Mansoura Journal of Forensic Medicine & Clinical Toxicology is a peer-reviewed journal that offers an Open Access platform for the authors to publish their research outcomes. It is published by the Department of Forensic Medicine and Clinical Toxicology, Faculty of Medicine, Mansoura University, Egypt. The journal allows the scientific community to explore its vast knowledge by publishing original contributions of all types like original research articles, review articles, clinical investigations, and case reports. Last but not least, commentary and letters to the editor are also welcomed.

All submissions are peer-reviewed by at least two independent reviewers using a double-blind policy through an editorial board composed of experts in this field. The first decision is achieved in 2-3 weeks.

Publication Schedule

Mansoura Journal of Forensic Medicine & Clinical Toxicology (MJFMCT) is published biannually. The first issue is released in January and the second issue in July.

Peer reviewing Process

Editors of MJFMCT shall ensure timely peer review and publication for papers they receive.

Authors should be aware that priority for publication is most likely for papers that, as judged by the journal’s editorial staff, may have important implications. The timing of publication may also be influenced by themed issues or if editors group submissions on a similar topic which, inevitably, prevents them from being published in the order that articles were accepted.

All submissions are peer-reviewed by at least two independent reviewers using a double-blind policy by expert reviewers in this field. The review process takes 2-3 weeks.

1-  Submitted manuscripts are reviewed initially by the MJFMCT chief and associate editors for the scope, structure, and language. Then manuscripts will be evaluated by reviewers according to standards set in the authors' guidelines

2-  The following elements (as appropriate) will be checked: • Confirmation that the authors have read and understood the Instructions to Authors •Authorship statement explaining what each author contributed to the paper •Funding information • Competing interests declaration •Permission obtained for use of copyrighted material from other sources •Documentation for any citations to unpublished work (eg, articles in press/personal communications) •Information about previous submissions to other journals (eg, name of the journal, reviewer comments) •Confirmation that the manuscript has been submitted solely to our journal and is not published, in the press or submitted elsewhere

3-   Manuscripts that do not follow these criteria will be rejected. 

Open-access Policy

• MJFMCT is permanently committed to maintaining this open-access publishing policy, retrospectively and prospectively.
• While allowing articles to be published and made freely available for all to access online, this form of copyright agreement enables the owners of intellectual property to retain copyright in their journal articles
• As such, every article appearing in MJFMCT is 'open access' and meant to be:

1. Universally and freely accessible via the Internet, in an easily readable agreed format; in at least one widely and internationally recognized open-access repository.
2. Author(s) or the journal irrevocably grant(s) to any third party, in advance and in perpetuity, the right to use, reproduce, or disseminate the article in its entirety or in part, in any format or medium, provided that no substantive errors are introduced in the process, proper attribution of authorship and correct citation details are given, and that the bibliographic details are not changed. If the article/book is reproduced or disseminated in part, this must be clearly and unequivocally indicated.

Open Access Publication

Definition of Open Access Publication from Bethesda Statement on Open Access Publishing (^{1, 2)}:  An Open Access Publication meets the following two conditions:

1. The author(s) and copyright holder(s) grant(s) to all users a free, irrevocable, worldwide, perpetual right of access to, and a license to copy, use, distribute, transmit and display the work publicly and to make and distribute derivative works, in any digital medium for any responsible purpose, subject to proper attribution of authorship, as well as the right to make small numbers of printed copies for their personal use.
2. A complete version of the work and all supplemental materials, including a copy of the permission as stated above, in a suitable standard electronic format, is deposited immediately upon initial publication in at least one online repository that is supported by an academic institution, scholarly society, government agency, or other well-established organization that seeks to enable open access, unrestricted distribution, interoperability, and long-term archiving (for the biomedical sciences, PubMed Central is such a repository).

Advantages of open-access publishing ⁽³⁾:

• Free availability due to unrestricted online access to anyone. This maximizes visibility, and thus the uptake and use of the work published
• Authors are keeping their copyrights. Publications can be reused and redistributed as long as the original author is correctly attributed.
• High quality and rigorous peer review by running through the same peer review, production and publishing processes similar to journals published under the traditional subscription-based model.
• Rapid publication through a streamlined and easy-to-use online submission and production process which enables quick review, approval and publication.
• No space constraints for supplementary material including figures, extensive data and video footage.
• Compliance with open access mandates from funding sources or academic institutions in the fastest and easiest way. Final articles can be deposited into bibliographic databases and institutional repositories without any embargo periods
• Citation tracking and inclusion in bibliographic databases
  Open access journals are tracked for impact factors and are deposited into bibliographic databases and institutional repositories without any embargo period just as traditional journals. 

1. http://legacy.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/bethesda.htm#definition
2. https://authorservices.wiley.com/open-research/open-access/about-wiley-open-access/open-access-policy.html
3. https://www.springeropen.com/about/open-access

Copyright Policy:
The journal allows the author(s) to hold the copyright, and retain publishing rights without any restrictions.

Open access:

The journal is an open-access journal. Users have the right to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of articles under the following conditions: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

For more information:

This work is licensed under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Plagiarism:

The journal has a strict policy against plagiarism. All submitted manuscripts are checked for plagiarism using professional plagiarism-checking software. Submitted manuscripts with an unacceptable similarity index resulting from plagiarism are rejected immediately.