Basics
The Journal of Health Administration follows the following ethical guidelines.

• Scientific rigour: research questions, methods and analyses should be appropriate and robust enough to generate useful, interpretable knowledge. Exposing humans or animals to risk without a realistic prospect of benefit to science or health is not acceptable.

• Respect for persons: including respect for dignity, autonomy, cultural context and privacy, with special care for those who may be vulnerable or have limited capacity to consent.

• Beneficence and non-maleficence: maximizing potential benefits and minimizing foreseeable harms, while maintaining a favorable risk–benefit balance throughout the project.

• Justice and fairness: fair selection of participants, equitable access to potential benefits, and avoidance of exploitation in low-resource settings.

• Integrity and accountability: honest design, conduct, analysis and reporting; willingness to correct the record when necessary; and openness to scrutiny by peers.

These basic ethical rules should be considered by editors, authors and editorial board.
 

Ethical considerations for authors 

Authorships
All authors must make a significant contribution in all of the following areas:

• Study design, data collection, or data analysis and interpretation

• Drafting the article or revising and editing the article

• Final approval of the article

Regarding the order and roles of authors, researchers must comply with the Ministry of Health’s ethical guidelines for authorship. The journal will not be held responsible for any disputes related to authorship order. Additionally, once an article is accepted, no changes will be made in terms of adding, removing, or rearranging authors, or changing the corresponding author.

Research involving human participants, and data
All submissions that involve human participants or identifiable personal data must demonstrate appropriate ethical oversight. Manuscripts should clearly state:

• the name of the responsible ethics committee or institutional review board;

• the approval number or written waiver (where applicable); and

• the main ethical frameworks or regulations followed (for example, the Declaration of Helsinki and relevant national regulations).

Ethical review is usually required not only for interventional clinical trials, but also for observational studies, registries, retrospective chart reviews, surveys, qualitative studies, and secondary analyses of identifiable data.
When formal ethics review was not required under local rules (for example, because data were fully anonymized before the research team received them), authors must explain the basis for this in the Methods section and describe how fundamental ethical principles – including respect for persons, confidentiality and fairness – were upheld in practice. In addition, the process of informed consent should be clearly described.

Use of AI
Application of AI should be according to the AI guide of the journal and publisher.
Misconducts
If any of the following unethical behaviors occur during the submission, peer review, editing, or publication stages of an article (or even after publication), it will be considered a violation of publication and research ethics, and the journal reserves the right to take legal actions:

• Data fabrication: Reporting false information or presenting fabricated data or results. This includes the unreal documentation of actions that were not performed or manipulation of study results.

• Data manipulation: Presenting research results in such a way that the details of the research method or the data collection or analysis process are altered, or data is omitted or modified, or minor results are exaggerated to conceal events in order to achieve certain research goals.

• Plagiarism: This includes the appropriation of another author’s thoughts, words, or ideas without proper citation, or presenting someone else’s results as original work. It also includes using someone else’s words or previously published sentences without attribution, even if they are the author’s own. The journal use plagiarism detection software in any stages of review process.

• Source manipulation: Citing multiple sources in an article that do not relate to the content, fabricating references, or intentionally altering the dates of references.

• Unnecessary self-citation: Citing previous unrelated works to artificially increase own or others’ citations.

• False affiliations: Attributing authorship to an institution, center, or research group that had no involvement in the original research.

• Resubmission: Submitting an article or part of it that is under review or in press at another journal.

• Failure to obtain a clinical trial registration number or IRB approval: For clinical trial studies, not obtaining a clinical trial registration number.

• Duplicate publication: Publishing data or findings from previous articles with only minor changes in a new article. Abstracts previously presented in conferences are allowed to be submitted to the Journal in full text, provided that the previous conference presentation is acknowledged.

• Any contact with editors or reviewers to manipulate the review process  

• Not appropriately reporting ethical considerations or conflicts of interests.

• Not complying with authorship criteria and adding authors without authorship criteria or removing authors with authorship criteria  

• Irresponsible and non-transparent use of AI

Re-publication of previously published articles in Journal of Health Administration in any language in other journals is not permitted.
*Authors may have published or submitted other articles from a same thesis/research. If a new article based on the same research is submitted to Journal of Health Administration, a copy of the previously published/submitted articles must be sent to Journal of Health Administration for evaluation.
If any of the above unethical behaviors are determined to be unintentional, the authors will be notified immediately, and they will be given an opportunity to correct the issue. However, if it is determined to be intentional, the authors will be informed, the article will be rejected, and if it has already been published, it will be retracted. Additionally, the authors will be placed on the journal's blacklist, and this will be communicated to the universities, institutions, and any other bodies where the authors may have used the publication as part of their credentials.
 

Ethical considerations for reviewers  
Peer review is a professional service that depends on expertise, fairness and confidentiality.
Reviewers should accept invitations only when they have suitable expertise and can commit to providing a thorough, unbiased review within a reasonable timeframe. If they feel unqualified, have insufficient time or identify a significant conflict of interest, they should decline promptly.
Manuscripts sent for review must be treated as confidential documents. Reviewers:

• must not share manuscripts with colleagues or students without the editor’s permission and appropriate acknowledgement;

• must not use unpublished data or ideas obtained through review for their own research or for others’ benefit without explicit consent from authors and the editor; and

• should focus their comments on the scientific content, clarity and ethical aspects of the work, avoiding personal or inflammatory language.

• Reviewers should declare any relationships or interests that could be perceived as influencing their assessment (for example, recent collaboration with the authors, institutional links, competing research programs or financial interests).

• Use of AI tools in peer review must follow the journal AI policy: in particular, confidential manuscripts and reports must not be uploaded to public AI services.

• Journal use double blind peer review. If reviewers are aware of authors, they should decline the review and inform the editor in chief. 

• Reviewers should avoid contacting authors.

• Reviewers should inform editor in chief any contacts by authors and decline the review. 

Any violations may be considered and treated as misconduct. 
 

Ethical considerations for editors

Decisions must be based on the manuscript’s content, not on authors’ personal characteristics, institutional affiliation, nationality, political views or discipline considerations. Editors must:

• manage conflicts of interest by declining to handle manuscripts where their judgment could reasonably be questioned (for example, due to recent collaboration, institutional ties or financial interests)

• should declare any relationships or interests that could be perceived as influencing their assessment

• organize fair and timely peer review, typically involving at least two independent reviewers with appropriate expertise

• treat manuscripts, reviews and correspondence as confidential, sharing them only with those directly involved in the editorial process

• avoid using unpublished information obtained through editorial work for personal research advantage or for others’ benefit without explicit permission.

• should focus their comments on the scientific content, clarity and ethical aspects of the work, avoiding personal or inflammatory language

• Use of AI tools must follow the journal AI policy

• Journal use double blind peer review. If they are aware of authors, they should decline the handling of manuscript and inform the editor in chief.

• They should avoid contacting authors

• They should inform editor in chief any contacts by authors and decline the handling of manuscript. 

Any violations may be considered and treated as misconduct.
 

How to raise concerns or complaints
Concerns about possible misconduct can be raised by editors, authors (including co-authors), reviewers, readers or other researchers, institutions, funders or regulatory bodies. To raise a concern or complaint, please contact the editorial office and provide, as far as possible:

• the article title, journal name and DOI or manuscript ID

• a clear description of the concern

• supporting evidence (for example, annotated figures, similarity reports, correspondence or relevant documents)

First steps will be taken by editor in chief when a concern is received. Editor will conduct an initial, confidential assessment to determine whether the issue appears credible and decide whether the matter can be handled through editorial correspondence with authors or whether it requires referral to institutional or funder-level investigation. During this stage, editors may request clarifications or original data from the authors, consult specialist editors, reviewers or external experts, or ethical review boards.

If the concern appears minor and can be resolved by explanation or a small correction, the editor will guide authors accordingly. If the concern suggests possible serious misconduct, a more formal investigation process is initiated.
 

Possible outcomes are from no action to corrections and retractions. Depending on the strength of evidence and severity of the issue, possible outcomes include:

• No action: when concerns are not supported by evidence or are based on misunderstanding.

• Clarification: minor issues addressed through correspondence or updated information on the article page.

• Correction / addendum: when the main findings remain valid but parts of the article require amendment, as described in the Corrections policy.

• Expression of concern: when serious doubts exist but investigations are incomplete or inconclusive.

• Retraction or withdrawal: when findings are unreliable or serious misconduct is confirmed.

• Rejection / removal during peer review: for submissions not yet published but affected by suspected misconduct.

Click here to download Ethical considerations