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Instructions for authors

Ownership and management

The Critical Care Innovations (CCI) journal has existed since 2018. The publisher is the Emergency Care Association (ECA), registered in Poland under the number "KRS 0000718747". ECA is a non-profit organization associating specialists in emergency medicine, medical education and scientists. The editor-in-chief of the CCI journal is Prof. Piotr Konrad Leszczyński, who supervises the work of the technical and IT departments, the scientific council and the members of the editorial board. The composition of the CCI council is international. The Critical Care Innovations journal offers quick evaluation and publication of submitted articles. Articles are published in English in electronic format. Abstracts are also available in Polish. The Journal is open access. Full texts of papers published in the Journal are available on the Journal website: www.criticalcareinnovations.eu or www.irdim.net/cci . All articles are made available under Creative Commons CC BY-NC licence 4.0 (Attribution - Noncommercial). This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon their work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they don't have to license their derivative works on the same terms.

Once you have prepared your submission in accordance with the Guidelines,
manuscripts should be submitted online at www.irdim.net .


MENU:

      AUTHOR GUIDELINES (video instruction)
      MAKING A MANUSCRIPT
      MANUSCRIPT EVALUATION
      PREPARATION OF MANUSCRIPT
      REFERENCES
      ETHICAL PRINCIPLES
            Consent of publication
            Publication on vulnerable populations
            Handling confidential data in business/marketing practices
      ANTI-PLAGIATIC POLICY
      CONFLICT OF INTERESTS
      CHARGES
      DECLARATION BY AUTHOR/AUTHORS
      QUALIFYING FOR AUTHORSHIP
      DATA PROTECTION
      SUBMIT MANUSCRIPT

MAKING A MANUSCRIPT
Manuscripts should only be submitted online, via the www.irdim.net website. The submission and review process is fully electronic. Registration on IRDIM is completely free. The manuscript should be prepared according to the following instructions.



MANUSCRIPT EVALUATION
Works submitted to the CCI Journal are pre-evaluated in terms of innovation and scientific value. Manuscripts with insufficient priority for publication are rejected to allow authors to submit work to another journal. Articles that are incomplete or unprepared in the style required are sent back to the authors without a scientific review. If the manuscript is accepted for review, the authors will be notified in an electronic form. Articles are rated by at least two independent reviewers according to the double-blind review process principle. The average review time is 4 weeks. All submitted manuscripts are considered confidential documents and are not shared with unauthorized persons. The mutual evaluation process is also confidential and the identity of the reviewers is not disclosed. After the reviewers have provided a written review, the editorial office issues one of four possible decisions:

-     SUITABLE FOR PUBLICATION,
-     REQUIRES CORRECTIONS WITHOUT RE-EVALUATION,
-     REQUIRES CORRECTIONS AND RE-EVALUATION,
-     NOT SUITABLE FOR PUBLICATION.

      The specimen of review can be downloaded here

The editors reserve the right to edit the text before publication in order to improve accuracy, transparency and length.

Appeal an editorial decision
If you wish to appeal a journal editor's decision, please submit an appeal letter to the journal's online editorial office. Please address this to the editor and explain clearly the basis for an appeal. You should:

1) Detail why you disagree with the decision. Please provide specific responses to any of the editor's and/or reviewers' comments that contributed to the reject decision.

2) Provide any new information or data that you would like the journal to take into consideration.

3) Provide evidence if you believe a reviewer has made technical errors in their assessment of your manuscript.

4) Include evidence if you believe a reviewer may have a conflict of interest.

5) After receiving the appeal, editors may involve any associate editors who handled the peer review of the original submission and/or Towarzystwo Pomocy Doraznej (publisher@irdim.net), depending on the nature of the appeal. Editors may confirm their decision to reject the manuscript, invite a revised manuscript, or seek additional peer- or statistical review of the original manuscript.

PREPARATION OF MANUSCRIPT

The works are published in English. The volume of original and review papers should not exceed 15 pages of typescript, case studies not exceed 8 pages - including references, engravings, tables and summaries. The text should be written in a 11-point Ariel font. Recommended leading: 1,5. Margins: 2.5 cm (1 in) at the top, bottom, right and left. The text should be saved in Microsoft WORD. Tables and figures (min.300 DPI) can be added at the end of the text or sent as separate files. They should be titled and numbered according to the order in which they appear in the text. Reporting guidelines for main study types can be found on the EQUATOR website (click here).

ORIGINAL ARTICLE :

Original works should have the following structure:

  1) TITLE PAGE (full title, names and surnames of all authors, ORCID numbers, authors' work place, address details, telephone number, e-mail address, name and surname of the correspondent author, source of financing);

  2) ABSTRACT (200-350 words in four paragraphs entitled: Introduction, Material and methods, Results, Conclusions);

  3) KEYWORDS (from 3 to 6 items);

  4) CHAPTERS (Introduction with the aim of the work, Materials and methods with statistical elaboration, Results, Discussion, Conclusions, References).

Randomized trials should meet the requirements of the CONSORT standard. Download the CONSORT checklist - click here.

REVIEW ARTICLE :

Review article should have the following structure:

  1) TITLE PAGE (full title, names and surnames of all authors, ORCID numbers, authors' work place, address details, telephone number, e-mail address, name and surname of the correspondent author, source of financing);

  2) ABSTRACT (150-350 words - precisely describe the content of the article);

  3) KEYWORDS (from 3 to 6 items);

  4) CHAPTERS (Introduction with the aim of the work, Other parts - at the author's discretion, Conclusions, References).

Systematic review or meta-analysis should meet a completed PRISMA checklist - click here and PRISMA flow diagram - click here. At minimum, your article should report the content addressed by each item of the checklist. Meeting these basic reporting requirements will greatly improve the value of your review and may enhance its chances for eventual publication.

CASE REPORT :

Case report should have the following structure:

  1) TITLE PAGE (full title, names and surnames of all authors, ORCID numbers, authors' work place, address details, telephone number, e-mail address, name and surname of the correspondent author, source of financing);

  2) ABSTRACT (150-350 words - precisely describe the content of the article);

  3) KEYWORDS (from 3 to 6 items);

  4) CHAPTERS (Introduction with the aim of the work, Case presentation, Discussion, Conclusions, References).

Case reports should meet the requirements of the CARE standard. Download the CARE checklist - click here.

LETTER TO THE EDITOR :

Letter to the editor should have the following structure:

  1) TITLE PAGE (full title, names and surnames of all authors, ORCID numbers, authors' work place, address details, telephone number, e-mail address, name and surname of the correspondent author, source of financing);

  2) ABSTRACT (150-250 words - precisely describe the content of the article);

  3) KEYWORDS (from 3 to 6 items);

  4) CHAPTERS (Letter - at the author's discretion, References).

REFERENCES

The references in the text should be placed in square brackets and marked with Arabic numerals. Each entry should be written from a new line with a number that matches the order in which the text is quoted. The recommended bibliographic style is to be compatible with the Vancouver System. The name and the initial of the name of the author / authors, the title of the work, the name of the journal (using the abbreviations of titles of magazines according to Index Medicus), year of publication, volume no., Notebook no., Starting and ending page number, DOI number should be included.

Example for article (Vancouver System):
Guilbert TW, Morgan WJ, Zeiger RS, Mauger DT, Boehmer SJ, Szefler SJ, et al. Long-term inhaled corticosteroids in preschool children at high risk for asthma. N Engl J Med. 2006; 354(19):1985-97. doi: ...

In the case of quoting books, mention should be made of: author / authors, title, publisher, place and year of publication.

Exapmle for book (Vancouver System):
Rang HP, Dale MM, Ritter JM, Moore PK. Pharmacology. 5th ed. Edinburgh: Churchill Livingstone; 2003

ETHICAL PRINCIPLES

Authors of works concerning research and experiments involving people are obliged to comply with the principles contained in the Helsinki Declaration. All tests on humans and / or animals must be accepted by the ethics committee competent for the Investigator. The declaration on compliance with the aforementioned rules or the reference number of the consent of the bioethical commission should be included in the manuscript. Administration and management shall follow the guidelines of COPE - the Committee on Publication Ethics (www.publicationethics.org). The Journal's editorial board shall follow the rules preventing the cases of ghostwriting and guest authorship, which are recognised as examples of scientific unreliability. Authors shall submit a statement that are available on the Journal website.

Checklist for the corresponding author:
  a) Declare to your chosen journal that your manuscript is not published elsewhere;
  b) Declare any conflicts of interest;
  c) Check all co-authors meet criteria for authorship and ensure appropriate acknowledgements made in the manuscript;
  d) Include appropriate funding statements in the manuscript;
  e) Show informed consent and provide assurances that participants rights are protected;
  f) Register clinical trials;
  g) Explain how research using animals is conducted responsibly;
  h) Be alert to bias and follow guidelines for accurate and complete reporting of research;
  i) Inform the journal if you subsequently find errors in your research;
  j) Sign a copyright agreement.

You can find a concise guide on: CCI Publishing Ethics and Malpractice Statement

Consent of Publication

The Author transfers to CCI Journal the non-exclusive publication rights and he/she warrants that his/her contribution is original and that he/she has full power to make this grant. The author signs for and accepts responsibility for releasing this material on behalf of any and all co-authors. This transfer of publication rights covers the non-exclusive right to reproduce and distribute the article, including reprints, translations, photographic reproductions, microform, electronic form (offline, online) or any other reproductions of similar nature. The author may self-archive an CCI Journal's PDF version which is posted on www.criticalcareinnovations.eu. Furthermore, the author may only post his/her version provided acknowledgement is given to the Journal as one of the original places of publication and a link is inserted to the published article on CCI website. Please use the appropriate DOI for the article (go to the Linking Options in the article, then to OpenURL and use the link with the DOI). Articles disseminated via www.criticalcareinnovations.eu and www.irdim.net are indexed, abstracted, and referenced by many abstracting and information services, bibliographic networks, subscription agencies, library networks, and consortia. After submission of this agreement signed by the corresponding author, changes of authorship or in the order of the authors listed will not be accepted by CCI Journal. Authors shall submit a statement that are available on the Journal website.

Publication on vulnerable populations

"There are several definitions available for the term "vulnerable population", the words simply imply the disadvantaged sub-segment of the community" (WMA Declaration of Helsinki-Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects-59th WMA General Assembly, Seoul, Korea, October 2008). The rules of the Declaration of Helsinki of 1975 was revised in 2013. According to point 23 of this declaration, approval from the local Institutional Review Board (IRB) or another appropriate ethics committee must be obtained before undertaking the research to confirm that the study meets national and international guidelines. As a minimum, a statement including the project identification code, date of approval, and name of the ethics committee or institutional review board must be stated in the 'Institutional Review Board Statement' Section of the article. "When the protocol sample study population incorporates the vulnerable subset of patients, rationale for their representation, scientific significance and contributions are to be discussed" (Indian Council of Medical Research Ethical Guidelines for Biomedical Research on Human Participants, New Delhi, 2006).

If a study involves vulnerable groups, the manuscript will undergo an additional review by the editorial office. If requested, the author must provide documentary evidence, including blank consent forms and any related discussion documents from the ethics board or other relevant bodies. Additionally, when studies describe groups by race, ethnicity, gender, disability, disease, etc., an explanation regarding why such categorization was needed must be clearly stated in the article.

It is essential to obtain necessary consents and permissions from the participants in a study in order to ensure compliance with relevant legislation and guidelines. This consent is required in order to obtain and use personal information about the participants. Written informed consent must be obtained from the parent or legal guardian of any participant who is unable to provide full informed consent on their own (children, adolescents, and vulnerable or incapacitated individuals). Signed consent forms should not be submitted to the journal. Instead, the authors should include a statement indicating that informed consents have been obtained from all participants. As you develop your study, consider the needs of the participants and be aware of issues that may arise regarding their ability to provide full consent. Inability to consent does not limit participation in a study but instead requires that additional safeguards and consent procedures are followed. The information on this page and in the subsequent sections provides additional information and suggestions for working with various populations. If you have additional questions about your population, please contact our office.

Manuscripts reporting studies involving human participants, human data, or human tissue must include a statement of informed consent for participation in research. Verbal informed consent to participate in a study can be acceptable under some circumstances (such as in ethnographic studies). The authors must explain the rationale for using this kind of consent in the "Informed Consent Statement" Section. For verbal informed consent, a copy of the script used must be provided during the submission stage.

Types of Vulnerable Groups:

  1 - Cognitive or communicative vulnerability
  2 - Institutional vulnerability
  3 - Deferential vulnerability
  4 - Medical vulnerability
  5 - Economic vulnerability
  6 - Social vulnerability
  7 - Legal vulnerability
  8 - Study vulnerability

1 - Cognitive or communicative vulnerability occurs when any participant is unable to process, understand, appreciate, and reason based on consent documentation and explanations, whether due to mental or linguistic limitations.

2 - Institutional vulnerability occurs when individuals are subject to formal authority and their consent may be coerced directly or indirectly. Examples include prisoners, student-professor relationships, and employee-employer relationships.

3 - Submissive vulnerability occurs when individuals informally submit to authority. For example, victims of abuse, doctor-patient relationships, or husband-wife relationships.

4 - Medical vulnerability occurs when a person's health condition may impede their ability to make decisions about participating in research.

5 - Economic vulnerability occurs when individuals' economic circumstances may make them vulnerable to the prospect of free medical care or payment for participation in a study.

6 - Social vulnerability occurs when participants are exposed to discrimination based on race, gender, ethnicity, and age.

7 - Legal vulnerability occurs when participants do not have the legal right to consent or may fear that their consent may expose them to legal repercussions.

8 - Research vulnerability occurs when participants are exposed to vulnerability because of the research design. This category refers to participants who are deceived during the study or the nature of the study is not disclosed to the participant.

Suspicion that signed informed consent forms are fraudulent - Critical Care Innovations, following the recommendations of COPE, will contact the institution where the research was conducted for assistance in assessing the raw data or for education or discipline of the researcher. In case of doubts or confirmation of falsification of informed consent forms (ethics committee approval), the CCI Editors have the right to reject the article or even remove it after publication.

Confidentiality and anonymity are ethical practices designed to protect the privacy of research subjects when collecting, analyzing, and reporting data. Confidentiality refers to separating or modifying any personal, identifying information provided by participants from the data. Anonymity, on the other hand, refers to collecting data without obtaining any personal, identifying information. Anonymity is usually a procedure used in quantitative research, while confidentiality is maintained in qualitative research. In both cases, the researcher collects information from participants, and it is this information that becomes the data for analysis. The CCI editorial office requires that ORIGINAL ARTICLES and CASE REPORTS indicate that the authors have confirmed that the research subjects have been anonymized. The manuscript submitted to the CCI must not contain information that would allow for the identification of research participants (e.g. genetic codes, biometric features, recognizable photographs, etc.). The CCI editorial office reserves the right to reject any article that does not meet this requirement.

The CCI Journal follows the current COPE principles. Ethical oversight should include, but is not limited to, policies on consent to publication, publication on vulnerable populations, ethical conduct of research using animals, ethical conduct of research using human subjects, handling confidential data and ethical business / marketing practices. Read more ...

Handling confidential data in business/marketing practices

Summary of principles of good practice:

1) It is good practice for companies to have in place internal systems to protect confidential, marketsensitive information.

2) It is good practice for companies to maintain an insider list when conducting a confidential, market-sensitive transaction.

3) It is good practice for companies that deal with confidential, market-sensitive information to ensure their directors, executives and employees are aware of their confidentiality obligations.

4) It is good practice for companies to bind their advisers and other service providers by entering into confidentiality agreements before passing on confidential, market-sensitive information, and to require confirmation from their advisers and other service providers that they have in place policies and practices relating to the handling and control of confidential, market-sensitive information that satisfy the terms of the agreement.

5) It is desirable for companies to know which, when and how potential investors are being sounded on their behalf in relation to a transaction involving the company.

6) Authors shall submit a statement that are available on the Journal website.

ANTI-PLAGIATIC POLICY

Each manuscript is subject to analysis in the anti-plagiarism program (RAPIDUS). The author shall submit only an original paper to the editorial board. S/he shall exercise due diligence in order to make sure that the surnames of authors referred to in the text are cited and listed correctly. Plagiarism shall be treated as an unethical and unacceptable behaviour. The cases of violating the code of ethics listed hereinabove shall be the reasons for rejecting papers. Should it be confirmed that a text, statements, research results or data have been illegally used, the author of the submitted paper shall be informed in writing that his/her paper has been rejected. Should the author fail to respond to the communication, the institution the author is affiliated with shall be informed. In the case of an autoplagiarism, when the author uses in the paper submitted for publication passages from his/her own text that has already been published, the editorial board shall inform the author about rejecting his/her paper due to a lack of originality of the analyses made.

The publishing house uses COPE flowcharts in the event of suspicion of plagiarism (see appendices below).

PLAGIARISM

Articles that have been published shall remain extant, exact and unaltered as far as is possible. However, very occasionally circumstances may arise where an article is published that must later be retracted or even removed. Such actions must not be undertaken lightly and can only occur under exceptional circumstances. In all cases, our official archives at the National Library of the Poland will retain all article versions, including retracted or otherwise removed articles.

Article removal - Infringements of professional ethical codes, such as multiple submission, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data or the like. A retraction signed by the authors and/or the editor is published in the paginated part of a subsequent issue of the journal and listed in the contents list. In the electronic version, a link is made to the original article. The online article is preceded by a screen containing the retraction note. It is to this screen that the link resolves; the reader can then proceed to the article itself. The original article is retained unchanged save for a watermark on the .pdf indicating on each page that it is "retracted". The HTML version of the document is removed. In cases where the article, if acted upon, might pose a serious health risk, the authors of the original article may wish to retract the flawed original and replace it with a corrected version. In these circumstances the procedures for retraction will be followed with the difference that the database retraction notice will publish a link to the corrected re-published article and a history of the document.

CONFLICT OF INTERESTS

Authors of works submitted to CCI are obliged to disclose at the time of submitting the manuscript all financial obligations related to the submitted work. The author declares that the manuscript sent is original and has not been published in print or in electronic form. The same applies to tables and figures.

Critical Care Innovations adheres to the principles set forth by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) www.icmje.org. Authors are required to submit manuscripts that adhere to the principles of scientific integrity and good scientific practices. Therefore, it has been adopted that there is a mandatory requirement to inform the CCI Editors about the existence of a conflict of interest. A manuscript containing a conflict of interest is not rejected, but is reviewed by the Editor-in-Chief. If accepted, information about the existence of a conflict of interest must be described and then published in the article. Detailed guidelines based on the ICMJE can be found at: Recommendations ...

The Editors may request additional information regarding conflicts of interest. According to the ICMJE principle, "authors should avoid entering into agreements with research sponsors, whether for-profit or non-profit, that could impede the authors' access to all study data or impede their ability to analyze and interpret data and prepare and publish manuscripts at any time and in any place." It should be noted that potential conflicts of interest are not limited to financial (e.g., memberships, employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, grants, contracts, licenses), but also include personal or professional relationships, affiliations, and personal beliefs.

The corresponding author must include a summary statement in the manuscript in a separate "Conflicts of Interest" section located immediately before the list of references. The statement should reflect all disclosures of potential conflicts of interest collected in the form.

Examples of disclosures are provided below:
Conflicts of Interest: Author "X" received funding for the study from Company "Y". Author "Z" was engaged as a consultant and expert witness for Company "Y". Author "S" is the inventor of the patent (...).

If no conflicts exist, the authors should provide:
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

CHARGES

The editorial office of CCI does not pay royalties for publishing the work. Submission of manuscripts and publication in CCI are free.

DECLARATION BY AUTHOR / AUTHORS

At the time of accepting the work for publication, the authors are required to submit a statement in paper form together with the license agreement. Each author submits a separate statement (along with the manuscript should be sent signed scans of statements). The authors transfer the copyright to CCI. All published materials become the property of CCI and may not be published without the written consent of the publisher. The CCI publishing house publishes all works in the open access mode, thanks to which everyone can read, copy, store, print, link to full texts and use for scientific or teaching purposes in accordance with the law. The license of the published content allows the use and distribution of the work only for non-commercial purposes and subject to its original form.

      The specimen of the statement to be downloaded here (.DOC)

      The specimen of the statement to be downloaded here (.PDF)

If you have any problems submitting your paper through IRDIM system, please contact the Editorial Office on: e-mail: office@irdim.net

QUALIFYING FOR AUTHORSHIP

Authorship criteria (from 2021) is based on the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals. Detailed guidelines based on the ICMJE can be found at: Recommendations ... The ICMJE lists four conditions for authorship credit. Authors must meet all four conditions in order to be listed:

1) Substantial contributions to conception and design, acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data, and
2) Drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content, and
3) Final approval of the version to be published, and
4) 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.


Author Contributions The contributions of all authors must be described. CCI Journal has adopted the CRediT Taxonomy to describe each author's individual contributions to the work. The submitting author is responsible for providing the contributions of all authors at submission. We expect that all authors will have reviewed, discussed, and agreed to their individual contributions ahead of this time. Contributions will be published with the final article, and they should accurately reflect contributions to the work.

A -	Conceptualization (Ideas; formulation or evolution of overarching research goals and aims.)
B -	Data Curation (Management activities to annotate / produce metadata, scrub data and maintain research data, including software code, where it is necessary for interpreting the data itself, for initial use and later reuse.
C -	Formal Analysis (Application of statistical, mathematical, computational, or other formal techniques to analyze or synthesize study data.)
D -	Funding Acquisition (Acquisition of the financial support for the project leading to this publication.)
E -	Investigation (Conducting a research and investigation process, specifically performing the experiments, or data/evidence collection.)
F -	Methodology (Development or design of methodology; creation of models)
G -	Project Administration (Management and coordination responsibility for the research activity planning and execution.)
H -	Resources (Provision of study materials, reagents, materials, patients, laboratory samples, animals, instrumentation, computing resources, or other analysis tools.)
I -	Software (Programming, software development; designing computer programs; implementation of the computer code and supporting algorithms; testing of existing code components.)
J -	Supervision (Oversight and leadership responsibility for the research activity planning and execution, including mentorship external to the core team.)
K -	Validation (Verification, whether as a part of the activity or separate, of the overall replication/reproducibility of results/experiments and other research outputs.)
L -	Visualization (Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically visualization/data presentation.)
M -	Writing - Original Draft Preparation (Creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically writing the initial draft, including substantive translation.)
N -	Writing - Review & Editing (Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work by those from the original research group, specifically critical review, commentary or revision - including pre- or post-publication stages.)
O -	Approved the final version (All authors must approve the final version of the manuscript).

DATA PROTECTION

By submitting a manuscript to or reviewing for this publication, your name, email address, and affiliation, and other contact details the publication might require, will be used for the regular operations of the publication, including, when necessary, sharing with the publisher (Towarzystwo Pomocy Doraznej) and partners for production and publication. The publication and the publisher recognize the importance of protecting the personal information collected from users in the operation of these services, and have practices in place to ensure that steps are taken to maintain the security, integrity, and privacy of the personal data collected and processed. Read more...