Reviewer Guidelines

Reviewers help IJF distinguish reliable pharmaceutical evidence from unsupported claims and help authors improve the clarity, transparency and usefulness of their work.

Open identity • Confidential manuscript • Constructive expert review

Before accepting an invitation

  • The manuscript falls within your current expertise, or you clearly tell the editor which portions you can assess.
  • You can complete a careful review within the requested period and will promptly request an extension or decline if circumstances change.
  • You have no financial, personal, professional, institutional or intellectual conflict that could compromise or appear to compromise impartiality.
  • You understand that IJF discloses reviewer identity to the authors.
  • You will keep the manuscript confidential and will not delegate the review without prior editorial permission.

What to assess

Question and relevance

Is the objective clear, important to pharmacy and appropriately situated in existing knowledge?

Design and methods

Are design, materials, controls, sample, outcomes, procedures and statistics suitable and reproducible?

Results

Are findings complete, internally consistent and reported with appropriate units, denominators and uncertainty?

Interpretation

Do conclusions follow from the evidence, acknowledge limitations and avoid causal, clinical or general claims the design cannot support?

Ethics and transparency

Are approvals, consent, registration, data, authorship, funding and conflicts stated and appropriate?

Presentation

Are the title, abstract, tables, figures and references accurate, useful and consistent with the manuscript?

Writing the report

  1. Briefly summarise the study and its principal strengths or contribution.
  2. List major concerns in priority order, explain why each matters and suggest a feasible remedy when possible.
  3. List minor corrections separately. Distinguish required scientific changes from optional stylistic preferences.
  4. Identify claims that need evidence and references that appear inaccurate, but do not demand citations to your own work unless essential.
  5. Give the editor a confidential note only for information that should not be in the author-facing report, such as a sensitive integrity concern.
  6. Select a recommendation consistent with the report; the editor makes the final decision.

Ethical duties

Use respectful, specific language and assess the work rather than the authors. Do not use unpublished ideas or data, contact the authors directly, reveal the manuscript, or seek personal advantage. Tell the editor if you recognise substantial overlap, implausible data, image manipulation, undisclosed conflicts, missing approval or another integrity concern; do not conduct an independent accusation campaign.

Use of AI and assistance

Confidential material must remain confidential

Do not upload the manuscript or review into a public generative-AI service or another externally retained system. An approved tool may be used only under explicit journal direction and adequate confidentiality safeguards. A reviewer remains personally responsible for the analysis and wording of the report.

After submitting the review

Retain no unnecessary copies or confidential material. Respond if the editor asks for clarification or review of a revision, but do not continue discussion with authors outside OJS. Notify the journal if a previously unrecognised conflict or material error in your report becomes apparent.

Peer-review policy Publication ethics