Journal of Pediatric Infection is the official, scientific, open access publication organ of Pediatric Infectious Diseases and Immunization Association of Turkey and is published quarterly in March, June, September and December. Moreover, an additional issue is published for the National Pediatric Infectious Diseases Congress. The aim of the Journal of Pediatric Infection is to publish scientifically high-quality research articles in the field of pediatric health and diseases. Additionally, review articles, original research, editor opinion, letters to the editor, case reports, pediatric radiology case and instructive manuscripts (what is your diagnosis?, routines, question-answer, clinical tips, news on world literature). The Journal, is bilingual both Turkish and English for every manuscript (each is translated by editorial office the other language), The journal is an independent, unbiased and double-blind peer-reviewed journal.  

The editorial and publication processes of the journal are shaped in accordance with the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), Council of Science Editors (CSE), Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), European Association of Science Editors (EASE), and National Information Standards Organization (NISO). The journal is in conformity with the Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing (doaj.org/bestpractice).

Originality, high scientific quality and potential for citation are the most important criteria for a manuscript to be accepted for publishing. Manuscripts submitted for evaluation should not have been previously presented or already published in an electronic or printed medium. The journal should be informed of manuscripts submitted to another journal for evaluation but rejected for publication. The submission of previous reviewer reports will expedite the evaluation process. Manuscripts presented in a meeting should be submitted with detailed information on the organization, including the name, date, and location of the organization.

Manuscripts submitted to the Journal of Pediatric Infection will go through a double-blind peer-review process. Each manuscript will be reviewed by at least two external, independent peer reviewers who are experts in their fields in order to ensure an unbiased evaluation process. The editorial board will invite an external and independent editor to manage the evaluation processes of the manuscripts submitted by the editors or the editorial board members of the journal. The Editor-in-Chief is the final authority in the decision-making process for all manuscripts.

An approval of research protocols by the Ethics Committee in accordance with international agreements (World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki “Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects,” amended in October 2013, www.wma.net) is required for experimental, clinical, and drug studies and for some case reports. If required, ethics committee reports or an equivalent official document will be requested from the authors. For manuscripts concerning experimental research on humans, a statement verifying that written informed consent of the patients and volunteers was obtained following a detailed explanation of the procedures should be included. For studies carried out on animals, the measures taken to prevent pain and suffering of the animals should be stated clearly. Information on patient consent, name of the ethics committee, and the ethics committee approval number should also be stated in the Methods section of the manuscript. It is the authors’ responsibility to carefully protect patients’ anonymity. For photographs that may reveal the identity of the patient, releases signed by the patient or his/her legal representative should be enclosed.

The responsibility of the supervision to screen the manuscript by a similarity detection software lies with the authors.

In the event of alleged or suspected research misconduct, e.g., plagiarism, citation manipulation, and data falsification/fabrication, the Editorial Board will follow and act in accordance with COPE guidelines.

Each individual listed as an author should fulfill the authorship criteria recommended by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE - www.icmje.org). The ICMJE recommends that authorship be based on the following 4 criteria:

1. Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of the data for the work;

2. Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content;

3. Final approval of the version to be published; AND

4. Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work, and ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

In addition to being accountable for the parts of the work he/she has done, an author should be able to identify which co-authors are responsible for other specific parts of the work. In addition, authors should have confidence in the integrity of the contributions of their co-authors.

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 in the title page of the manuscript.

The Journal of Pediatric Infection requires corresponding authors to submit a signed and scanned version of the authorship contribution form available for download through www.cocukenfeksiyon.org during the initial submission process in order to act appropriately on authorship rights and to prevent ghost or honorary authorship. If the editorial board suspects a case of “gift authorship,” the manuscript will be rejected without further review. As part of the submission of the manuscript, the corresponding author should also send a short statement declaring that he/she accepts to undertake all responsibility for authorship during the submission and review stages of the manuscript.

The Journal of Pediatric Infection requires and encourages the authors and the individuals involved in the evaluation process of the submitted manuscripts to disclose any existing or potential conflicts of interests, including financial, consultant, and institutional.

Cases of a potential conflict of interest of the editors, authors, or reviewers are resolved by the journal’s Editorial Board within the scope of COPE and ICMJE guidelines.

The Editorial Board of the journal handles all appeal and complaint cases within the scope of COPE guidelines. Authors should get in direct contact with the editorial office regarding their appeals and complaints. When needed, an ombudsperson may be assigned to cases that cannot be resolved internally. The Editor-in-Chief is the final authority in the decision-making process for all appeals and complaints.

When submitting a manuscript to the Journal of Pediatric Infection, authors accept to assign the copyright of their manuscript to the Pediatric Infectious Diseases and Immunization Association If rejected for publication, the copyright of the manuscript will be assigned back to the authors. Journal of Pediatric Infection requires each submission to be accompanied by a Copyright Transfer Form available for download at www.cocukenfeksiyon.org. When using previously published content, including figures, tables, or any other material in both print and electronic formats, authors must obtain permission from the copyright holder. Legal, financial and criminal liabilities in this regard belong to the author(s).

Statements or opinions expressed in the manuscripts published in the Journal of Pediatric Infection reflect the views of the author(s) and not the opinions of the editors, the editorial board, or the publisher. The editors, the editorial board, and the Publisher disclaim any responsibility or liability for such materials. All responsibility in regard to the published content rests with the authors.

Original articles, reviews, case reports and letters to the editor regarding especially pediatric health and diseases are published in the Journal of Pediatric Infection.

1. In order for a manuscript to be accepted for publication in the journal, the manuscript should be original, worthy of attention and scientific. The language of the journal is Turkish and English..

2. Manuscripts submitted for evaluation should not have been previously presented or already published in an electronic or printed medium. Manuscripts presented in a congress are accepted provided that this condition is indicated. The authors declare in writing that the right of publication of their manuscripts is assigned to the journal. These conditions are stated in the letter of application to the editor for publication, signed by all authors.

3. Manuscript format should be organized following the rules in ICMJE-Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals (updated in December 2015 - http://www.icmje.org/icmje-recommendations.pdf).

4. Manuscripts to be published in the journal should be in accordance with research and publishing ethics. Regarding human and animal rights, an approval of research protocols by the Ethics Committee in accordance with international agreements (World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki “Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects,” amended in October 2013, www.wma.net and “Guide for the care and use of laboratory animals - https://grants.nih.gov/grants/olaw/Guide-for-the-Care-and-use-of-laboratory-animals.pdf)) is required for experimental, clinical, and drug studies and for some case reports. For manuscripts concerning experimental research on humans, a statement verifying that written informed consent of the patients and volunteers was obtained following a detailed explanation of the procedures should be included.

5. All authors should submit a signed form stating their scientific contributions and responsibilities and that there is no conflict of interest. If present, funding and support received for the study should be indicated. Financial or in-kind aid, though partial, to the research and from which institution, body, and pharmaceutical company these aids came from should be stated as footnote before the references at the end of the full-text

6. Statements or opinions expressed in the manuscripts published in the Journal of Pediatric Infection reflect the views of the author(s). Payment of royalties to the manuscripts sent to the journal is not made. 

7. All manuscripts sent to be published should be prepared by meticulously complying to the spelling rules of the journal. After being evaluated and seen fit to be published by at least two reviewers, the manuscript is published in the journal. If required, the editors may send the manuscript to independent reviewers who are not in the editorial board and advisory board as regards the subject matter of the manuscript. Manuscripts not accepted for publishing are not sent back, and the authors do not lay a claim on this matter. The editors have the right to make amendments and reductions that do not alter the message of the manuscript.

8. The editors have the right to not publish the manuscripts not in conformity with the publishing rules or send back the manuscripts to the authors for corrections or reductions.  The authors are deemed to have accepted that corrections in the text can be made by the editors provided that fundamental changes are not performed as in the way of Turkish and English language.  

9. The language of the journal is Turkish and English. Turkish manuscripts should be in conformity with the dictionary of Turkish Linguistic Society (Türk Dil Kurumu) (www.tdk.gov.tr/) and the new Spelling Dictionary (http://www.tdk.gov.tr/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&id=50). The authors are expected to be meticulous and diligent in using Turkish terms. Anatomical terms should be given in their Latin equivalences. Terms set in everyday medical language should be written as how they are read according to Turkish spelling rules. Terms required by the authors to be written in their form in the foreign language should be indicated in inverted commas. Abbreviations can only be continued to be used in the rest of the text if explanation is given in its first occurrence. The name of the Latin microorganism used in the text should be shortened by using the first letter of the species and written in italics, as in Streptococcus pneumoniae/S. pneumoniae. Names set in our language “like streptokok and stafilokok” and names of antibiotics should be written in Turkish. Numbers smaller than ten without a unit beside should be written in in writing, and affixes used after numbers written in digits should be separated with apostrophe as in yedi çocuk, olguların 12’si (seven children, 12 of the cases). No space should be given after the percent (%) sign or numbers with units as in %95.12 mL. Sentences should not be started with a number unless mandatory, and the number should expressed verbally.

10. More than three manuscripts of the first author cannot be published in an issue of the journal.

Preparation of the Manuscript

The manuscripts should be sent via online manuscript acceptance system (www.emanuscript.org). The manuscript should be written on Windows 2003 or higher program with standard font size of 11, in Times News Roman character and with double-spacing. If present, quality photographs, graphics, and diagrams should be added and the manuscript be sent via online manuscript acceptance system (www.emanuscript.org).    

There should be 2.5 cm margins on both sides of the page, adjusted to left, and the pages should be numbered starting from the title page. Page number should be written on the right upper corner of every page. Original articles should not exceed 16, reviews 10, case reports 8 and letters to editor 2 pages. Each of the photographs, graphics and diagrams should be placed on separate pages.

Title page

The title of the manuscript should be short and appropriate for the text itself. The English title indicated in parenthesis under the Turkish title of the manuscript should be in conformity with the Turkish title. A short title (running head) of no more than 40 characters should be added to this section. Names, affiliations, academic degrees and addresses of all authors should be indicated as one under the other. Name and address of the clinic, department, institute, and institution the study took place should be stated. If the study has priorly been presented as a report in a congress or symposium, it should also be stated. 

Name, address, telephone (including the mobile phone number) and fax numbers, and email address of the corresponding author should be written. Acknowledgements can be given in this section, if necessary. The acknowledgment note should also be added before the references.

Abstract

Turkish and English abstracts should not exceed 350 words for reviews and original articles and 150 words for short articles and case studies. English title, running head and abstract should be equivalent to the Turkish title, running head and abstract. The abstract should briefly indicate the objective of the study and research, the methods(s) used, and main results should be stated in a way that they support the conclusion. The abstract should include Objective, Material and Methods, Results and Conclusion parts. Keywords should be written under Turkish and English abstracts. 

Keywords

There should be a maximum of five keywords in accordance with Index Medicus Medical Subject Headings (MESH) under the Turkish and English abstracts. If there are no proper terms in the Index Medicus medical topic titles for new terms, existing terms can be used. After the abstract, the main text of original articles should be structured with Introduction, Material and Methods (with subheadings), Results, Discussion, Conclusion, and References headings, and the main text of case reports should be structured with Introduction, Case Presentation(s), Discussion and References.  

Introduction

The objective and justification of the study and observation should be summarized. Data and conclusion of the study should not be given in this part.

Material and Methods

For experimental and clinical studies, ethics committee report, from where it has been received, the date, and number should be specified. References should be given to old and established methods, and brief explanations should be given to new ones. In the last paragraph of the material and methods heading, the statistical analyses used and what the values given with (±) mean after arithmetic mean or ratio should be indicated. The real value of probability (p) should be given  (i.e. p= 0.012 instead of p< 0.05).

Results

The results should be written clearly and in a manner that does not lead to any confusion. Unnecessary repetitions of the information specified in tables should be avoided. The tables should be written with titles and footnotes after the main text and references, each on separate pages. The tables should be numbered in sequence as regards the order they appear in the text. Abbreviations that are not standards should be explained with footnotes. Figures (charts, graphics and photographs) should be written after the main text and references, each on separate pages. Figures should be numbered in sequence as regards the order they appear in the text and their footnotes should be written respectively on a separate page.  

Discussion

The conclusions made should be compared with emphasis on prior literature, study results and original hypotheses and interpretations be made. 

References

References should be numbered in the full text of the manuscript in the sentence after “et al.” or in the end of the sentence in parenthesis with Arabic numbers, and the references should be given in parenthesis as regards the order they appear in the text. References should not exceed 40 in reviews and original articles and 15 in case reports. The references should be organized as demonstrated below in their original languages. Abbreviations used msut be in compliance with Index Medicus and Science Citation Index.

Journals: Abbreviations of journals are made according to the January issue of each year of Index Medicus. In articles with six and less than six authors, all names of the authors are given. In articles with seven or more writers, the names of the first six are written and “ve ark.” Is added for Turkish and “et al.” is added for English references. The ordering after the names of the authors is a s such: “Full title of the article. Name of the Journal. Volume Number. Page”   

i.e. Yılmaz Y, Candar T, Kara F. Serum sodium levels in children with lung infections. J Pediatr Inf 2016;10:10-3.

Book: The ordering is: “Name(s) of the author(s). Title of the book. City: Publishing House, Year.” Yazar(lar)ın ismi/isimleri. Kitap başlığı. Şehir: Yayınevi, Yıl.”

i.e. Janner D. A Clinical Guide to Pediatric Infectious Disease. Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2005.

Book section: The ordering is: “Name(s) of the author(s), Title of the section, Editors, Title of the book. Volume and Issue Number. City: Publishing House. Year:Pages.” 

i.e: Meissner HC, Hall CB. Respiratory syncytial virus. In: Cherry JD, Harrison GJ, Kaplan SL, Steinbach WJ, Hotez PJ (eds). Feigin & Cherry’s Textbook of Pediatric Infectious Diseases. 7th ed. Philadelphia: Elsevier Saunders, 2014:2407-34.

Congress proceedings: Should be given as such:

i.e.: Çetin BŞ, Çelebi S, Bozdemir ŞE.  Fungal infections and risk factors in hospitalized children. 8. National Pediatric Infectious Diseases Congress, 10-14 May 2013, Antalya, Turkey, Congress Book, Oral Presentation-08, p.175.

Unpublished observations and personal meetings cannot be used as references. Further information on references can be found on the website of “International Commitee of Medical Journal Editors” (www.icmje.org).

Pictures, Figures and Tables

Pictures and figures should be clear. Written publishing consent should be sent if these are taken from a previous published article of another author. Tables should not be repetitions of the text but make the text more easily understood and explained. Abbreviations used should be given as footnotes under the tables.

Reviews

Reviews should be written by authors with studies and citations on the matter based on their experience and information in the literature and should cover latest innovations and developments in our country. Abstracts should not exceed 350 words. References are limited to 40.

Case reports

Case reports should be instructive and specific. Abstracts should not exceed 150 words. References are limited to 15. 

Letters to Editor

Letters to editor discussed the importance, a part that has been overlooked or its drawback. There are no titles of headings. References are limited to 5. Full name and address of the author is given at the end. Evaluation to responses to letters is made by directly the Editor-in-Chief and/or receiving the opinion of the author(s) of the original manuscript.