About

Aims and Scope

Acta medico-historica Rigensia (AMHR) is a refereed academic open access journal devoted to research in history of medicine and life sciences and medical museology in Latvia and Baltic see region countries. Published once a year since 2018, the journal collects original research papers in Latvian and in English, book and media reviews, as well as reports on relevant academic and museum events.

The journal dates back to 1957 and was previously published under the title Iz istorii meditsiny. In 1992 the journal was renamed to Acta medico-historica Rigensia. AMHR is published by the Institute of History of Medicine at Riga Stradiņš University.

Policies

Quality control policy

AMHR is a double blind peer-reviewed academic journal. There are at least two or more reviewers for each article in each issue.

Open access policy

Beginning with issue X (XXIX) AMHR is an open access journal which means that all content is freely available on the internet to all users immediately upon publication. Non-commercial use and distribution in any medium is permitted, as long as the author is properly credited.

Plagiarism policy

AMHR publishes original papers only. The AMHR is a member of CrossCheck. Manuscripts submitted for publication will be checked for potential plagiarism before undergoing peer review to verify their originality.

Licence and copyright policy

Beginning with the issue X (XXIX) AMHR is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) License, which allows users to read, copy, distribute and make derivative works for non-commercial purposes from the material, as long as the author of the original work is cited properly.

Author retains copyright without any restrictions.

Licence agreement

Authors grant AMHR a licence to publish the article and identify AMHR as the original publisher. Authors also grant any third party to use, distribute, reproduce and build upon the article in any non commercial medium, as long as the author of the original work is cited properly. All authors before the publication will be required to sign the Licence Agreement.

Archiving policy

The journal utilises the DSpace repository for the long-term storage, access and preservation of the digital content of AMHR.

Charges

With the support of Riga Stradiņš University the journal does not have article submission, processing and publishing charges.

Privacy statement

The names and e-mail addresses entered in this journal will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party.

Ethics and Malpractice Statements. Peer Review Process

The AMHR is committed to maintaining the best practice in the ethics of scholarly publishing. Our ethic statements are based on Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines.

Editor Responsibilities

Accountability

The editor of a journal is responsible for deciding which articles submitted to the journal should be accepted or rejected for publishing. The editor may be guided by the policies of the journal’s editorial board as well as by legal requirements regarding libel, copyright infringement and plagiarism. The editor may consult with other editors or reviewers when making publication decisions. The editors should maintain the integrity of the academic record, prevent business needs from compromising intellectual and ethical standards, and always be willing to publish corrections, clarifications, retractions, and apologies when needed.

Fair play

Editor's decision to accept or reject a paper for publication should be based only on the paper’s importance, originality, and clarity, and the study’s relevance to the aim and scope of the journal, without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the author(s).

Confidentiality

The editor and any editorial staff must not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in an editor’s own research without the express written consent of the author. The editor should seek to ensure a fair and appropriate peer review process. Editors should recuse themselves from considering manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest. Editors should require all contributors and reviewers to disclose relevant competing interests and publish corrections if competing interests are revealed after publication.

Involvement and cooperation in investigations

Editors should guard the integrity of the published record by issuing corrections and retractions when needed and pursuing suspected or alleged research and publication misconduct. Editors should pursue reviewer and editorial misconduct. An editor should take reasonably responsive measures when ethical complaints have been presented concerning a submitted manuscript or published paper.

Reviewer Responsibilities

Contribution to editorial decisions

Peer review assists the editor in making editorial decisions and, through the editorial communication with the author, may also assist the author in improving the manuscript.

Promptness

Peer reviewers agree to review manuscripts for which they have the subject expertise and which they can assess in timely manner. Reviewers that feel unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or know that its prompt review will be impossible should immediately notify the editor so that alternative reviewers can be contacted.

Confidentiality

Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. They manuscript should not be shown to or discussed with others except if authorised by the editor. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage.

Standards of objectivity

Reviews should be conducted objectively and constructively. Personal criticism of the author or hostility is unacceptable. Reviewers should express their views clearly with appropriate supporting arguments according to review form provided by the editor.

Acknowledgement of sources

Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also call to the editor's attention to any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published data of which they have personal knowledge.

Disclosure and conflict of interest

Reviewers should declare all potential conflicting interests and should not consider evaluating manuscript in which they have a relevant interest.

Author Responsibilities

Reporting standards

The research being reported should have been conducted in an ethical and responsible manner and should comply with all relevant legislation. The results should be presented clearly, honestly and without fabrication, falsification or inappropriate manipulation with the data or sources. The research methods should be described clearly and unambiguously. A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to confirm the veracity of the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behaviour and are unacceptable.

Originality, Plagiarism and duplicate publication

The authors should ensure that they have written entirely original works, and if the authors have used the work and/or words of others that this has been appropriately cited or quoted. Copyright material should be reproduced only with appropriate permission and acknowledgement. Authors should ensure that submitted paper has not been published elsewhere in any language. Parallel submission of the same manuscript to more than one journal constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.

Acknowledgement of sources

Proper acknowledgment of the work of others must always be given. Authors should also cite publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the reported work.

Authorship of the paper

Authorship should be limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the reported study. All those who have made significant contributions should be listed as co-authors. Where there are others who have participated in certain substantive aspects of the research project, they should be acknowledged. The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co-authors and no inappropriate coauthors are included in the author list of the manuscript, and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the paper and have agreed to its submission for publication.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

All authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial or other conflict of interest that might be construed to influence the results or interpretation in the manuscript. All sources of financial support for the project should be disclosed.

Fundamental errors in published works

When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her own published work, it is the author’s obligation to promptly notify the journal’s editor and cooperate with him/her to either retract the paper or to publish an appropriate erratum.