Publishing Ethics

The journal ENT Updates requires all individuals involved in the publishing process to adhere to the highest ethical standards as outlined by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

The editorial team is committed to maintaining a rigorous peer-review process and upholding strict ethical policies to ensure the publication of high-quality scientific research. While the journal strives to maintain the highest standards, instances of unethical practices such as plagiarism, data falsification, image manipulation, and inappropriate authorship credit may occur.

The editorial team takes all ethical concerns seriously and adheres to a zero-tolerance policy regarding such issues. In the event of any suspected misconduct, in-house editors will conduct a thorough investigation, which may involve contacting the authors' institutions or funders if necessary. If misconduct is confirmed, the journal will conduct a reasonably rigorous investigation and take all allegations of potential misconduct seriously according to the COPE flowchart.

Authors are expected to comply with the best practices in ethical publishing when submitting their work to ENT Updates.

Plagiarism, Data Fabrication and Image Manipulation

ENT Updates adheres to strict ethical standards and does not tolerate any form of plagiarism, data fabrication, or image manipulation.

Plagiarism involves the uncredited use of text, ideas, images, or data from any source—including the authors’ own previously published work. All reused text must be placed within quotation marks and properly cited. If the design, structure, or language of a manuscript is inspired by previous studies, those sources must be clearly acknowledged.

All manuscripts submitted to the journal are screened for plagiarism using industry-standard software (e.g., iThenticate). Submissions found to contain plagiarized content during peer review will be rejected. If plagiarism is discovered post-publication, the journal will conduct an investigation and take appropriate corrective action, which may include retraction.

Image manipulation is strictly prohibited if it leads to misrepresentation or distortion of the original data. Unacceptable practices include:

• Adding, removing, enhancing, or altering features in an image;
• Combining images that should be presented separately (e.g., different parts of the same gel or different experiments);
• Adjusting contrast, brightness, or color in a way that conceals or exaggerates findings.

Suspected image manipulation will be carefully reviewed. If confirmed, the manuscript may be rejected during peer review or corrected/retracted after publication.

Data integrity is essential. Authors must ensure that all data presented are accurate, original, and not selectively reported or manipulated. Unethical practices include:

• Fabrication or falsification of data;
• Omitting data points to exaggerate results;
• Selectively presenting findings that support a desired conclusion while ignoring contradictory data;
• Using biased analysis methods or statistical tools to influence outcomes (e.g., p-hacking).

Authors are encouraged to preregister their study design and analysis plans to enhance transparency and reproducibility.

The journal is committed to upholding the highest standards of publication ethics and reserves the right to take action in cases of confirmed misconduct.

Authorship

UK Scientific Publishing Limited follows the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) guidelines which state that in order to qualify for authorship of a manuscript, authors must meet all four criteria:

• Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work;
• Drafting the work or reviewing it critically for important intellectual content;
• Final approval of the version to be published;
• Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Those who contributed to the work but do not qualify for authorship should be listed in the acknowledgments. More detailed guidance on authorship is given by ICMJE.

Any change to the author list during the editorial process or after publication should be approved by all authors, including any who have been removed. We reserve the right to request evidence of authorship, and changes to authorship after acceptance will be made at the discretion of UK Scientific Publishing Limited.

Author Contributions

For complete transparency, all submitted manuscripts should include an author contributorship statement that specifies the work of each author. For research articles with several authors, a short paragraph specifying their individual contributions must be provided.

The following statements should be used: Conceptualization, X.X. and Y.Y.; methodology, X.X.; software, X.X.; validation, X.X., Y.Y. and Z.Z.; formal analysis, X.X.; investigation, X.X.; resources, X.X.; data curation, X.X.; writing—original draft preparation, X.X.; writing—review and editing, X.X.; visualization, X.X.; supervision, X.X.; project administration, X.X.; funding acquisition, Y.Y. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Please refer to the CRediT taxonomy for an explanation of the terms. Authorship must be limited to those who have contributed substantially to the work reported.

The corresponding author should act as a point of contact between the editor and the other authors, keep co-authors informed, and involve them in major decisions about the publication.

Joint first authors can be indicated by the inclusion of the statement “X and X contributed equally to this paper” in the manuscript. The roles of the equal authors should also be adequately disclosed in the contributorship statement.

For review articles, where individual statements are less applicable, a statement should be included that clarifies who was responsible for the ideation, who performed the literature search and/or data analysis, and who drafted and revised the work.

For articles that are principally based on a student’s dissertation or thesis, UK Scientific Publishing Limited recommends that the student is listed as principal author.

Consortium/Group Authorship

If authorship is retained by the consortium or group, the consortium or group should be listed as an author. Individual consortium/group author members listed in the author byline must qualify for authorship according to ICMJE guidelines.

Where work is presented by the author(s) on behalf of a consortium or group, this should be clarified in the author list, for example, “Author A on behalf of XXX Consortium/Group”. The consortium/group will not retain authorship and will only appear in the author list.

If provided, the consortium/group members will be listed in a separate section at the end of the article in Acknowledgments, Appendix or Supplementary Materials.

Authorship and the Use of AI or AI-Assisted Technologies

UK Scientific Publishing Limited follows the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) position statement when it comes to the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and AI-assisted technology in manuscript preparation. Tools such as ChatGPT and other large language models (LLMs) do not meet authorship criteria and thus cannot be listed as authors on manuscripts.

In situations where AI or AI-assisted tools have been used in the preparation of a manuscript, this must be appropriately declared with sufficient details at submission via the cover letter. Furthermore, authors are required to be transparent about the use of these tools and disclose details of how the AI tool was used within the “Materials and Methods” section, in addition to providing the AI tool’s product details within the “Acknowledgments” section.

Authors are fully responsible for the originality, validity, and integrity of the content of their manuscript, including any material contributed by AI or AI-assisted tools, and must ensure, through careful review, that this content complies with all UK Scientific Publishing Limited’s publication ethics policies.

Deceased Authors

If a manuscript is submitted with a deceased author included in the authorship, or if an author passes away during peer review, the corresponding author, or co-authors, should inform the editorial office. If the deceased author was a corresponding author, the authorship group should nominate a co-author for this role. The corresponding author should confirm the contribution of the deceased author and any potential conflicts of interest. Upon publication, a note will be added under the author list.

Changes to Authorship

Authors are expected to carefully consider authorship before manuscript submission. Any change to the author list should be made during the editorial process, before manuscript acceptance. Authorship changes, including any addition, removal, or rearrangement of author names will require the approval of all authors including any to be removed. To request any change in authorship, the journal must receive a completed authorship change form that includes the signatures of all authors, and provides a reason for the change. Any changes to authorship requested after manuscript acceptance will result in a delay in publication. If the manuscript has already been published, requests for a change in authorship will be evaluated and require the publication of a Correction. We reserve the right to request evidence of authorship, and changes to authorship after acceptance will be made at the discretion of UK Scientific Publishing Limited.

Authorship Disputes

UK Scientific Publishing Limited follows the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines when it comes to resolving authorship disputes that may occur either during processing or post-publication. Here, COPE guidelines clearly state that Journals are not in a position to adjudicate on appropriate authorship contributions (https:/publicationethics.org/resources/discussion-documents/authorship) and that disputed authorship is not usually grounds for retraction when “there is no reason to doubt the validity of the findings” (https://publicationethics.org/retraction-guidelines).

In situations where disputes cannot be settled by the affected parties, Journals will reach out to an appropriate Institution or Governing Body for final adjudication. UK Scientific Publishing Limited reserves the right to amend authorship lists in line with Institution or Governing Body recommendations.

Conflict of Interest

Authors’ Declaration of Conflict of Interest
In accordance with the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), authors are required to disclose all relationships or interests that could inappropriately influence—or be perceived to influence—the submitted work. Conflicts of interest can be financial or non-financial, professional or personal, and may relate to individual authors or their institutions.

Examples of potential conflicts include (but are not limited to):

• Financial relationships: employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, paid expert testimony, patents, grants, or other funding.
• Non-financial relationships: personal or professional relationships, affiliations, academic competition, ideological or political beliefs.

Authors must clearly disclose any potential conflicts in the manuscript, in a dedicated section titled “Conflicts of Interest”, located just before the reference list. If there is no conflict, the following statement should be included:
“Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.”

If the research received external funding, authors must also disclose the role of the funder. If the funder had no role in the study, authors should state:
“The funding sponsors had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript, or in the decision to publish the results.”

All disclosures must also be made at the time of submission via the journal’s online system.

Important note:
UK Scientific Publishing Limited does not accept studies funded (either partially or fully) by the tobacco industry. Manuscripts on smoking cessation or tobacco harm reduction will be considered only if they are free of such funding sources. For studies funded by other industries (e.g., pharmaceutical, food, chemical), the role of the sponsor in the study design and data interpretation must be fully disclosed.

Reviewers’ Declaration of Conflict of Interest
All reviewers are required to declare any potential conflicts of interest before accepting a manuscript for review. Reviewers should decline the invitation to review if they have any of the following relationships with the authors or the work, as these may unduly influence—or be perceived to influence—their objectivity:

• Collaborations with the authors within the past three years or ongoing collaborative projects.
• Shared institutional affiliation with any of the authors at the time of review.
• Personal relationships, disputes, or academic competition with any of the authors.
• Financial interests or investments that may be affected by the publication or rejection of the manuscript.
• Involvement in directly competing research or related intellectual property.

Since ENT Updates adopts a double-blind peer review process, reviewer and author identities are kept confidential to the extent possible. However, if a reviewer becomes aware of the authors’ identity and a potential conflict exists, they should immediately notify the handling editor or editorial office and withdraw from the review if necessary.

Editorial Staff’s Declaration of Conflict of Interest
All editorial staff at UK Scientific Publishing Limited are required to declare any interests—financial, academic, or otherwise—that may affect or be perceived to affect their editorial decisions. Editorial independence is strictly enforced, and acceptance decisions are based solely on scientific merit and editorial standards, without any influence from commercial considerations.

Failure to disclose potential conflicts is considered a serious violation of professional conduct and may result in disciplinary action.