Open Access Policy

Duhok Medical Journal (DMJ) is a peer-reviewed, Open Access journal that allows all content to be freely available without charge to the user or his/her institution. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This policy follows the Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI) definition of open access.

The Duhok Medical Journal is a signatory journal to the uniform requirement for manuscripts submitted to biomedical journals, February 2006 http://web.uod.ac/ac/c/com/duhok-medical-journal/archive/ [updated 2017] http://dmj.uod.ac/index.php/dmj/index/ . The Journal has obtained the International Standard Serial Number: ISSN 2071-7326  (Print) and is in processing to obtain ISSN 2071-7334 (Online). The ISSNs listed above are officially registered at https://issn.org

In addition, DMJ has obtained the Digital Object Identifier (DOI) from Crossref Organization  which will be identified via this link https://doi.org/10.31386/eissn.2071-7334

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Aims and Scope

The Duhok Medical Journal (DMJ) is a non-profit peer-reviewed scientific journal published biannually by Duhok College of Medicine, University of Duhok, Kurdistan Region- Iraq dedicated to the advancement of medical and health sciences. The journal publishes high-quality research articles, review papers, case reports, and short communications across all areas of medicine, public health, dentistry, pharmacy, nursing, and biomedical sciences. DMJ seeks to promote scientific knowledge that improves health outcomes and clinical practice regionally and globally. The DMJ also publishes short articles, letters to editors, review articles, and case reports.

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Editorial Board

The Duhok Medical Journal (DMJ) maintains an experienced and multidisciplinary Editorial Board composed of qualified academics and clinicians from Iraq and around the world. The Editorial Board includes: Academic staff from the University of Duhok; Faculty from other universities across Iraq and International experts.

Each member’s name, academic title, and institutional affiliation are listed on the Editorial Board page of the journal’s website. All members are affiliated with reputable universities, hospitals, or research institutions, ensuring both scientific rigor and global representation in editorial decisions.

The Board is committed to maintaining transparency, high ethical standards, and international collaboration in the peer-review and publication process.

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Instructions for Authors

Detailed submission guidelines, manuscript formatting requirements, and ethical standards are provided on the Instructions for Authors page (Authors Guidelines). Authors are required to Register with the journal before submission and must ensure that manuscripts comply with the journal’s editorial policies and ethical principles.

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Editorial Process (Peer Review)

All manuscripts submitted to DMJ undergo an initial editorial screening followed by a double-blind peer-review process involving at least two independent reviewers.
Decisions are based on originality, scientific quality, and relevance. The editorial team ensures confidentiality and fairness throughout the review process.

  • Average time from submission to first decision: 28 days

  • Average time from submission to final acceptance: 70–90 days

  • Acceptance rate: 56%

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Peer Review Process

All manuscripts submitted for publication in DMJ are strictly and thoroughly peer-reviewed. The review process is double-blind. If the manuscript is accepted for a full review, it will be reviewed by a minimum of two external reviewers.

Submitted manuscripts will undergo an initial check including a Plagiarism Check in the Editorial Office via using the Turnitin software to compute and assess the percentage of similarity of the research (Up to 25% is allowed). The content and outcomes of the manuscripts submitted for publication to the DMJ are the responsibility of the author. An Editorial Office takes charge of the peer-review process. It starts with a preliminary review by the Editor (finished in more than 15 working days after manuscript submission).

After a manuscript is accepted for a full review, the Editor will send the manuscript to at least two reviewers (registered with the DMJ system) specialized in the research field inside and/or outside the Kurdistan region for evaluation. Within an average of 4-6 weeks, the Editor will collect the reviewers’ comments and prepare a decision letter based on the comments of the reviewers. The decision letter will be sent to the Corresponding Author to reply to reviewers' comments. Furthermore, the Author will be able to track the reviewers’ comments via the journal's online system. In the case of acceptance of the submitted manuscript, the acceptance letter will be released and sent via the system to all authors and the author will be requested to follow the formatted manuscript according to the Duhok Medical Journal template before it goes into publication process and they will receive the paper in PDF produced by DMJ for checking before it is published online.

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Becoming a Reviewer for the Duhok Medical  Journal

If you are interested in becoming a reviewer for the Duhok Medical Journal, then please follow the steps below: 

  • Contact the editors and inform them about your Research Interests.

  • Decline an invitation to review if there is a conflict of interest with one of the authors. Conflicts of interest may include relationships with academic advisors and/ or advisees, anyone at your current institution, members of your family, or people with whom you have collaborated during the last ten years.

  • When rejecting a review, feel free to provide the contact information of a person  ( within the academic community) who would be qualified to review the manuscript 

  • Upon accepting an invitation you will be allowed two-three weeks to complete your review. Reviewers that don't reply on time will be excluded from the Database of Reviewers.

The benefits of reviewing for the Duhok Medical Journal include the opportunity to read, see and evaluate the latest work in your research area at an early stage and to contribute to the overall integrity of scientific research in the Medical field and its published documentation. You may also be able to cite your work for the Duhok Medical Journal  as part of your professional development requirements for different Organisations and Professional Societies

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 Archiving

This journal uses the CLOCKSS  (Controlled Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe) and LOCKSS systems (Lots Of Copies Keep Stuff Safe) to create a distributed archiving system among participating libraries and permits those libraries to create permanent archives of the journal for purposes of preservation and restoration.

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 Publication Ethics

The publication of an article in the peer-reviewed  Duhok  Medical Journal is to support the standard and respected knowledge transfer network. Our publication ethics and publication malpractice statement is mainly based on the Code of Conduct and Best-Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors that was revised and approved for publishing in 2011, for more details Click Here   

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 Privacy Statement

The names and email addresses entered in this journal site 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.

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Copyright Terms

Authors retain full copyright of their published work.
By submitting to DMJ, authors grant the journal the right to publish and disseminate their article under the CC BY-ND license. The journal maintains the right to archive and distribute the published version for educational and research purposes.

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Licensing Terms

Articles in DMJ are published under the Creative Commons Attribution–NoDerivatives (CC BY-ND) license.
This license allows users to download, reuse, and distribute the work with proper attribution to the author and journal, provided that no modifications or derivative works are made.

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 Publication Fees

The Duhok Medical Journal operates under an open-access publishing model supported by article processing fees.

  • Article Processing Charge (APC): 250,000 Iraqi Dinars (IQD) per accepted article.

  • Submission Fees: None.

  • Editorial or Processing Fees: None.

  • Page or Color Charges: None.

  • Withdrawal Fees: None.

Waiver Policy:
At present, the journal does not offer routine fee waivers. Exceptional cases may be considered by the editorial board upon formal request.

Method of payment:  Cash to bursar of College of Medicine, University of Duhok. 

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Publisher Information

Publisher Name: University of Duhok – College of Medicine
Address: University of Duhok, Zakho Road, Duhok, Kurdistan Region, Iraq
Website: https://uod.ac

Journal Website: https://dmj.uod.ac

Contact Person: Editor-in-Chief, Duhok Medical Journal
Email:[email protected]

Country of Registration: Republic of Iraq