Excerpt from the P.I.E. Guidelines for E.B. Members – Consistency of conduct

1    Editors take full responsibility for the content of their publications and understand the effects that bad practice can have upon society at large. Robust systems should be in place to ensure all published content is correct, checked, and ethically sourced before publication.

2    Editorial board members must always balance the informative aspect of published material with public interest and sensibility.

3    Editorial staff should abstain from handling and publishing articles that may cause harm or place inequitable emphasis on religion, ethnicity, race, gender, sexuality, disability or other sensitive matters.

4    Inconvenient facts and information must not be censored from written material for the expedience of a document’s main proposal, discourse, or viewpoint.

5    Editorial staff must not consciously proffer manipulated data and misinformation in the content of their publications.

6    When corrections are necessary, the editorial board members are required to take swift action and make the required adjustments immediately.

7    If errors of any nature relating to the manuscript handling and publishing activity of an editorial board member are signalled, the editor-in-chief should immediately correct them according to the PIE guidelines. If there was no official complaint, then correcting to the recommendation of the individual who signalled the errors is the required course of action.

8    Any limitations that may have had an effect upon the finished content be it conflicting data, financial issues, or inconsistencies, must be relayed to the reader in full detail, to avoid confusion.

9    All research, including clinical trials involving humans and animals, must adhere to set ethical and legal legislative standards. Editorial staff should be or able to be in possession of all official certification regarding ethical committees, consent forms, as well as the necessary documentation asserting the ethical and legal sourcing of the data used.

10     Editorial board members are part of a wider community and should be active in encouraging consistency in their teams conduct. This can include supporting their publications, attending all board meetings, and acting as a positive ambassador for their organisation.