• Focus and Scope
  • Section Policies
  • Peer Review Process
  • Publication Frequency
  • Open Access Policy
  • Legal disclaimer
  • Ethics
  • Conflict of Interest
  • Indexing & Abstracting
  • Focus and Scope

    Journal of Ophthalmic and Optometric Sciences (JOOS) aims to provide a new opportunity to advance the field of ophthalmologic and optometric research and to make a bridge between Iranian researchers and fellow scientists globally. This open access journal is published in print and online and includes high quality manuscripts covering basic and clinical aspects of ophthalmic and optometric disorders such as: diagnosis, treatment, epidemiology, etiology, biology and molecular aspects as well as clinical genetics of these diseases. We also cover articles regarding the history of contemporary ophthalmology and optometry in Iran. Manuscripts narrating the history of modern ophthalmology and optometry in Iran, the outstanding scientists’ contribution to its progress, and the improvement of our ophthalmic care system over the past decades are important to us and are welcome.

     

    Section Policies

    Case Reports

    Case reports should not exceed 1500 words and should include abstract, keywords, introduction, case presentation, discussion, conclusion acknowledgment, references, and 1 to 4 figures or tables. Necessary documentations of the case(s) like ophthalmic pathology and laboratory test results should be included. All case reports should contain patients’ informed consent and the approval of the ethics committee of the corresponding institution. 

     

    Original Articles

    Original articles should contain title page, abstract, keywords, introduction, materials and methods, results, discussion, acknowledgment, references, tables, and figures, enumerated from the title page. The length of the text should be limited to 3000 words excluding the references and abstract. Clinical trials should contain patients’ informed consent and the approval of the ethics committee of the corresponding institution. 

     

    Review Articles

    Review articles might be requested by the editor, but JOOS will also accept submitted reviews. The authors of review articles are encouraged to contact the editorial office before preparing a review article. Both solicited and unsolicited review articles are subjected to editorial and peer review similar to original papers.

     

    Letters to Editor

    Journal of Ophthalmic and Optometric Sciences accepts letters to editor. Letters should be less than 500 words and discuss articles published in the journal during the previous six months or other important aspects related to the field of ophthalmology or optometry. Letters will undergo peer-review processing and will be edited for clarity.

     

    Peer Review Process

     The peer review process in JOOS starts when corresponding author submits the paper to the journal via the journal’s online system or email. In the next step the editorial office checks the paper’s composition and arrangement against the journal’s Author Guidelines to make sure it includes the required sections and stylizations. The quality of the paper is not assessed at this point. The manuscript will be then appraised by the executive editor to make a decision if paper is appropriate for the journal and is sufficiently original and interesting. If not, the paper may be rejected without being reviewed any further. In the next step the executive editor sends the manuscript to 2 appropriate reviewers. If major shortcomings are found at this stage, the reviewers may reject the paper without further work. Otherwise the reviewers submit their review to the journal as accepted or with a request for revision before it is reconsidered. The executive editor evaluates the reviews and considers all the reviewers comments and suggestions before making an overall decision to accept or reject the manuscript.  At this stage if the executive decides to continue the process he sends an email to the corresponding author including any relevant reviewer comments and his own constructive comments to help the author improve the article. If the paper is sent back for revision, the reviewers should expect to receive a new version, unless they have opted out of further participation. However, where only minor changes are requested this follow-up review might be done by the executive editor. If the authors can successfully perform the requested changes the article will be accepted and a formal acceptance letter will be sent for the corresponding author.

     

    Publication Frequency

    This journal is a quarterly publication published at the first month of each season. As soon as an article is ready for publication it will be posted in our website if a spot is available in the current issue as ahead of print.

     

    Open Access Policy

    Journal of Ophthalmic and Optometric Sciences gives immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge, meaning:

     

    • Everyone has free and unlimited access to the full-text of articles published in Journal of Ophthalmic and Optometric Sciences; manuscripts are freely available without subscription or price barriers.
    • Papers are immediately released in open access format (no long waiting periods),

     

    Legal disclaimer

    All articles in JOOS are the opinions of authors and are not endorsed by "The Basir Eye Health Research Center". The advertisements in the journal do not reveal a warranty, endorsement or approval of any products or services described in JOOS. "Basir Eye Health Research Center" disclaims responsibility for any injury or property loss resulting from any ideas or products referred to in the articles or advertisements.

     

    Ethics

    By submitting your manuscript to this journal it is understood that the manuscript is an unpublished work and is not under consideration elsewhere. Authors should follow the standards with respect to publication ethics as described by the Commission on Publication Ethics (COPE). Plagiarism, falsification or fabrication of data including duplicate publication of the authors’ own work without proper citation, are unacceptable practices. Any cases of ethical misconduct are treated very seriously and will be dealt with in accordance with the COPE guidelines.

    For studies involving human participants or animals, authors are expected to provide approval of regional/ national/ institutional or independent Ethics Committee or Review Board. Obtaining informed consent from adult research participants and obtaining parental assent for children is mandatory. When reporting experiments on animals, indicate what institutional or national or international guide on the care and use of laboratory animals was followed. When reporting studies on human beings authors should follow the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000 (available at http://www.wma.net/e/policy/17-c_e.html). 

    All clinical trials submitted to this journal should have been registered in a public trials registry at or before the time of first patient enrollment as a condition of consideration for publication.
    It is the author's responsibility to ensure that a patient's anonymity is carefully protected and avoid mentioning participants’ names, initials or hospital numbers, especially in illustrative material. For photographs or videos, the author must obtain written and signed permission from the patient if the patient could be recognizable.
    Each person listed as an author is expected to have participated in the study to a significant extent. JOOS abides by the Authorship Criteria as set by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. Please visit http://www.icmje.org/index.html to review the criteria and to determine whether contributors should be listed as authors or be listed in the acknowledgments.
    Authors must submit written permission from the copyright owner (usually the publisher) to use direct quotations, tables, or illustrations that have appeared in copyrighted form elsewhere, along with complete details about the source. Any permission fees that might be required by the copyright owner are the responsibility of the authors requesting use of the borrowed material.

     

    Conflict of Interest

    As part of the submission process, corresponding authors are required to confirm whether they or their co-authors have any conflicts of interest to declare, and to provide details of these conflicts. 
    If the manuscript is published, conflict of interest information will be communicated in a statement in the published paper conflict of interest.

     

    Indexing & Abstracting

    Articles of this journal are accessible in: Google Scholar