1. Submission. The corresponding author completes the OJS workflow, uploads files and confirms authorship, originality, ethics and declarations.
2. Technical check. Journal staff assess metadata, file readability, required sections, similarity signals and basic policy compliance. The submission may be returned for completion.
3. Editorial triage. An editor assesses scope, contribution, design, reporting, integrity and reader value. Out-of-scope or fundamentally unsuitable work may be declined without external review.
4. Editor assignment. A qualified editor without a disqualifying conflict oversees the manuscript. Specialist statistical, ethics or methodological advice may be requested.
5. External peer review. Normally at least two independent experts are invited under IJF's open-identity model. Reports remain confidential unless a separate publication arrangement is explicitly made.
6. First decision. Considering the reports and their own assessment, the editor requests revision, seeks more advice, accepts or rejects.
7. Author revision. Authors upload a clean revision, a marked version when requested and a point-by-point response. Changed analyses, methods, authorship or declarations must be highlighted.
8. Reassessment. The editor may decide directly or return the revision to reviewers. Major revisions can require more than one round.
9. Acceptance. Acceptance occurs only when scientific and editorial requirements are met. A publication-charge request can follow acceptance but cannot determine it.
10. Production. The article is copyedited, formatted and proofed. Authors correct production errors and verify names, affiliations, tables, figures and declarations.
11. Publication. The final article and metadata appear in an IJF issue as the version of record under the stated open-access licence.
12. Post-publication stewardship. Credible questions are assessed and the record is corrected, clarified or retracted when necessary.

How decisions are made

Novelty is considered together with validity, transparency, pharmacy relevance and the usefulness of the question. A negative, confirmatory or locally focused result is not rejected merely for being negative, confirmatory or local when the question and methods are sound. Conversely, striking claims do not compensate for weak design or unsupported interpretation.

Editorial-board submissions and special content

A submission involving an editor, board member, publisher employee, close collaborator or institutional colleague is assigned to an unconflicted editor. The conflicted person cannot access confidential review or influence the decision. Special issues, invited papers and sponsored content follow the same authorship, peer-review, ethics and correction standards and are clearly identified.

Communication and status

Authors should monitor the OJS submission record and keep contact information current. Review speed depends on manuscript quality, specialist availability, revision complexity and integrity checks; the journal therefore does not advertise a guaranteed decision or publication time. A polite status enquiry should include the submission ID and be sent through OJS whenever possible.