CONTENTS
- Scope and applicability
- Adopted peer review model
- Position on transparent peer review and publication of reports
- Manuscript types subject to peer review
- Reviewer suggestions by authors
- Phases of the editorial process
- Reviewer selection criteria
- Verification of reviewer eligibility criteria
- Editorial Board involvement
- Management of reviewer conflicts of interest
- Tiered flexibility mechanism for reviewer pool
- Ethical and procedural duties of reviewers
- Use of artificial intelligence in peer review
- Structure of the review report
- Editorial decision
- Appeal procedure
- Dual submission and originality
- Manuscript versioning during the process
- Confidentiality, data security, and auditability
- Recognition of reviewer work
- Exceptions and particular situations
- Monitoring, public reporting, and revision of the policy
- Reference standards
1. SCOPE AND APPLICABILITY
This Peer Review Policy governs the peer assessment process adopted by European Gynecology and Obstetrics (EGO). The document defines the founding principles, the review model, the operational phases of the process, the criteria for reviewer selection, the timelines, the responsibilities of the parties involved, and the procedures for managing exceptional situations. The policy applies to all manuscripts submitted to the Journal, to the Editorial Direction, to reviewers, and to authors, and constitutes an integral part of the Editorial Policy Statement of which it represents the operational articulation.
The document is drafted in compliance with the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers, the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, the Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing of the Directory of Open Access Journals, and the WAME guidelines.
2. ADOPTED PEER REVIEW MODEL
The European Gynecology and Obstetrics (EGO) adopts a double-anonymized peer-review model: the authors' identities are not disclosed to the reviewers, and the reviewers' identities are not disclosed to the authors at any stage of the process. To ensure the model functions properly, please submit an appropriately anonymized version of the manuscript, separate from the identifying title page, in accordance with the technical specifications in the Submission Guidelines.
The choice of the double-anonymized model addresses 4 needs:
• reducing assessment biases related to author recognizability (geographical origin, affiliation, academic status, gender);
• preserving the autonomy of judgment of reviewers, ensuring them freedom to express critical assessments without fear of retaliation or pressure;
• strengthening the perception of equity of the process among authors and the scientific community;
• aligning with the most recent COPE and WAME recommendations on best practices in peer review.
The Journal evaluates the operational effectiveness of the double-anonymized model every six months. It reserves the right to progressively expand the model's scope of application to sections not initially covered (for example, invited editorials) based on accumulated experience and the orientations of the international scientific community.
3. POSITION ON TRANSPARENT PEER REVIEW AND PUBLICATION OF REPORTS
The Journal does not currently adopt a transparent peer-review model and does not publish review reports or reviewer identities in association with published manuscripts. The choice is consistent with the adopted double-anonymized model and with the consolidated practice of safeguarding the confidentiality of the process. The Journal monitors the evolution of international practices on the subject and may reassess its position during periodic revisions of this policy.
Exception: a reviewer may voluntarily waive anonymity by explicitly communicating their consent to the disclosure of their identity to the authors. The waiver of anonymity is always voluntary, never solicited by the Editorial Direction, and is acquired in writing through the editorial platform. The waiver does not in any case entail publication of the review report, but exclusively communication of the reviewer's identity to the authors of the manuscript at the time of transmission of the report.
4. MANUSCRIPT TYPES SUBJECT TO PEER REVIEW
4.1 General rule
All manuscripts accepted for assessment are subject to external peer review under the double-anonymized model described in Section 2 of this policy, with the exception of the categories listed in Section 4.2, which are assessed directly by the Editor-in-Chief or by a delegated Associate Editor. The categories listed in this Section correspond to the article types set out in Section 7 of the Submission Guidelines; where a new article type is introduced there, this Section is updated accordingly.
4.2 Categories not subject to external peer review
The following categories are assessed directly by the Editor-in-Chief or by a delegated Associate Editor:
- Editorials, whether commissioned by invitation or solicited through a specific call for contributions;
- Opinion pieces published in the Opinion / Opinion Corner category, whether commissioned by invitation or solicited through a specific call for contributions;
- communications and announcements of the European Society of Gynecology of a non-scientific nature;
- errata and post-publication editorial correction acts;
- abstracts of communications presented at the congresses of the European Society of Gynecology and published as supplements, which are selected by the scientific committee of the congress concerned; the Editor-in-Chief retains full responsibility for the content of every supplement, in accordance with Section III.G of the ICMJE Recommendations.
Exclusion from external peer review does not exempt these categories from editorial assessment, nor from the provisions of the Journal on authorship, on conflict of interest, on the disclosure of the use of artificial intelligence and on publication ethics, which apply to all published content without exception. In accordance with Section 2 of this policy, the Journal reviews on a six-monthly basis the scope of application of the double-anonymized model and may progressively extend it to categories initially not covered.
4.3 Categories subject to mandatory peer review
For the following categories the peer review process is mandatory and follows the procedures described in this policy:
- Original Articles;
- Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses (compliant with PRISMA 2020);
- Narrative / Short Reviews;
- Protocols;
- Guidelines and Consensus documents;
- Position Papers, including those produced upon mandate of the European Society of Gynecology or of other scientific societies;
- Statements;
- Case Reports (compliant with CARE);
- Data Notes;
- Commentaries.
4.4 Particular review regimes
Commentaries are subject to expedited review, conducted under the double-anonymized model with compressed timelines determined by the Associate Editor in charge of the manuscript.
Letters to the Editor are subject to editorial review by the Editor-in-Chief or by a delegated Associate Editor. Where a letter carries substantial scientific content, the Editor-in-Chief may submit it to expedited external peer review; the decision is discretionary and is documented in the editorial record of the manuscript.
Invited manuscripts other than those listed in Section 4.2, including manuscripts solicited for special issues and Position Papers produced upon mandate of the European Society of Gynecology, are subject to external peer review under the ordinary procedure, as provided in Section 21 of this policy. An invitation to submit does not in any case constitute a guarantee of acceptance.
Manuscripts of exceptional clinical or public health relevance may be assessed under the fast-track procedure provided in Section 21, which compresses the timelines while preserving the essential principles of independent external peer review.
4.5 Correspondence with the article types of the Submission Guidelines
The following table states the review regime applicable to each article type. In the event of any discrepancy between this table and Section 7 of the Submission Guidelines as regards the denomination of an article type, the Submission Guidelines prevail; as regards the review regime, this policy prevails.
|
Article type |
Review regime |
Reference |
|
Original Article |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Systematic Review |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Meta-analysis |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Narrative / Short Review |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Protocol |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Case Report |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Guideline / Consensus |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Position Paper |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Statement |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Data Note |
Mandatory external review |
Section 4.3 |
|
Commentary |
Expedited external review |
Section 4.4 |
|
Letter to the Editor |
Editorial review; expedited external review at the discretion of the Editor-in-Chief |
Section 4.4 |
|
Editorial |
Editorial assessment, no external review |
Section 4.2 |
|
Opinion / Opinion Corner |
Editorial assessment, no external review |
Section 4.2 |
|
Conference abstracts published as supplements |
Selection by the congress scientific committee, no external review |
Section 4.2 |
5. REVIEWER SUGGESTIONS BY AUTHORS
At the submission stage, authors may indicate:
• up to 3 suggested reviewers, providing name, affiliation, institutional email address and specific area of competence;
• up to 3 reviewers to be excluded from the assessment of the manuscript, accompanied by mandatory motivation (for example: known conflict, competition on patents or scientific priority, documented controversy).
The indications of authors are not binding for the responsible Associate Editor, who maintains full discretion in the selection of reviewers. Reviewers suggested by authors are taken into consideration only if they fully meet the independence and qualification criteria outlined in sections 6 and 7 of this policy. Requested exclusions are normally respected, except in cases of manifestly unfounded or pretextual motivation, evaluated by the Associate Editor in consultation with the Editor-in-Chief.
6. PHASES OF THE EDITORIAL PROCESS
The assessment process is articulated in 5 sequential phases, each with its own responsibilities, Service Level Agreements (SLAs), and specific criteria. The declared SLAs are public and subject to quarterly monitoring.
Phase 1 - Receipt and formal check (initial check).
Upon receipt through the editorial platform, every manuscript is subjected to formal control by the Editorial Office within 2 working days. The control verifies the completeness of documentation (anonymized main file, separate identifying title page, figures, tables, supplementary materials, cover letter, ethical declarations), compliance with the formal requirements of the Submission Guidelines, the declaration of the CRediT taxonomy, the completion of the COI form, the eventual declaration of clinical trial registration and ethics committee approval. Manuscripts that do not pass the formal control are returned to the authors for completion, without being assigned to the Editorial Direction.
The Editorial Office additionally notes whether authors have provided ORCID identifiers in the submission system. At the same time, ORCID provision is strongly recommended and actively encouraged by the Journal; the absence of ORCID identifiers does not constitute a formal deficiency requiring return of the manuscript.
Phase 2 - Textual integrity and plagiarism screening.
All manuscripts that pass formal control are subjected to an automated similarity-check screening within 1 working day of a positive outcome in Phase 1. The operational threshold for attention is set at 20 percent of the overall similarity index, with case-by-case qualitative assessment by the Editorial Direction. In the qualitative assessment, the following interpretive criteria apply:
• overlaps concentrated in scientifically critical sections (Methods, Results, Discussion) are assessed with greater severity than distributed overlaps of equivalent total percentage;
• the Methods and Bibliography sections are subject to separate assessment from the body of the text, given the structural recurrence of standardized language in these sections;
• the assessment takes into account the article type: Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses, Protocols and Guidelines naturally present higher overlap on methodological and reporting language (e.g. PRISMA, CONSORT) and are assessed accordingly;
• overlaps attributable to the author's own previously published work are assessed under the self-plagiarism and text recycling criteria established by the Plagiarism and Misconduct Policy, distinguishing legitimate self-citation from undisclosed redundant publication.
Detailed operational provisions are contained in the Plagiarism and Misconduct Policy.
Phase 3 - Editorial pre-screening assessment.
Once the integrity screening is passed, the Editor-in-Chief assigns the manuscript to an Associate Editor competent in the relevant disciplinary area, who conducts a preliminary assessment within 5 working days. The Associate Editor verifies the relevance of the manuscript for the objectives and scope of the Journal, the originality of the contribution, the overall methodological soundness, the quality of the writing, and the appropriateness of submission to external review. The Associate Editor may recommend 3 outcomes:
• desk rejection (rejection without external peer review) for manuscripts not in scope, of manifestly insufficient quality, or with decisive ethical or methodological criticalities;
• submission to external peer review;
• request for preliminary revision to authors before initiating peer review (for example in the presence of substantial correctable formal gaps).
Desk rejection decisions are formally ratified by the Editor-in-Chief and communicated to authors with explicit motivation. The desk rejection rate is subject to quarterly internal monitoring and to annual public reporting as a quality indicator of the pre-review filter.
Phase 4 - External peer review.
Manuscripts that pass editorial pre-screening are sent to external peer review, according to the following SLAs:
• invitation to reviewers within 5 days from the decision to send to peer review;
• receipt of reviewer reports within 14-21 days from acceptance of the assignment by the reviewers.
The detailed provisions of external peer review are the subject of sections 7, 8, 9 and 10 of this policy.
Phase 5 - Editorial decision.
Based on the external reviewers' reports, the Associate Editor issues a well-reasoned recommendation to the Editor-in-Chief, who makes the final editorial decision. The decision is communicated to the authors within 3-5 working days from the receipt of the last useful report. The possible decisions are detailed in section 15 of this policy.
Overall target timelines: from submission to first editorial decision, 30-45 days as a rule. Effective timelines may vary depending on the complexity of the manuscript, the availability of reviewers, and the timeliness of authors' responses to a revision request.
7. REVIEWER SELECTION CRITERIA
Reviewers are selected by the Editor-in-Chief and the Associate Editors responsible for the manuscript, in consultation with the Editor-in-Chief where necessary, applying the following cumulative criteria:
• specific and demonstrable disciplinary competence on the topic of the manuscript, evidenced by recent publications (last 5 years) in indexed peer-reviewed journals;
• qualified and verifiable institutional affiliation, preferably associated with a ROR identifier;
• possession of a validated ORCID identifier (where available);
• independence with respect to the authors of the manuscript, the institutions of affiliation of the authors, the declared funding bodies and any companies involved;
• absence of co-authored publications with one or more authors of the manuscript in the last 3 years;
• absence of consulting, training or supervisory relationships with the authors ongoing or concluded in the last 3 years;
• plurality of geographical origin within the same manuscript, with preference for the presence of at least one reviewer from a country different from that of the corresponding author;
• positive track record as a reviewer (in case of previous collaborations with the Journal);
• declared availability to complete the review within the foreseen timeframes.
As a rule, 3 to 5 reviewers are invited to review each manuscript to obtain at least 2 complete reports before the editorial decision. In cases of particular complexity or of contrasting outcomes of the reports, the Associate Editor may request a third or fourth report.
8. VERIFICATION OF REVIEWER ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA
The verification of the cumulative criteria outlined in section 7 of this policy is performed before the issuance of the formal invitation to the reviewer, through a structured workflow that combines preliminary automated and semi-automated checks with editorial validation.
Verification responsibility. The Editorial Office performs preliminary verification on each candidate reviewer identified by the Associate Editor. Final validation of eligibility is the responsibility of the Associate Editor in charge of the manuscript, who assumes formal responsibility for the invitation's appropriateness.
Tools used. Verification is performed using the following primary tools:
• ORCID - for verification of identity, current and past institutional affiliations, and verification of any shared affiliations with the authors of the manuscript;
• Crossref - for verification of co-authored publications between the candidate reviewer and the authors of the manuscript over the past 3 years and beyond, where relevant.
In cases not resolvable through ORCID and Crossref alone (for example, absence of validated identifiers, ambiguous results, or particularly specialized topics), the Editorial Office may extend the verification to other recognized scholarly information sources (Scopus, Web of Science, institutional websites of authors and reviewers), with documentation of the additional checks performed.
Active declaration of independence. At the time of acceptance of the assignment, and before access to the manuscript, the reviewer is required to provide an active written declaration of independence with respect to the authors, their institutions of affiliation, the funding bodies and any companies involved. The declaration is obtained through the official editorial platform and is an integral part of the audit record for the process.
Handling of violations identified after assignment. Should an undisclosed conflict of interest, a violation of the eligibility criteria, or any other element incompatible with reviewer independence emerge during or after the conclusion of the review, the following procedure applies:
• if the violation emerges during the review process, the Editorial Direction immediately suspends the review, removes the reviewer from the assignment, and proceeds with the identification of a substitute reviewer; the report potentially already received from the conflicted reviewer is excluded from the editorial decision;
• if the violation emerges after the editorial decision but before publication, the Editorial Direction reassesses the decisional process and, if appropriate, activates a complementary review with an independent reviewer;
• if the violation emerges after publication, the Editorial Direction activates the COPE flowcharts applicable to peer review misconduct, with possible publication of an Expression of Concern, Correction or Retraction according to the procedures established by the Corrections, Retractions and Expressions of Concern Policy.
In all cases, the violation is documented in the manuscript's audit record and, where appropriate, reported to the reviewer's institution of affiliation, in compliance with COPE guidelines on peer-review misconduct.
9. EDITORIAL BOARD INVOLVEMENT
The Editorial Board of the Journal may be involved in the peer review process in the following modalities:
• as a primary pool of qualified reviewers, activatable by the Associate Editor according to disciplinary pertinence;
• as an advisory body for the assessment of manuscripts of particular complexity or controversy;
• as a referrer of qualified external experts for specialized topics;
• as editorially responsible for Special Issues, in the capacity of Guest Editor designated by the Editor-in-Chief.
The involvement of Editorial Board members in the peer review process is subject to full compliance with the independence criteria outlined in section 7, the verification procedures outlined in section 8, and the absence of conflicts of interest outlined in section 10 of this policy.
10. MANAGEMENT OF REVIEWER CONFLICTS OF INTEREST
Invited reviewers are required to declare to the Editorial Direction, before accepting the assignment, any circumstance that may constitute a conflict of interest with respect to the manuscript. The following circumstances constitute grounds for mandatory abstention:
• co-authorship with one or more authors of the manuscript in publications of the last 3 years;
• relationship of supervision, mentorship or research collaboration active or concluded in the last 3 years;
• affiliation with the same institution as the authors at the time of the review;
• direct financial interests relevant to the funders of the manuscript or to the cited companies;
• family relationship or close personal friendship with one or more authors;
• direct competition on research projects, patents or scientific priorities.
In the presence of minor or not immediately decisive conflicts, the reviewer is required to declare them to the responsible Associate Editor, who evaluates case-by-case the appropriateness of confirming or revoking the assignment. The guiding principle is the appearance of independence: in case of doubt, abstention prevails.
11. TIERED FLEXIBILITY MECHANISM FOR REVIEWER POOL
The criteria outlined in section 7 of this policy constitute the standard track for identifying reviewers under ordinary conditions. In recognition of the operational difficulties that may arise in highly specialized sub-disciplines or during periods of structural unavailability of qualified reviewers, the Journal adopts a tiered flexibility mechanism to preserve the feasibility of the declared SLAs without compromising the core requirement of independence.
Trigger for activation of the secondary track. The secondary track is activated by the Associate Editor when, despite a methodologically sound search effort, 5 invitations to qualified reviewers go unanswered or are declined within 10 days of the first invitation. The activation is documented and motivated by the Associate Editor.
Criteria preserved in the secondary track (non-relaxable). The following criteria remain mandatory in any track:
• absence of co-authored publications with one or more authors of the manuscript in the last 3 years;
• absence of consulting, training or supervisory relationships with the authors ongoing or concluded in the last 3 years;
• absence of affiliation with the same institution as the authors at the time of the review;
• absence of direct financial, family, or competitive conflicts as outlined in section 10.
Criteria modifiable in the secondary track. The following criteria may be relaxed under controlled conditions:
• the recency requirement of the reviewer's publications may be extended from 5 to 7 years;
• the preference for plurality of geographical origin may be relaxed, while remaining a documented evaluation element;
• the preference for the ROR identifier of the reviewer's affiliation remains a preference but does not constitute an exclusion criterion;
• the preference for previous track record with the Journal does not constitute an exclusion criterion.
Documentation and monitoring. Each activation of the secondary track is documented in the manuscript's internal decision file on the editorial platform, with a motivational note from the Associate Editor indicating the number of invitations issued, the period covered, the criteria applied, and the editorial justification. Activations of the secondary track are included in quarterly monitoring under section 22 to allow the Editorial Direction to assess any structural difficulties in the reviewer pool and to take corrective measures.
12. ETHICAL AND PROCEDURAL DUTIES OF REVIEWERS
Reviewers who accept the assignment assume towards the Journal, the authors and the scientific community the following duties:
• treat the manuscript as strictly confidential communication, not disclose its content to third parties, not distribute copies, not use the contents, data or ideas for own purposes or those of third parties before publication;
• respect confidentiality also after the conclusion of the process, regardless of outcome, and for the entire lifetime of the manuscript;
• comply with the provisions on the use of generative artificial intelligence tools outlined in section 13 of this policy;
• draft the review report in English, in an objective, constructive and reasoned manner, avoiding personal, denigratory or disrespectful comments towards the authors;
• focus the assessment on scientific merit (relevance, originality, methodological validity, quality of analysis, correctness of conclusions) and not on extraneous elements (inferred geographical origin, inferred affiliation, language, inferred academic position of authors);
• respect the timelines agreed at the time of acceptance of the assignment and promptly communicate any impediments requiring extension or withdrawal;
• report to the Editorial Direction any suspicion of plagiarism, duplicate publication, data manipulation or other forms of misconduct that emerge during the review;
• not contact the authors directly under any circumstances and at any stage of the process;
• declare any use of external consultants or supplementary specialists for specific parts of the review (for example, statistical) and obtain prior consent of the Editorial Direction;
• not attempt to identify the authors of the manuscript through autonomous research, in coherence with the adopted double-anonymized model.
13. USE OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN PEER REVIEW
The Journal recognizes the rapid evolution of generative artificial intelligence tools and acknowledges the operational opportunities and the ethical risks they entail in the context of peer review. The provisions outlined in this section integrate, for the specific peer-review domain, the principles established in the Editorial Policy Statement and will be developed in the Journal's Artificial Intelligence Policy.
General principle of prohibition. Reviewers may not upload, transmit, copy, paste, or otherwise expose any part of the manuscript, of the supplementary materials, of the review reports under preparation, or of the editorial communications related to the manuscript, to generative artificial intelligence platforms or services of third parties. The prohibition includes, by way of example and not exhaustively: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Copilot, DeepSeek, and any other web interface, API or application that processes the content on external servers, whether commercial or free of charge, regardless of the data retention policies declared by the provider.
Rationale of the prohibition. The prohibition is grounded on:
• the absolute primacy of the confidentiality obligation towards authors, which extends to all data, ideas, methodologies and results contained in the manuscript;
• the impossibility of guaranteeing that content uploaded to external generative AI platforms is not retained, used for model training, or otherwise exposed to third parties;
• the non-delegable nature of the intellectual responsibility of peer review, which constitutes a critical assessment that can only be the subject of human judgment.
Limited admissible exceptions. The use of language editing tools that operate strictly locally on the reviewer's device, without transmitting data to external servers, is permitted, provided that they are used exclusively on the review report drafted by the reviewer and never on parts of the manuscript or of the editorial communications.
Authorized exceptions for specific tools. In particular and reasoned cases, the reviewer may submit to the Editorial Direction a written request for authorization for the use of a specific tool, indicating: name of the tool, intended purpose of use, technical modality (local versus cloud), data retention policy of the tool, scope of the parts of the process to which the tool would be applied. The Editorial Direction responds in writing; without explicit written authorization, use is prohibited. Each authorization is documented in the manuscript's editorial record.
Transparency on permitted uses. Where the reviewer has used permitted local tools, or has obtained explicit authorization for specific tools, the reviewer is required to declare the use in the comments confidential to the Editorial Direction at the time of submission of the report.
14. STRUCTURE OF THE REVIEW REPORT
The review report is drafted by the reviewer in English through the official editorial platform of the Journal, in 2 distinct sections:
• Comments confidential to the Editorial Direction - section visible exclusively to editors, in which the reviewer may express overall assessments, editorial recommendations, reports of suspected misconduct, declaration of any use of artificial intelligence tools according to section 13 of this policy, and considerations of confidential nature that would not be appropriate in comments addressed to the authors.
• Comments to the authors - section that will be transmitted to authors in anonymized form, containing the reasoned assessment of the manuscript, the criticalities identified, the requests for revision, the questions of clarification and the constructive suggestions for the improvement of the work.
The report systematically evaluates the following elements: relevance of the contribution to the discipline, originality with respect to the state of the art, adequacy of the study design, methodological and statistical correctness, discussion of the study's limitations, compliance with the relevant EQUATOR reporting guidelines (CONSORT, STROBE, PRISMA, STARD, CARE, ARRIVE), quality of figures and tables, completeness and accuracy of the bibliography, expository clarity, ethical compliance (ethics committee approval, consent, trial registration), compliance with SAGER principles for the reporting of sex and gender, declaration of data availability.
The editorial recommendation expressed by the reviewer may be: acceptance without modifications, acceptance with minor revisions, major revision with re-review, rejection. The recommendation is an element of orientation but does not bind the final editorial decision, which remains the prerogative of the Editor-in-Chief.
15. EDITORIAL DECISION
The Editor-in-Chief, based on the recommendation of the Associate Editor and the reports of the reviewers, takes the final editorial decision. The possible decisions are:
• Accept - manuscript accepted for publication without further substantial modifications. Only copyediting and formal adaptation interventions may be required.
• Minor revision - manuscript substantially acceptable, subject to revisions of limited extent that do not require new external peer review. Authors have 30 days to submit the revised version. The verification of modifications is entrusted to the Associate Editor.
• Major revision - manuscript of interest but subject to substantial revisions. Authors have 60 days to submit the revised version, accompanied by a point-by-point response to reviewer comments. The revised version is subject to a new peer review, typically involving the same reviewers as in the first phase.
• Reject and resubmit - manuscript not acceptable in current form but of potential interest to the Journal should the authors intend to resubmit it after radical modifications. The resubmitted manuscript is treated as a new submission and subjected to a complete new process.
• Reject - manuscript rejected. The decision is based on reviewer reports and the overall editorial assessment.
Maximum number of revision iterations: a manuscript may be subject to a maximum of 2 consecutive rounds of Major revision. Once the second round is exhausted without acceptance, the editorial decision is mandatorily Accept or Reject. The rule protects authors and reviewers from indefinite iterations and guarantees certain timelines for process closure.
Rejected manuscripts and new submission: a rejected manuscript (Reject decision) cannot be resubmitted to European Gynecology and Obstetrics (EGO), except for radical modifications of content and study design such as to configure a substantially new manuscript, and subject to explicit authorization by the Editor-in-Chief requested by the authors before resubmission.
Editorial communication and authors' silence: in the event of failure to respond within the foreseen deadlines (30 days for Minor revision, 60 days for Major revision), the Editorial Direction sends a single formal reminder granting an additional 14 days. If we do not receive a response, we will consider the manuscript withdrawn due to inactivity. The authors may resubmit it as a new submission, with a full restart of the process. The Journal may grant motivated extensions upon reasoned request from authors.
Communication of the decision to authors occurs exclusively through the corresponding author, who assumes responsibility for informing co-authors. The communication includes the editorial letter signed by the Editor-in-Chief, the reviewer comments in anonymized form, any additional comments from the Associate Editor, and, where applicable, the deadlines for subsequent phases of the process.
16. APPEAL PROCEDURE
Authors who consider the editorial decision unjustified may submit a formal appeal to the Editor-in-Chief within 30 days from the communication of the decision. The provisions of this section govern the appeal procedure and are subsequently developed in the Complaints, Appeals and Whistleblowing Policy.
Admissibility criteria. An appeal is considered admissible when it presents at least one of the following elements:
• new substantial scientific arguments not emerged in the course of the original review process;
• documentation of manifest technical errors in the assessments of the reviewers;
• evidence of an undisclosed conflict of interest of one of the reviewers or of the Associate Editor in charge of the manuscript;
• documented procedural violation of the Journal in the conduct of the review process.
Appeals based exclusively on disagreement with the editorial judgment of priority or scope, on emotional or personal arguments, or on the mere repetition of arguments already evaluated in the original process, are not considered admissible.
Appeal procedure. The Editor-in-Chief examines the appeal. Where the appeal raises issues of conflict of interest or impartiality of the Editor-in-Chief, or in any case where the Editor-in-Chief deems it appropriate to ensure the independence of the review, the appeal is transferred to an Associate Editor different from the one who managed the original assessment. The Editor-in-Chief or the Associate Editor in charge of the appeal may request complementary opinions from members of the Editorial Board or from external experts.
Probative standards for each outcome. The outcome of the appeal is determined based on the following probative standards:
• confirmation of the original decision - applies in default mode in the absence of evidence sufficient to justify a different outcome, or when the elements presented by the authors do not constitute admissibility grounds under this section;
• complementary review - applies when the appeal identifies a specific assessment aspect not adequately covered by the original review, without invalidating the overall validity of the process; complementary review is normally entrusted to a new independent reviewer;
• submission to new peer review - applies when the appeal documents a significant conflict of interest of one of the original reviewers, or technical errors of such severity as to invalidate the assessment provided; in this case the manuscript is reassessed by reviewers different from the original ones;
• acceptance of the appeal with reopening of the process - applies when the appeal documents a procedural violation of the Journal in the conduct of the original process, or presents new evidence decisive on the scientific merit; in this case the process is reopened, and the manuscript reassessed in the appropriate phase.
Outcome timelines. The outcome of the appeal is communicated to the authors within 30 days from receipt of the reasoned request.
Repeated appeals. A second appeal on the same editorial decision is not admissible. As a sole exception, a further appeal may be considered only in the presence of documented substantial new elements not available at the time of the first appeal. The decision on the admissibility of any further appeal rests with the Editor-in-Chief.
Internal exhaustion and external referral. The final decision on the appeal exhausts the internal remedy provided by the Journal. Any further reports fall under the procedure outlined in the Complaints, Appeals and Whistleblowing Policy, with the possibility for authors to refer to COPE in case of suspected violations of editorial ethics principles.
17. DUAL SUBMISSION AND ORIGINALITY
The submission of a manuscript to EGO implies the formal declaration by the authors that the manuscript, in whole or in substantial parts, has not been previously published, is not simultaneously under assessment by other journals, and will not be submitted to other journals as long as the editorial process at the Journal has not concluded with a definitive decision of rejection, withdrawal or acceptance.
Dual submission (the simultaneous presentation of a manuscript to 2 or more journals) constitutes a serious violation of editorial ethics and is handled in accordance with the applicable COPE flowcharts. Subsequent detection of dual submission entails immediate rejection of the manuscript, formal communication to the editors of the other journals involved, and, if publication has already occurred, retraction in accordance with the procedures established by the Corrections, Retractions and Expressions of Concern Policy.
Submission of manuscripts previously deposited on recognized preprint servers (medRxiv, bioRxiv, Research Square and others) is permitted, provided that the deposit is explicitly declared by the authors at the submission stage and the DOI of the preprint is communicated. Detailed provisions are contained in the Preprint Policy.
18. MANUSCRIPT VERSIONING DURING THE PROCESS
The official editorial platform of the Journal archives all successive versions of a manuscript subjected to peer review, each identified by progressive numbering and timestamp. The standard versioning sequence is:
• Version 1: initial submission;
• Version 2: first revision (in case of Minor or Major revision);
• Version 3: second revision (in case of a second round of Major revision);
• Subsequent versions: copyediting and proof, identified as Version 4 and following.
Previous versions remain accessible to the Editorial Direction and to reviewers involved in subsequent phases, to allow verification of modifications applied. Previous versions are not accessible to authors after submitting a subsequent version. All versions are retained for the duration of the process, in accordance with the archiving provisions set out in section 19 of this policy.
19. CONFIDENTIALITY, DATA SECURITY, AND AUDITABILITY
The peer review process is managed entirely on the Journal's official editorial platform, which guarantees complete traceability, secure archiving of manuscripts and communications, and controlled access for authorized users. Personal data of authors and reviewers are processed in compliance with EU Regulation 2016/679 (GDPR) and with the Privacy Policy of the Journal.
Communications with authors and reviewers occur exclusively through the platform's official channels, except for exceptions expressly authorized by the Editorial Direction and adequately documented. All exchanges are archived to guarantee full traceability of the process.
Process auditability: the Editorial Direction retains a complete documentary record of every manuscript submitted to the Journal, including editorial decisions, review reports, communications with authors and reviewers, declarations of conflict of interest, and any other actions in the process. Documentary retention has a minimum duration of 10 years from the date of the manuscript's final decision, to allow for possible internal audits, audits by indexers (DOAJ, Scopus, PubMed/PMC, Web of Science), COPE verifications, research activities, and any other legitimate purpose consistent with this policy.
20. RECOGNITION OF REVIEWER WORK
The Journal recognizes the value of peer review as an essential component of the scientific process and as an unremunerated contribution to the academic community. In recognition of reviewers' commitment, European Gynecology and Obstetrics adopts the following tools:
• issuance of formal certification of activity carried out upon request of the reviewer, with indication of the year and number of reviews completed;
• possibility of automatic registration of completed reviews on the Web of Science Reviewer Recognition Service platform (formerly Publons), with explicit consent of the reviewer;
• annual publication, in the last issue of the calendar year, of the list of reviewers who collaborated with the Journal during the year, in compliance with the double-anonymized model (the list does not associate reviewers with specific manuscripts);
• ad honorem recognition by the Editorial Direction for reviewers of particular contribution, with possibility of invitation to more structured collaborations (Guest Editor, Editorial Board).
The Journal does not pay economic compensation to reviewers for peer-review activity, in keeping with international editorial practice and the principles of independence and gratuity in peer assessment.
21. EXCEPTIONS AND PARTICULAR SITUATIONS
The following exceptional situations are managed with specific procedures:
• Manuscripts with authors who are members of the Editorial Direction - manuscripts that include as authors the Editor-in-Chief, Associate Editors or members of the Editorial Board are managed by a different Associate Editor, in the absence of relations with the authors. The author-editor is completely excluded from every phase of the decision-making process for their own manuscript, from the choice of reviewers to the final decision. The fact that the manuscript has been managed in accordance with this procedure is made explicit in the acknowledgments section of the published version to ensure transparency.
• Invited manuscripts (special issues, ESG position papers), other than the categories listed in Section 4.2 of this policy, are nonetheless subject to external peer review according to ordinary procedures. The invitation to submit does not constitute in any case a guarantee of acceptance.
• Urgent manuscripts (rapid communication) - in exceptional cases of clinical relevance or public health, the Editor-in-Chief may arrange an accelerated process (fast-track) with compressed timelines, while respecting the essential principles of independent external peer review. The decision to activate a fast-track is discretionary and motivated.
• Suspicions of misconduct emerged during review - they are handled according to the applicable COPE flowcharts and managed by the Editor-in-Chief in coordination with the Editorial Direction. The review of the manuscript is suspended pending the outcome of the investigation.
• Prolonged unavailability of qualified reviewers - in case of impossibility to obtain qualified reviews within reasonable times, the Associate Editor activates the tiered flexibility mechanism outlined in section 11 of this policy. Where this mechanism also proves insufficient, the Associate Editor may propose alternative solutions (referral to qualified internal peer review, involvement of experts from other scientific societies, communication to the author of the objective difficulty), always respecting the principles of independence and quality of the assessment.
22. MONITORING, PUBLIC REPORTING, AND REVISION OF THE POLICY
Internal quarterly monitoring. The Journal monitors quarterly the following performance indicators of the peer review process:
• median time from submission to first editorial decision (SLA target: 30-45 days);
• median time from submission to final decision;
• median time from submission to publication;
• desk rejection rate;
• overall acceptance rate;
• average number of reviewers per manuscript;
• acceptance rate of invitations to review;
• average completion time of review by reviewers (SLA target: 14-21 days);
• frequency of activation of the secondary track outlined in section 11;
• geographical and gender provenance of reviewers involved.
Annual public reporting. In the spirit of transparency required by the Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing of the Directory of Open Access Journals, and in coherence with the consolidated practice of leading Open Access journals, the Journal publishes annually on a dedicated page of its institutional website an Annual Editorial Report containing the following indicators referring to the previous calendar year:
• median time from submission to first editorial decision;
• median time from submission to final decision;
• median time from submission to publication;
• desk rejection rate;
• overall acceptance rate;
• average number of reviewers per manuscript;
• acceptance rate of invitations to review;
• average completion time of review by reviewers;
• geographical distribution of authors of accepted manuscripts and of reviewers involved.
The gender provenance of reviewers and authors remains subject to internal monitoring, which is instrumental in implementing the Journal's Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Policy. It is not currently subject to public reporting in this form.
Six-monthly review of the double-anonymized model. A specific six-monthly review is dedicated to assessing the operational effectiveness of the double-anonymized model, with the possibility of progressively expanding it to sections not initially covered.
Policy revision. This policy is also subject to annual or extraordinary revision in the face of significant changes in the international normative framework (updates of COPE, ICMJE, DOAJ) or of the governance of the Journal. Revisions are approved by the Editor-in-Chief and adopted by the Publisher.
Annual review of editorial performance. The performance of the Editor-in-Chief and Associate Editors is subject to annual review by the Publisher in consultation with the European Society of Gynecology. The review is based on the KPI data produced by the quarterly monitoring outlined in this section, on qualitative assessment of editorial decisions, and on the criteria established in the Editorial Board Charter. The outcome of the review may include renewal of the mandate, corrective measures, or, in cases of persistent non-compliance with the standards established by this policy, termination of the editorial appointment.
23. REFERENCE STANDARDS
This policy is drafted in compliance with the following international standards:
• COPE - Committee on Publication Ethics, Core Practices (2019, current version);
• COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers;
• COPE Flowcharts for managing suspected misconduct that emerged during peer review;
• ICMJE - Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals (section II.D Peer Review);
• DOAJ - Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing;
• WAME - World Association of Medical Editors, recommendations on the role of editors and on peer review conduct;
• CSE - Council of Science Editors, White Paper on Promoting Integrity in Scientific Journal Publications, section 2.3 Peer Review;
• EQUATOR Network - Reporting guidelines (CONSORT, STROBE, PRISMA, STARD, CARE, ARRIVE, SAGER);
• EU Regulation 2016/679 (GDPR) for the processing of personal data in the editorial process.