At KnE Publishing, we aim to ensure everything we publish is ethically sound and complies with the policies and principles set out by:

• Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE)
• Council of Science Editors (CSE)
• European Association of Science Editors (EASE)  
• International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE)
• World Association of Medical Editors (WAME)

We ask that all our authors comply with the following standards:

• Any manuscript submitted is an original piece of work that has not been published anywhere else in a current or similar form. However, suppose a substantial portion of the manuscript has been published elsewhere. In that case, that journal editor needs to provide permission for its re-use, and this must be acknowledged in the new work and declared to the journal editor on submission. Note that all manuscripts submitted to our journals are subjected to a Crossref Similarity Check to identify potential plagiarism or copyright infringement issues.
• Any manuscript submitted must not be currently under consideration by any other journal or publisher.
• All conflicts of interest must be declared upon submission.
• In submitting your work for consideration, you offer a personal guarantee that the work does not infringe on any existing copyright.
• Authorship: The COPE’s Guideline on Authorship and AI Tools state that AI tools cannot be listed as an author of a paper. As non-legal entities, they can neither take responsibility for the submitted work and assert the presence or absence of conflicts of interest nor manage copyright and license agreements. Authors who use AI tools in the writing of a manuscript, production of images or graphical elements of the paper, or in the collection and analysis of data, must disclose clearly in the Materials and Methods (or similar section) of the paper how and which AI tool was used. Authors are fully responsible for the content of their manuscript, including the parts produced by an AI tool, and are thus liable for any breach of publication ethics.

Human and animal research

Any research involving humans must adhere to the Declaration of Helsinki Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects. In addition, all research participants should be informed about the study's aims and any possible adverse effects of the intervention and written informed consent must be obtained from all participants.

Research involving animals must adhere to the National Institutes of Health guidelines for the care and use of laboratory animals. In addition, the authors must describe any anesthetic or surgical procedures used, as well as evidence that all possible steps were taken to avoid animal suffering at each stage of the experiment.

Approval for research involving humans or animals must be obtained from an institutional or local review board.

This information, the name of the review board, and approval numbers / codes should be stated in the manuscript.

Ethical considerations must be clearly addressed in the methods section.

The Journal reserves the right to request the related documents.

Clinical trials

According to the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), a clinical trial is “any research study that prospectively assigns human participants or groups of humans to one or more health-related interventions to evaluate the effects on health outcomes”.

Authors of clinical trials are required to prospectively register their trial with one of the trial registries recognised by the ICMJE or World Health Organization.

The registration number of the trial and the name of the trial registry must be mentioned in the manuscript.

Medical Sciences requires a completed CONSORT 2010 checklist and flow diagram as a condition of submission when reporting the results of a randomized trial. Templates for these can be found on the CONSORT website, which also describes several CONSORT checklist extensions for different designs and types of data beyond two parallel-group trials. At a minimum, your article should report the content addressed by each item of the checklist. Meeting these basic reporting requirements will significantly improve the value of your trial report and may enhance its chances for eventual publication.

Plagiarism

All manuscripts submitted to our journals are screened for plagiarism using the Crossref Similarity Check powered by iThenticate.

Conflicts of interest

All conflicts of interest (including financial, personal, academic, and/or ideological) must be declared upon submission. If no conflicts exist, the authors should state this. It should be noted that editors and reviewers are likewise responsible for disclosing any conflicts of interest.

The Journal of Spine Practice has clear definitions of conflicts of interest and processes for handling conflicts of interest of authors, reviewers, editors, journals and publishers, whether identified before or after publication.

• Authors are required to submit a conflict of interest form prior to publication. The Journal adopts the ICMJE’s Conflict of Interest form
• All published manuscripts contain a conflict of interest statement for each author, even if no conflicts exist
• All published manuscripts contain a statement regarding funding, whether or not the study was funded, and about the role(s) of the funder(s) (e.g., involvement in the design, analysis, or writing, or control over publication)
• Reviewers are required to declare any conflicts of interest prior to agreeing to review a manuscript
• Members of the Editorial Board are required to declare any conflicts of interest prior to joining the Editorial Board
• All members of the Saudi Spine Society Board of Directors are required to sign a commitment of editorial independence for the Journal Editorial Board
• The Publisher has signed a contract with the Journal to declare any conflicts of interest
• The Journal Sponsorship policy governs sponsorship handled by the Society

The Journal of Spine Practice adheres to the conflict of interest definition outlined by Paul Romain, who states that "Circumstances that create a risk that professional judgments or actions regarding a primary interest will be unduly influenced by a secondary interest" (https://doi.org/10.1007/s12178-015-9270-2).

The Journal of Spine Practice follows the COPE flowcharts for the following scenarios of suspected nondisclosure of conflicts of interest:

• When a reviewer suspects undisclosed conflict of interest in a submitted manuscript
• When a reader suspects undisclosed conflict of interest in a published article

Retraction policy

This journal adheres to the Guidelines for retracting articles published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

A retraction may be considered in cases such as:

• A major unintentional error (miscalculation or experimental error) which invalidates the findings or conclusions of the authors
• Fabricated or falsified data, or other misconduct
• Figure or image manipulation
• Plagiarism
• Copyright infringement
• Redundant publication: publication of the findings elsewhere without proper attribution or permission
• Use of unethical research practices in conducting the study
• Identification of major competing interest that was not disclosed and is thought to have potentially influenced the results or their interpretation

Grievance procedure

The Journal of Spine Practice draws from the guidelines presented by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) to manage complaints and disputes. Should they arise, complaints and/or disputes may be directed to publishing@knowledgee.com.

Privacy statement

The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used for the stated purposes of this journal.

Upon publishing, all authors will be automatically registered for content alerts from the publication. To stop receiving the alerts, authors can subsequently unsubscribe through the link provided in the email.

These email addresses will not be made available to any other party.