1. About the International Journal of Spine Surgery
The International Journal of Spine Surgery (IJSS) is a publication aimed at disseminating high-quality spine surgery research to an audience of physicians, policy-makers, and patients. To achieve this goal of maximizing the impact of the research we publish, the IJSS is an open access journal and provides access to its articles without any paywall or subscription.
While IJSS remains committed to the open access publishing model, as we believe it increases the accessibility of articles and promotes learning and further innovations to improve patient outcomes, to optimize the economic foundation of the IJSS, the ISASS Board has approved a change to the IJSS model. Beginning October 15, 2021, any newly submitted manuscript that is accepted for publication will be subject to a publication fee, commonly referred to as an article processing charge (APC). Manuscripts submitted prior to this date but not accepted before October 15, 2022, will also be subject to an APC. Members of ISASS will receive a reduced rate. Fees will be as follows:
- ISASS Members: $500 per accepted manuscript
- ISASS Nonmembers: $750 per accepted manuscript
Authors will be expected to pay the APC once the manuscript has been accepted. Solicited content and letters to the editor will be exempt from the APC.
The IJSS follows a double-blinded peer review process. This process is a rigorous, created around recommendations from the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), and focuses on ensuring that any new technologies or techniques are explained clearly and on the technical and statistical soundness of methods outlined in articles as well as their execution.
2. Criteria for Publication
To be accepted for publication in IJSS, original research articles must satisfy the following criteria:
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The material must be not only relevant but of utility to spine surgeons, biomechanical engineers, and/or scientists involved in spine surgery research.
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Results reported in primary scientific research have not been published elsewhere.
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Experiments, statistics, and other analyses are performed to a high technical standard and are described in sufficient detail.
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Conclusions are presented in an appropriate fashion and are supported by the data.
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The article is presented in an intelligible fashion and is written in standard English.
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The research meets all applicable standards for the ethics of experimentation and research integrity.
Additionally, review articles must be meta-analyses and systematic reviews that follow the PRISMA guidelines. Note that unsolicited narrative reviews will no longer be considered for publication.
The Journal’s Peer Reviewer Board, and any invited external peer reviewers, will evaluate submissions against these criteria.
To expand on each of these criteria:
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Is the manuscript not only relevant but of utility to spine surgeons, biomechanical engineers, and/or scientists involved in spine surgery research? As the official scientific publication of the International Society for the Advancement of Spine Surgery (ISASS), the audience of both the IJSS and ISASS are the same: surgeons, engineers, and scientists. The IJSS accepts primary research, editorials & commentary, trial protocols, and systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Of note, the IJSS limits the publication of case reports to those that are highly unusual and/or deemed to be of high value for IJSS readership. Authors of case reports must clearly articulate why the case is important and must structure their manuscript according to the CARE guidelines.
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Have the results been published elsewhere? The IJSS does not accept for publication work that has already been published elsewhere. However, studies that replicate results that are already in the literature may be considered for publication, as the independent confirmation of results can often be valuable, as can the presentation of a new dataset (for example, a new clinical trial). Research that has been put into an institutional repository or written as a thesis do not disqualify an article from publication.
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Are the experiments, statistics, and other analyses performed to a high technical standard and are described in sufficient detail? The research must have been performed to a technical standard high enough to allow robust conclusions to be drawn from the data. Methods, instruments, and reagents must also be described in sufficient detail so that another researcher is able to reproduce the experiments or surgical techniques described.
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Are the conclusions presented in an appropriate fashion with speculations and hypotheses identified as such? The results must be interpreted appropriately, such that all conclusions are justified. However, authors may discuss possible explanations for their results as long as these are clearly identified as speculations or hypotheses, rather than as firm conclusions. Inappropriate interpretation of results is a justifiable reason for rejection.
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Is the article presented in an intelligible fashion and written in English? Journal staff perform minimal copyediting the text of accepted manuscripts; it is therefore important for the work, as presented, to be intelligible. Perfect, stylish English is not essential, but the language must be clear and unambiguous. If the language of a paper is poor, journal editors may recommend that authors seek independent editorial help before submission of a revision. Poor presentation and language is a justifiable reason for rejection.
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Does the research meet all applicable standards with regard to the ethics of experimentation and research integrity? Research published in the IJSS must have been conducted to the highest ethical standards. In accordance with the recommendations of the ICMJE, "All investigators should ensure that the planning conduct and reporting of human research are in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration." For all prospective studies involving human subjects, authors must seek approval to conduct the research from an independent local, regional, or national review body (e.g., ethics committee, institutional review board). Also in accordance with the ICMJE, "When reporting experiments on animals, authors should indicate whether institutional and national standards for the care and use of laboratory animals were followed."
Registration of clinical trials in a public registry is also required, per ICMJE guidelines. The IJSS follows the definition of "clinical trials" set forth by the ICMJE: "Any research project that prospectively assigns people or a group of people to an intervention, with or without concurrent comparison or control groups, to study the relationship between a health-related intervention and a health outcome."
3. Overview of the Editorial Process
The IJSS will provide all authors with an efficient and hassle-free editorial process. Our aim is to identify those submissions that warrant inclusion in the scientific record and present them to the scientific community with as few hurdles as possible.
Upon submission, manuscripts are reviewed by editorial staff to ensure appropriate quality and requirements have been met. Once approved, the editorial process is run by the journal’s expert Deputy Editors, who work together to orchestrate the peer-review process. Deputy Editors oversee the review process for submitted manuscripts on the basis of the content of the manuscript and their own expertise.
The Deputy Editor first assigns reviewers (typically a minimum of 2 peer reviewers per manuscript, including senior review editors) based on areas of expertise. The IJSS employs a double-blind peer review process--reviewers are blinded to the authors and authors are blinded to the reviewers. Once the required reviews have been submitted, the Deputy Editor will review the manuscript and reviewers' feedback to determine whether the manuscript is an appropriate fit and meets the scientific standards of the journal. On occasion, the Editor in Chief or Deputy Editor will reject a manuscript outright if it is clear that the manuscript is not appropriate for the journal.
After appropriate consideration by the Editor, a decision letter to the author is drafted. There are several types of decisions that may be made:
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Accept
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Minor Revisions
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Major Revisions
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Reject
Upon acceptance, the manuscript is checked by IJSS staff to ensure that all necessary files are received and that the files meet the basic criteria to allow the manuscript to be efficiently handled by our production system. All manuscripts must comply with AMA standards. Minor issues will be handled during copyediting. However, if significant changes are needed, the manuscript will be returned to the author for revision, or the author may choose to pay the IJSS to provide comprehensive editing to ensure the manuscript is suitable for publication.
The corresponding author will receive a link to review a draft of their copyedited manuscript, at which point they will be asked to respond to the copyeditor's queries and make any other additional adjustments. If requested, authors can receive a final proof of their manuscript before advance online publication.
4. Reviewer Selection
Selection of reviewers for a particular manuscript is the responsibility of the Section Editors and is based on many factors, including expertise, specific recommendations of authors and editors, and the reviewer’s past performance (eg, quality and timeliness of past reviews).
As part of our editorial procedures, the IJSS confers with potential reviewers before sending them manuscripts to review. Reviewers must keep all correspondence regarding manuscripts--even these initial messages or conversations--confidential.
5. Using the Reviewer Form
The IJSS employs a structured reviewer form to help reviewers share their insights with authors and improve the efficiency of peer review. The form consists of four sections:
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Reviewer Suggestion and Rating (required). Reviewers here answer the question of whether the manuscript should be Accepted, sent back for Revision, or Rejected.
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Responses to basic evaluation questions. Reviewers are asked to respond to 5 questions regarding the submission (eg, evaluate the relevance and importance of a manuscript, state whether any major issues exist in the methods).
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Comments to the Author (required). In this section, reviewers should address each and every point in which the manuscript may be improved in their estimation, especially those with regard to the publication criteria above. Authors should be given a chance to improve their manuscript as much as possible, and this feedback is the core of the peer review process.
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Comments to the Editor. In this section, reviewers must declare any potential or perceived competing interests that may influence their review, as well as any other comments that they wish to remain confidential between themselves and the editor. Reviewers may also wish to further explain their recommendation and rating.
More broadly, reviewers may wish to consult this helpful guide to peer reviewing.
6. Confidentiality
The review process is strictly confidential and should be treated as such by reviewers. As the author may have chosen to exclude some people from this process, no one who is not directly involved with the manuscript (including colleagues and other experts in the field) should be consulted by the reviewer unless such consultations have first been discussed with the Section Editor. Reviewers must not take any confidential information they have gained in the review process and use it before the paper is published. Even after publication, unless they have the permission of the authors to use other information, reviewers may only use publicly published data (i.e. the contents of the published article) and not information from earlier drafts.
7. Timely Review
An efficient editorial process that results in timely publication provides a valuable service both to authors and to the scientific community at large. To ensure a timely review process, reviewers are asked to complete and submit their reviews within 14 days. The average turnaround time for an initial decision is just over 30 days.
8. Anonymity
Reviewers may remain anonymous during the review process or may choose to sign their review and therefore become known to the author.
9. Editing Reviewers' Reports
The editors and IJSS staff do not edit any comments made by reviewers that have been intended to be read by the authors unless the language is deemed inappropriate for professional communication or the comments contain information considered confidential. Such remarks should be reserved for the confidential section of the review form, which is intended to be read by the editors only. In their comments to authors, reviewers are encouraged to be honest but not offensive in their language; it is important for reviewers to remember that the authors are their peers and deserve due respect. On the other hand, authors should not confuse frank and perhaps even robust language with unfair criticism.
10. Competing Interests
As far as possible, we respect requests by authors to exclude reviewers whom they consider to be unsuitable. We also, as much as possible, try to rule out those reviewers who may have an obvious competing interest, such as those who may have been collaborators on other projects with the authors of this manuscript, those who may be direct competitors, those who may have a known history of antipathy with the author(s), or those who might profit financially from this work. Because it is not possible for all such competing interests to be known by a particular editor, we request that reviewers who recognize a potential competing interest inform the editors or journal staff and recuse themselves.
On occasion, reviewers may be asked to offer their opinion on a manuscript that they may have reviewed for some other journal. This is not in itself a competing interest. That two journals have identified the same person as especially well qualified to judge the manuscript under consideration does not in any way decrease the validity of that opinion and may perhaps even enhance it.