Conflicts of Interest, Human and Animal Rights and Ethical Opinion

Conflicts of Interest and Funding Information. Corporate, institutional, and/or commercial affiliations should be mentioned on the Title Page, as well as possible conflicts of interest of one or more authors that may influence the manuscript. If a commercial product is mentioned in the manuscript, authors must state whether they have a financial or contractual relationship with the company. If the Editor-in-Chief detects undeclared conflicts, he/she will consult the corresponding author. If the answer is not considered acceptable and characterized as a deliberate omission, the article may be rejected or published with a mention of the loss of reliability.

Ethics Committee Approval (does not apply to narrative revision articles or RCTs). Along with the submission of the manuscript, it is mandatory to send a statement that all procedures were approved by a research ethics committee appointed by the National Research Ethics Committee of the Ministry of Health (CONEP) (Brazilian Ministry of Health, National Health Council, Resolution nr. 466 of 2012 on research involving human subjects). In the case of non-Brazilian authors/institutions, manuscripts must comply with the Helsinki Declaration and local ethical standards. Proper obtaining informed consent when applicable should also be described. In experimental animal studies, the guidelines applicable to the corresponding type of work must be observed (according to Resolution Nr. 879 of 2008 of the Federal Council of Veterinary Medicine). Animal studies should also follow the guidelines applied to the corresponding study type as the standards established in the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (Institute of Laboratory Animal Resources, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC, 1996) and determinations National Council for the Control of Animal Experimentation (CONCEA) and have approval from the institution's Ethics Committee on Animal Use (CEUA). Free and informed consent form (ICF) terms should be collected and indicated in the text whenever possible. It is optional to send signed ICFs together with the submission. For research on animals and humans, the number of the ethics committee approval report must be explicit in the body of the manuscript, which attests that the project has been appropriately appreciated and approved.

Clinical Trials Registry. Clinical trial articles should be registered in one of the WHO and ICMJE-validated Clinical Trials Registry, whose addresses are available on the ICMJE website (e.g., www.clinicaltrials.gov, www.ISRCTN.org, www.umin.ac.jp/ctr/index.htm and www.trialregister.nl). In Brazil, registration must done at the ReBEC website (http://www.ensaiosclinicos.gov.br/). To do this, you must first obtain a work registration number, called UTN ( Universal Trial Number ), at the link http://www.who.int/ictrp/unambiguous_identification/utn/en/, and also import an XML file from the study filed at Plataforma Brasil. The identification number must be registered at the end of the summary. All articles resulting from randomized controlled trials must have been given an identification number in these records.    

Register of Systematic Reviews. Manuscripts classified as Systematic Reviews must show their registration in the PROSPERO (International prospective register of systematic reviews) public registration database. Narrative, scoping, and integrative reviews do not fit this register.  

Originality. Manuscripts submitted must be unpublished and not under consideration for publication in any other media. Papers will be immediately evaluated for plagiarism. Updates of previously published studies are accepted as long as the authors submit the previous article for review by the Editors. Papers updates with at least 50% or more patients or a follow-up of at least 2 additional years are generally accepted. The previous work must be mentioned in the Methods section in this case. However, plagiarism will not be allowed in the Introduction and Discussion sections.