor-in-chief appoint editorial Board members. The editorial board is made up of an interdisciplinary mix from a wide range of disciplines. The main responsibilities of editorial board members are to provide strategic and operational advice (unsolicited, as well as in editorial board meetings) and to guide papers in their area of expertise through the peer-review process.

Any manuscript submitted by an Editorial Board member will be treated in the same manner as any other manuscripts with both the Editorial Board member and reviewers blinded to one another in the review process.

Material submitted to the OMJ journals must not be discussed with the media, except in the case of accepted contributions, which can be discussed with the media only once published. Authors that are contacted by the media about any OMJ should ask that the OMJ is credited in any news stories.

The OMJ Editorial Board and publication staff keep all information about a submitted manuscript confidential and limited to those involved in the evaluation, review and publication process. The OMJ used a double-blind review process so that authors’ names and affiliations are not revealed to reviewers nor are reviewers’ names revealed to authors. Only information on accepted articles is archived for future reference.

It is the responsibility of every person listed as an author of an article published in OMJ to have contributed in a meaningful and identifiable way to the design, performance, analysis, and reporting of the work, and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work. Authors must complete an authorship form clearly stating their responsibilities, contribution, and financial sources.

According to the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), as revised in 2013, authorship credit should be based on the following 4 criteria: 

• substantial contributions to conception or design of the work, or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; and
• drafting of the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; and
• final approval of the version to be published; and
• agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved. All those designated as authors should meet all four criteria for authorship, and all who meet the four criteria should be identified as authors. Those who do not meet all four criteria should be acknowledged.

All authors (ie, the corresponding author and each coauthor) must read, complete, and submit an electronic Authorship Form with signed statements on Authorship Responsibility, Criteria, and Contributions and Confirmation of Reporting Conflicts of Interest and Funding.

©2021 All rights reserved to Oman Medical Journal. All articles published represent the opinions of the authors and do not reflect the official policy of the journal. This open access journal is distributed under the terms of Oman Medical Specialty Board, permitting non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Published manuscripts become the permanent property of Oman Medical Specialty Board and may not be published elsewhere.

A conflict of interest may exist when an author (or the author’s institution or employer) has financial or personal relationships or affiliations that could influence (or bias) the author’s decisions, work, or manuscript. All authors are required to complete and submit the ICMJE Form for Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest: This form will be requested after a manuscript has been submitted, but authors should also include conflict of interest disclosures in the Disclosure section of the manuscript. Authors are expected to provide detailed information about all relevant financial interests, activities, relationships, and affiliations. Peer-reviewers are also expected to declare any conflicts of interest as part of their review.

For all manuscripts reporting data from studies involving human participants, formal review and approval, or formal review and waiver, by an appropriate institutional review board or ethics committee is required and should be described in the Methods section. Such studies must also be in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975 (revised in 2008). For investigations of humans, state in the Methods section the manner in which informed consent was obtained from the study participants (ie, oral or written) and whether participants received a stipend. Editors may request that authors provide documentation of the formal review and recommendation from the institutional review board or ethics committee responsible for oversight of the study.

Oman Medical Journal publishes according to the recommendation the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) (http://www.icmje.org/icmje-recommendations.pdf) and the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) (https://publicationethics.org/guidance).

Following information is necessary when reporting an erratum:

1. Title of the manuscript 
2. Volume, issue, and page number of publication
3. We do our best to avoid mistakes in publication. In fact, persistent communication with the author, whenever it is necessary, during the publication process is one of our way to ensure the correctness of publication. However, in terms errors slipped from our sight, we publish corrections when needed. 
4. Part that needs corrections 
5. The corrected version

All allegations of misconduct will be referred to the Editor-In-Chief. Authors will be contacted in writing with any concerns and asked to state their case and explain the circumstances. Until a decision about the manuscript is reached, work on the manuscript will be stopped. The Editor-in-Chief will make a final decision on the handling of the manuscript.

Erratum will be included in the upcoming issue upon reporting the erratum.

Oman Med J also consider retraction of manuscript. Reasons of retractions includes plagiarism, duplicate publication, unethical research, and unreliable data or findings base on the report of author, editors, and academic or institutional sponsor.

When retracting a manuscript, please provide the necessary information:

1. Title of the article.
2. Volume, issue, page number, and date of publication.
3. Reason of retraction.
4. Statement mentioning that all author have agreed with the retraction.
5. Signature of all the authors.

Reason of retraction and correction if any, will be posted on the upcoming issue prior to submission of retraction request letter.

All allegations of misconduct are refer to the Editor-In-Chief. Authors are contacted in writing with any concerns and asked to state their case and explain the circumstances. Until a decision about the manuscript is reached, work on the manuscript will be stopped. The Editor-in-Chief will make a final decision on the handling of the manuscript.

The OMJ uses the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME) definition of scientific misconduct as described below:

1. Falsifying data: fabrication of data, selective reporting or omission, suppression or distortion of data.
2. Plagiarism: using the published or unpublished language, ideas or thoughts of another writer without crediting the source and presenting them as one’s own. Plagiarism includes duplicate publication (publication of an article in more than one journal or in another language).
3. Authorship issues: exclusion of involved researchers or inclusion of researchers who have not contributed to the work or publication without permission from all authors.
4. Violation of generally accepted research practice: including manipulating experiments/statistics to get biased results or improper reporting of results.
5. Failure to follow legal requirements: violating local regulations and laws involving the use of funds, care of human subjects, investigational drugs, recombinant products, new devices or radioactive, biological or chemical materials.
6. Inappropriate behavior in cases of misconduct: including false accusations of misconduct; failure to report misconduct; not providing relevant information in a misconduct claim and retaliation against people claiming or investigating misconduct.

Oman Medical Journal gives importance to data sharing to promote the availability of the research work in a wider research community for transparency, scrutiny, and independent verification of the result. Our data sharing depends upon the policy of the journal.

We encourage authors to make their research data available in a relevant data repository upon publication of the article in Oman Med J. Data shared should be properly cited and linked to the original publication on the journal website. Researches and authors who are going to use the data that are published in Oman Med J should cite the data properly in the text and the reference list.

Citation should follow the Oman Med J reference style https://omjournal.org/guide-author.aspx.

The list of Open Domain-Specific Data Sharing Repositories is available at https://www.nlm.nih.gov/NIHbmic/domain_specific_repositories.html

All advertisement must comply the Oman Medical Journal advertising policy. Advertiser must be honest about their products and services. They should avoid misleading or offensive content to the reader. Any advertisement showing racial, ethnic, sexual, or religious bias will be rejected. Oman Med J have the right to decline any types of advertisement that is inappropriate and damaging to the content of the journal. Oman Med J may change the terms at any time, excluding advert approved prior to changes. Advertiser are hold liable for the content of the advertisement (including text, illustrations, trademarks, labels, or other copyright).

All advertisement are subject for the approval of Oman Med J which may take up to five working days. Oman Med J have the right to reject and discontinue any advertisement for any reason. Advertisement is not related in any way to editorial decision, it is separate from the content of Oman Med J.

What advert do we accept?

1. Pharmaceuticals and food supplements that are approved by Central Drug Committee
2. Medical equipment
3. Conferences
4. CME programs and workshops

Advertisement relating to alcohol and tobacco will not be accepted as these are known to be harmful to health.

Oman Medical Journal is publish every two months (bi-monthly). The schedule of publications are January, March, May, July, September, and November. If you want the advert to be included in an issue, the deadline of submission will be one month before the month of release. Example: advert for March issue should be submitted on or before February 1. But if you want to advertise monthly, you need to submit it 15 days before the posting date of the advert on the website.

Regarding the advert specification, we accept PDF, EPS, or TIFF format with 300 DPI or above. The price will vary according to the size of the advert that will appear online and if there is a directly link to the advertiser-sponsored website (URL).

(Please see price below)

CURRENTLY, we are not accepting any advert.

Oman Med J has the right to reject or discontinue any advertising for any reason including advertising that does not follow the publication’s standard. The advertiser is liable for the completeness and correctness of the advert. File that will be submitted to Oman Med J for advert is considered as a final and approved file.

Cancellation should be made 15 days before the month of release. No cancellation is allowed less than 15 days before the month of release unless otherwise agreed by both parties in writing. Payment Terms Payment should be made in Omani Rial with net of 15 days if monthly or 30 days if per issue from invoice date. You need to pay online for your advert booking through Debit care or Credit card.

For further queries, please feel free to email us at omj@omsb.org