POCUS Journal Editorial Policies

POCUS Journal is published biannually, with regular issues released in April and November. In addition to these regular issues, the journal may publish special issues or supplements on an ad hoc basis to address emerging topics or to highlight specific themes in point-of-care ultrasound.

Any changes to the regular publication schedule, including the release of special issues, will be communicated in advance to affected authors, reviewers, and readers through the journal’s website and editorial correspondence. The journal remains committed to transparency and timely communication regarding publication timelines.

Content and Audience

POCUS Journal is an English-language, open-access, online publication serving a global audience of healthcare professionals, educators, and students in the health sciences. The journal focuses on the clinical and educational use of point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) across a wide range of medical specialties and settings.

Content includes original research, reviews, case reports, educational resources, and expert commentary related to the application, advancement, and integration of POCUS in healthcare practice.

Authorship

Authorship of scholarly work carries significant professional, academic, and ethical responsibility. POCUS Journal adheres to the authorship criteria defined by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), which state that authorship should be based on the following four criteria:

Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
Final approval of the version to be published; AND
Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work, ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

All individuals listed as authors must meet all four criteria. Likewise, anyone who meets these criteria should be included as an author.

Contributors who do not meet all four criteria — such as those who provided technical support, general supervision, or writing assistance — should be acknowledged in the Acknowledgements section, with their permission.

Any changes in authorship (addition, removal, or rearrangement of author names) after submission must be approved by all authors and explained to the editorial office in writing.

Author Contributions to the Manuscript and CRediT Taxonomy

To ensure transparency in authorship and accountability for published work, all manuscript submissions must include a detailed account of each author’s contributions using the CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy). Authors should identify their specific roles in the cover letter or on the title page at the time of submission.

The CRediT taxonomy includes, but is not limited to, the following roles: Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Validation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Resources, Data Curation, Writing – Original Draft, Writing – Review & Editing, Visualization, Supervision, Project Administration, and Funding Acquisition. For detailed definitions, see: https://credit.niso.org.

Example format:
JD: Writing – Review & Editing; CG: Investigation, Writing – Original Draft

Author contributions will be published alongside the article to maintain transparency.

Author Warranties and Obligations

By submitting a manuscript to POCUS Journal, authors confirm and warrant the following:

Originality and Prior Publication
The submitted work is original, has not been previously published in whole or in part (except as a preprint or abstract, if disclosed), and is not under consideration elsewhere. Authors should avoid redundant or duplicate publication, as outlined by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) ICMJE Recommendations, 2023.
Legal and Ethical Right to Submit
Authors affirm that they are the sole creators of the work and have full legal authority to submit the manuscript for publication under the terms of the POCUS Journal Author Publication Agreement. If the work is subject to contractual or funding-related obligations that affect licensing or copyright, such conditions must be disclosed at submission ICMJE, 2023.
Accuracy and Integrity of Content
All data, findings, and claims are accurate and based on valid methods and evidence. Authors are accountable for the integrity of the research and agree to resolve any questions regarding accuracy, even after publication. This commitment aligns with the responsibilities outlined by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) COPE Core Practices, 2017.
Compliance with Ethical Standards
For studies involving human participants, animals, or sensitive data, authors confirm that the research complies with ethical standards and has received prior approval from appropriate ethics committees. Authors must comply with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki World Medical Association, 2013, as well as local and national research regulations. A statement of ethical approval and informed consent must be included in the manuscript where applicable.
Full Disclosure of Conflicts and Funding
Authors must disclose all potential conflicts of interest and all sources of financial or material support. Full transparency helps ensure integrity in authorship and interpretation, as outlined by the ICMJE and WAME WAME Recommendations on COI, 2019 ICMJE COI Form.

Failure to comply with these obligations may result in withdrawal of the manuscript, retraction of the article, or other editorial actions in line with POCUS Journal’s publication ethics policy.

Authors and Competing Interests

In accordance with best practices outlined by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) and the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), POCUS Journal requires full disclosure of all potential competing interests.

All authors must complete and submit the ICMJE Disclosure of Interest Form at the time of manuscript submission. This form is available at: https://www.icmje.org/disclosure-of-interest/

Authors are not expected to determine whether a relationship constitutes a conflict of interest. Instead, all financial and non-financial relationships or activities that could be perceived to influence the submitted work should be disclosed, including:

Financial relationships (e.g., grants, honoraria, consulting fees, stock ownership)
Institutional affiliations
Intellectual property interests
Personal or professional relationships with organizations or individuals connected to the subject matter

Disclosure forms are reviewed by the Editor-in-Chief or a designated Associate or Section Editor to determine whether a declared interest requires further editorial action. Peer reviewers do not have access to author disclosure forms to maintain impartiality during the review process.

All relevant author disclosures will be published with the final article to ensure transparency for readers.

For more information, see:

COPE Guidelines on Competing Interests

ICMJE Recommendations on Conflicts of Interest, 2023

WAME Conflict of Interest Policy

Corresponding Author Responsibilities

The corresponding author serves as the primary liaison between the POCUS Journal editorial office and all co-authors throughout the submission, peer review, and publication process. This author is responsible for ensuring that:

All authors have reviewed and approved the final version of the manuscript before submission
All listed authors meet the journal’s authorship criteria
All communications from the journal (including requests for revision, ethical clarifications, or publishing agreements) are handled in a timely and accurate manner
Any required permissions (e.g., for use of copyrighted materials or institutional approvals) are obtained and submitted as needed
All co-authors are kept informed of editorial decisions and changes throughout the review and publication process

The journal will only correspond with the designated corresponding author, who acts on behalf of all co-authors. Post-publication, the corresponding author remains the point of contact for any questions related to the integrity or provenance of the work (ICMJE, 2023).

Author Fees

POCUS Journal does not currently impose any author fees at any stage of the editorial process, including submission, peer review, or publication. However, the journal reserves the right to introduce reasonable fees for publication-related services in the future, should the need arise.

Any future fee adjustments will be clearly communicated to authors before implementation, and no fees will be applied retrospectively to manuscripts that are already under consideration or have been accepted for publication (ICMJE, 2023).

POCUS Journal recognizes that, in some cases, two or more authors may contribute equally to a manuscript and wish to be acknowledged as co–primary (or co–first) authors. In such instances, authors must submit a signed letter at the time of submission explaining:

That equal contribution is being claimed
The specific nature of each author’s contributions
Agreement from all co–primary authors regarding the designation

The letter must be signed by all co–primary authors and included with the manuscript submission. The editorial board reserves the right to review the justification and may request additional clarification. If approved, a footnote indicating equal contribution will appear on the published article.

Equal contribution statements promote transparency in authorship and are consistent with ethical standards recommended by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE, 2023) and Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE, 2022).

Disputes over Authorship

If POCUS Journal becomes aware of a dispute concerning the authorship of a submitted or published work, all editorial processes will be suspended until the matter is resolved. This includes pausing peer review, revisions, or publication-related communications.

The journal follows the authorship dispute resolution guidance outlined by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE). It is the responsibility of the authors — not the journal — to resolve disputes, ideally with the assistance of their affiliated institutions or research ethics committees (COPE, 2022; ICMJE, 2023).

POCUS Journal reserves the right to reject any unpublished manuscript, including manuscripts that have been accepted but not yet published, if an authorship conflict cannot be resolved to the satisfaction of the editorial board.

Requests to change authorship (additions, removals, or reordering) after publication will only be considered under exceptional circumstances and must be accompanied by a formal corrigendum explaining the nature of the correction and signed statements from all listed authors, including any who are being added or removed.

ORCID

POCUS Journal encourages all authors to provide their ORCID iD (Open Researcher and Contributor Identifier) at the time of manuscript submission. An ORCID iD is a unique, persistent digital identifier that distinguishes researchers from others with similar names and ensures accurate attribution of authorship across publications and databases.

Including an ORCID iD:

Enhances transparency and credibility in scholarly publishing
Supports automated linking of published work to an individual researcher’s profile
Facilitates compliance with funder and institutional mandates
Reduces the risk of author misidentification in indexing services

Authors who do not yet have an ORCID iD may register for free at: https://orcid.org (ORCID, 2023).

Competing Interests

The Journal is committed to upholding the highest standards of publication ethics and transparency in accordance with the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME).

A competing interest—also referred to as a conflict of interest—exists when a secondary interest (e.g., financial gain, personal relationship, or academic rivalry) could unduly influence professional judgment regarding the primary interest (e.g., the validity of research findings) (ICMJE, 2024). Competing interests may be financial or non-financial, and full transparency is essential for trust in the scientific record (COPE, 2023).

Authors

All submitting authors are required to disclose any actual or potential competing interests by completing the official ICMJE Disclosure Form at the time of submission (ICMJE Disclosure Form, 2024). Disclosures should include:

Financial relationships (e.g., grants, consultancies, stock ownership)
Personal or institutional affiliations
Intellectual property or patent interests
Any other factors that could be perceived as influencing the research

Disclosed competing interests will be listed in the published version of the manuscript. If none exist, the following statement will be included: “The authors declare no competing interests.”

Editors and Editorial Board Members

Editors and editorial board members are expected to recuse themselves from handling manuscripts in which they have any competing interest—whether financial, personal, academic, or otherwise. Editorial team members are required to:

Complete or update the ICMJE Disclosure Form annually and/or upon any significant change in relationships (ICMJE, 2024).
Report disclosures to the Editor-in-Chief, who will assess whether an interest is material and may impair editorial objectivity.

If the Editor-in-Chief has a competing interest, an appropriate editorial board member or external expert will oversee the process (COPE, 2023).

Peer Reviewers

All invited reviewers must disclose any potential competing interests before accepting a review assignment. This includes, but is not limited to:

Current or recent collaboration with the authors
Personal relationships
Financial interests that may affect impartial judgment

Reviewers with relevant competing interests must decline to review the manuscript. Any disclosed interests are reviewed by the handling Section Editor, who may reassign the manuscript if necessary (COPE, 2017).

Editorial Conflict Resolution

The Journal reserves the right to involve outside peers or experts to resolve competing interests if members of the editorial board are unable to do so.

Funding

All sources of funding for the research reported in the manuscript must be disclosed at the time of submission. Authors should clearly state the full name of the funding agency and provide the grant number, if available. If no specific funding was received, this should be stated explicitly. Accurate and transparent disclosure of funding is essential to ensure accountability and to identify potential conflicts of interest, in accordance with the Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing, jointly issued by COPE, DOAJ, OASPA, and WAME.

General Principles

Dissemination of scholarly work in the health sciences has been crucial to advances in our understanding of the human body. Regrettably many advances have come at the expense of the privacy and dignity of people who were unable to provide their informed consent to participate. All human subjects research must be performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki (revision 2013) [https://www.wma.net/policies-post/wma-declaration-of-helsinki/]. Research involving human subjects must be reviewed and approved by an independent local or institutional review board (or ethics board). If authors are unsure that their research is human subjects research a determination should be obtained from the local review board. Authors should not determine for themselves whether or not their work would be characterized as human subjects research if the question is unclear. A useful tool is the NIH online tool “Am I Doing Human Subjects Research” available at https://grants.nih.gov/policy-and-compliance/policy-topics/human-subjects/hs-decision. The use of this tool is not a substitute for review board oversight .

The authors should be able to provide details of the review board determination on request from the editors. The editorial staff reserve the right to make their own determination regarding appropriateness of review board decisions.

Individuals must provide informed consent prior to participating in medical research. Study design and the consent process should be approved prospectively by the review board or ethics committee. Where the review board approves a consent process that does not follow established standards the authors must explain the reasons for deviating from standards and the efforts made to ensure informed consent to the degree possible. Authors must include a statement about the consent process in the study methods.

Authors must make the Journal aware of any review board or ethics committee concerns or corrective actions at the time of submission.

Special Populations

Certain populations, such as children, prisoners, and other vulnerable groups, are more susceptible to undue influence and coercion during the informed consent process. This vulnerability may stem from power imbalances, limited comprehension of research goals, or restricted freedom to make autonomous decisions. Authors are required to explicitly outline the steps taken to ensure the fair treatment and protection of these special populations in any research they conduct or report.

In accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, researchers must ensure that any research involving vulnerable groups adheres to the highest ethical standards. Specifically, the research should be conducted only when the potential benefits of participation outweigh the risks, and adequate safeguards should be in place to mitigate those risks. For children, prisoners, and others who may be unable to fully understand the nature of the research, additional measures, including the involvement of guardians or legal representatives and careful review by ethics committees, are essential.

Moreover, authors must ensure compliance with COPE guidelines and relevant ethical standards, which emphasize the following ethical principles for research involving vulnerable populations:

Informed Consent: Ensure that consent is obtained in a manner that is appropriate for the participant’s capacity to understand, which may involve legally authorized representatives for those unable to consent fully (e.g., parents for children, legal guardians for vulnerable adults).
Protection from Coercion: Participants must give voluntary consent without undue influence. Researchers should take special care to prevent coercion or undue pressure, particularly when participants are from vulnerable groups.
Ethical Review: Research involving vulnerable populations must undergo independent ethical review by an ethics committee or institutional review board (IRB) to assess the appropriateness of the research and ensure participant protection.
Minimizing Harm and Maximizing Benefit: The risks associated with involving vulnerable populations must be minimized, and the potential benefits of participation should justify the risks. Any risks should be clearly explained and mitigated through appropriate safeguards.
Transparency in Reporting: Authors must disclose the steps taken to ensure informed consent was properly obtained and that participants were not unduly influenced, including the role of ethics committees or guardians in the process.
Privacy and Confidentiality: Researchers must ensure privacy and confidentiality of participants’ personal information, taking extra care to protect vulnerable populations from risks associated with data exposure.

Additionally, researchers should seek the approval of relevant ethical review boards and provide thorough documentation of the review process, ensuring that adequate protections are in place to prevent exploitation or harm. These protections must be explicitly discussed in the publication, detailing any efforts made to reduce harm, ensure equitable participation, and enhance the understanding of the research by the participants.

In summary, when conducting research involving special populations, researchers must prioritize ethical standards that respect autonomy, ensure protection from harm, and provide clear communication about the risks and benefits of participation. Adherence to the Declaration of Helsinki and COPE guidelines should be evident in every step of the research process, from planning to reporting.

Registration of Clinical Trials

Prospective registration of clinical trials—defined as any research study that prospectively assigns human participants to one or more health-related interventions to evaluate health outcomes—is essential for ensuring transparency, accountability, and public access to research data. It promotes the reporting of both positive and negative results, helps prevent unnecessary duplication of research, and supports ethical oversight.

POCUS Journal requires that all clinical trials and other prospective interventional studies involving human participants be registered in a publicly accessible clinical trial registry before the enrollment of the first participant. Acceptable registries include ClinicalTrials.gov, ISRCTN, the EU Clinical Trials Register, and the WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP). Studies conducted in Canada may also be listed in Health Canada’s Clinical Trials Database, but this alone does not replace the requirement for registration in a WHO/ICMJE-compliant public registry.

Registration information, including the registry name and trial number, must be included with the manuscript submission. This policy is consistent with the ICMJE Recommendations and the Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing.

Peer Review

Which Content is Peer Reviewed?

POCUS Journal is committed to a rigorous, fair, and transparent peer review process for scholarly works, particularly those of an investigational nature. Peer review is a cornerstone of academic publishing and ensures the integrity, credibility, and scientific merit of published work.

Externally Peer-Reviewed by at Least Two Independent Reviewers:

Case Series
Observational studies (prospective, retrospective)
Guidelines
Clinical Trials (randomized, other)
Curricula
Methods and Protocols
Unsolicited Position Statements

Externally Peer-Reviewed by at Least One Independent Reviewer:

Case Files
Case Reports
Brief Research Reports

Editorially Reviewed (Not Externally Peer Reviewed):

Letters
Solicited Editorials
Solicited Position Statements

Peer Review Details

Peer Reviewers are not blinded to author identities. Authors are blinded to Peer Reviewer identities.
Peer Reviews are not published.
Peer Reviews are intended to aid the editor in evaluating the quality of the work and the degree to which it contributes to the health sciences.
Peer reviewers are not asked to perform copy editing and should refrain from commenting on style outside of significant concerns regarding readability or language that may mislead the reader.
Peer Reviewers may recommend revisions, publication, or rejection but the Editor is the decision authority for editorial steps following peer review.

Peer Review After Revisions

The editor handling the work will determine if additional peer review is required after revisions are submitted. Revisions that are well documented and address the reviewers initial concerns do not typically require additional peer review.

Submissions to the Journal by Members of the Editorial Staff

A work submitted to the journal including a member of the editorial staff as author represents a potential significant conflict of interest and are subject to additional processes:

An uninvolved Section Editor or the Associate Editor will handle the submission
An author other than the Staff Member will handle all communication regarding the submission
A minimum of three external reviewers are required
The article will be declined if any two external reviewers recommend rejection

Peer Reviewer Conflict of Interest

Peer Reviewers must disclose any conflicts of interest prior to beginning review of a work. Peer Reviewers may not participate in review of a work where they have a conflict of interest. Conflict of interest includes but is not limited to:

Close association with an author
Competing research or publication activity
Financial or other material relationship with a relevant entity \
Personal animus or other unprofessional motives

Authors who believe a violation of the conflict of interest policy has occurred may notify the Editor in Chief or the Managing Editor in writing describing the nature of the violation or other concerns.

Allegations of Misconduct

Editorial Misconduct

Concerns about editorial misconduct should be directed to the managing editor or directly to the journal publisher. The journal publisher will follow internal policies to investigate editorial misconduct. Editorial misconduct can include but is not limited to improper processing of a submission, fabrication of peer reviews or peer review components, or misrepresenting the content of peer reviews.

Author Misconduct

Concerns about author misconduct may be directed to the Editor in Chief or the Managing Editor. Concerns should be timely and substantiated and be material to the author’s involvement with the journal. Example areas of concern that are appropriate are:

Plagiarism
Fabrication of or misrepresenting data
Prior publication

The Editor in Chief may direct another member of the editorial staff to pursue the investigation. All information regarding investigations of misconduct will be handled confidentially. The editorial staff will contact the author to investigate concerns. The editorial staff reserves the right to contact outside entities including those listed as affiliations for authors or other journal editors if such contact is necessary to resolve the concerns. Authors will be made aware of which other entities, if any, are contacted and what information will be shared.

Articles may be published with a correction or retraction notice as appropriate. The decisions of the editorial board subsequent to a completed investigation are final and not subject to appeal.

The research community is well served by studies who make data available for subsequent analysis and replication. If a work makes use of data from a third party source that data should be cited in the work in a manner that would allow readers to identify it.

Works involving data analysis submitted for publication consideration must include a statement on the availability of data to outside parties.

The editors reserve the right to request de-identified data to resolve concerns over data analysis in select cases.

Standards of Reporting

There are well accepted guidelines for reporting the various forms of medical research and scholarship published in the Journal. When possible authors are encouraged to make use of guidelines for structuring their work. When authors do make use of reporting guidelines:

The guideline used should be stated clearly in the manuscript
A copy of the guideline with appropriate references to the manuscript, to be published as an appendix

Citations

At the time of submission of the work the authors warrant that all in text citations are accurate and appropriately cited. Citations should follow the format specified in the Author Instructions.

Any material that is not the original work of the authors such as figures, illustrations, or quoted text must have appropriate copyright permissions from the copyright holder for reproduction in the Journal under a Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution License.

Misconduct

-TBD

Images and Figures

Images and figures included in the work must be accurate and not mislead the reader.

Figures should use appropriate scales and labels. The Journal reserves the right to request the data required to reproduce figures for the purposes of publication and type setting.

Images should be unmodified except for changes required to remove identifiers for anonymization. Images may have general corrections to brightness and contrast. Regional corrections of any kind including modifications with AI tools are prohibited. Where close up images are required there should be a more representative image included to provide context for the reader. Any images of experimental results should include unaltered representations of any controls.

Images of Persons

By their very nature images of persons can only be de-identified in a limited fashion. Subjects must provide explicit consent for publication of their likeness even when attempts at de-identification are performed.

Cultural Appropriateness

Cultures vary in which types of images are acceptable for publication and which images may be taboo regardless of the scientific value of such images (eg images of dead bodies, images of unclothed persons). The authors should consider cultural context when choosing to submit images with their work.

Corrections, Expression of Concern and Retractions

Name Change

An author may request a name change for a variety of reasons. Simple name changes can be initiated by contacting the managing editor. The Managing editor will confirm with the corresponding author that the request matches the appropriate author. Simple name changes will be republished without corrigendum and updated copies will be provided to indexing agencies.

Expressions of Concern

Readers who have an academic concern or opinion regarding a published work are welcome to submit a letter to the Editor. Letters which contribute to the academic discourse around a topic will be published at the discretion of the Editor in Chief.

Readers who are concerned about ethical performance or academic misconduct should submit an ethics complaint as noted in Allegations of Misconduct.

Corrections

Published authors requesting minor corrections to a published work such as a name misspelling or typographical error may contact the managing editor. The request will be reviewed by the section editor who will determine 1) if the change can be made and 2) if a corrigendum will be published alongside the correction.

Corrections will be published to the website, a new PDF will be generated, and the corrected work will be forwarded to indexing agencies Any correction may generate a new DOI. Outside indexers (eg PubMed) follow their own policies regarding reindexing and correction notices.

Retractions

Articles may be retracted if serious flaws are identified after publication that call the integrity of the work into question. Examples of such concerns could include but are not limited to author misconduct, plagiarism, mishandling of data, or serious errors in data analysis.

Authors may notify the Editor in Chief of issues requiring retraction via written request. Authors in turn will be notified when the editorial board has resolved action on the decision to issue a retraction. Retractions will be published in a timely manner on the journal website and the associated PDF and electronic indexes will be updated in turn.

Appeals and Complaints

Editorial decisions to accept or reject a work are final. If there are concerns that the decision is the result of editorial misconduct the Authors should notify the Editor in Chief in writing with a request to appeal their rejection and refer to the appropriate submission number.

Desk rejections are final and not subject to appeal. Desk rejections do not require explanation. If the author has evidence that a desk rejection was the result of malice or ethical misconduct on the part of the editor they may notify the Editor in Chief or the Managing Editor. This is not considered an appeal of the editorial decision but rather an ethics complaint.

Complaints related to the editorial process including editorial decisions, conduct in the process of peer review, or related to the process of investigating author complaints, may be directed to the Managing Editor or the Publisher. In either case the Publisher will follow internal procedures to investigate and resolve the complaint.

The Journal takes responsibility for the content of the Journal. Corrections to the content of the Journal including retractions will be made in a timely manner. Concerns over author, staff, or editor misconduct may be referred to their employers, funding agencies, or institutions as appropriate.

Copyright, Licenses, and Preprints

Website Copyright

Website design, text, and graphical elements not covered under the copyright terms of the Public Knowledge Project and Open Journal Systems are copyright Cinquill Medical Publishers. All rights are reserved.

General Copyright and License for Published Works

Works published in the POCUS Journal are published under a Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution License (Deed – Attribution 4.0 International – Creative Commons).

Commercial use of work published in POCUS Journal requires additional permissions from the publisher. Commercial use includes publication in print or online for the purposes of product support or advertising. Authors who are employees of commercial entities may not post their Work to employer websites without additional permissions for commercial use.

Authors Ownership of Copyright

Authors retain copyright for their submitted work. At the time of publication acceptance authors complete an Author Publication Agreement granting the Journal an exclusive and irrevocable right to publish the accepted manuscript under the Creative Commons license in effect at the time of publication. The copyright agreement contains additional permissions that may affect the authors’ ability to exercise their copyright.

Published Version as Authoritative Version of the Work

Authors agree to make only the published version of the work available in university archives or via other modes of dissemination/distribution. When possible electronic references to the work should link to the published version on the Journal website.

Preprints

Authors may publish pre-print versions of their manuscript but any such versions should clearly be marked as a pre-print copy. Authors should make the editors aware of a preprint and provide a working link to the preprint at the time of submission. At the time of publication the preprint must be updated with a link to the published version of the work.

AI Policy

The Editors of POCUS Journal recognize that generative AI has provided many individuals with access to language resources that may flatten social and economic inequalities. The Editors distinguish between computer pattern matching for specific data tasks (here defined as “machine learning”) and content generation (“Generative AI”).

If Generative AI was used in conceptualization, data analysis, or other more substantive portions of the work these uses should be described in the methods of the work. Documentation must be provided on the prompts used and responses obtained and submitted to the Journal as an appendix.

The use of machine learning in the work should be described in the methods section of the work.

AI Use and Disclosure in Manuscript Preparation

The authors must disclose any use of Generative AI in manuscript preparation including which sections of the manuscript are involved (eg. Chat GPT 3.0 (OpenAI) was used for rephrasing and language editing after manuscript preparation in the abstract, introduction, and discussion sections of the manuscript).

The editors understand that these definitions only partially resolve the ambiguity around the terms used to describe computer learning. When necessary authors should contact the editors for clarifications on how to document AI use.

Text and Data Mining

Contents of the Journal are available under a CC-BY-NC-ND license. Content may be aggregated only for purposes consistent with those license terms and any other use is prohibited. For the purposes of this license the use of data for LLM training is considered commercial use.

Commercial Use and Reprints

Articles or other works published in POCUS Journal are published under a Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution License. Any reuse of the Journal’s published content for commercial purposes is not permitted.

The corresponding author is the point of contact for reprints.

Harassment

-TBD

Designation of Territories

The Journal respects the conventions of authors on the use of territory names and takes no political position on territory names or designations.

Permanency of Articles

The POCUS Journal participates in the Public Knowledge Project Preservation Network https://pkp.sfu.ca/pkp-pn/. POCUS Journal is also indexed in PubMed. Should the journal cease operations all content will be available online through the PKP online archive or PubMed.

Business model

Cinquill Medical Publishing operates as a division of the CINQ Research Laboratory. The organization maintains control over advertising placement within both the Journal and its website. Editorial staff have no involvement in the solicitation, acceptance, or placement of advertisements.

The journal does not charge fees to readers for accessing articles, and editors continue to perform their duties on a volunteer basis, underscoring the commitment to a transparent, ethical, and volunteer-driven publication model.

Terms of Publication (Cinquill Medical Publishing)

At the time of acceptance for publication the corresponding author will complete a publication agreement on behalf of all the authors. The publication agreement is available here and is summarized below:

The author(s) are the owner of copyright for the work
The author(s) grant the Journal an irrevocable right to publish online the accepted version of the work under the license in effect at the time of publication.
As the owners of copyright the author(s) may use the work for purpose they wish provided that:
- The published version of the work is the only version distributed online
- Other use of the work appropriately references the published version of the work
The publisher reserves the right to license or otherwise authorise any commercial use of the work. Licensing the work for commercial use does not convey any obligation by the Journal to reimburse or reward the author(s) either financially or otherwise.
The Journal is currently an online-only publication. The Journal reserves the right to publish the work in print.
Any pre-print will be updated with a reference to the online published work.

Publishing Schedule