Q: Why did the journal contact my university for IRB approval when I have already submitted it?

Detailed Question -

I have submitted my paper to an English journal managed by a Japanese medical society. During the review process, the journal office contacted the Institutional Review Board of my university, and requested them to submit the documents for ethical review regarding my research. I have already mentioned the ethical review number on my paper and also sent a copy of the approval (written in Japanese). However, I have also told the Review Board to send all the necessary documents to the journal as requested.

I was surprised with this request and felt resentment, since this was not a requirement as per the Instruction for Authors. This journal is an English journal managed by a Japanese society, and receives submissions from many foreigners. I don’t think the journal always contacts the university as they did in my case, so is there a reason why they did so? Has this become common in recent times?

1 Answer to this question
Answer:

The journal decision-making process is time consuming, ranging anywhere between a few weeks to several months, depending on  factors such as publication frequency, subject area of study, etc.

The status “With editor” implies that no reviewers have as yet accepted the invitation to review the manuscript. This could happen because of many reasons. If the manuscript has a niche subject area, it might be difficult to find reviewers. Since you have already emailed the journal editor thrice, I would recommend emailing the help support at Elsevier as well as the editor once again. You can wait a few more weeks.

If you still do not receive any response, you can consider withdrawing the manuscript from the journal. However, be aware of the fact that submission to a new journal will mean starting the entire process from scratch once again. 

Related reading:

 

 

Comment