Highlight knowledge gaps that will refine the health system research agenda.
Comment: 1 000 words, 10 references, one figure or table. Pre-submission enquiry strongly advised.
Comment articles are editorial-style pieces that present an argument or discuss a topical development in the field. They should be concise and tightly written articles with a clear point. Links to current events, publications, conferences, or announcements are encouraged. Comment articles can be a maximum of 1200 words with 10 references and one image or table. Pre-submission enquiry is strongly advised. These articles will be reviewed internally but only sent for external peer review if the editor deems it necessary.
A copy of the guidelines for reviewers may be downloaded here. Email the editorial team directly at submissions@hmpg.co.za for assistance.
SAJPH is actively engaged in addressing the 5/95 health systems publications gap - a term coined by the WHO-based Alliance for Health Policy and Systems Research to describe the imbalance between the numbers of publications on health systems from developing and developed countries, respectively. This policy means the journal will provide thorough feedback to all prospective authors who submit pre-submission enquiries or full papers, and support non-academic authors to apply the conventions of scientific reporting. If the paper is not of sufficient quality and interest for peer review, the feedback will be from the editorial team alone. For those papers that meet the journal's content guidelines and quality standards, external reviewers' opinions will be sought to support the editorial decision-making process.
SAJPH uses a double-blind peer review process which means that both the reviewer and author identities are concealed from each other throughout the review process.
The editorial team will request two-three reviews for every paper: one expert technical review; one reviewer with knowledge of the country or context that is the subject of the paper; and one methodological review. Depending on the type of paper, there may be additional needs for statistical or ethical opinions and these will be sought at the discretion of the Editor.
The editors are under no obligation to accept the judgements of a reviewer, or to send all comments to authors in cases where the editors feel the reviewers’ comments are contrary to the aims of the journal. However, all relevant and appropriate reviewers' reports will be sent to authors along with the publication decision: accept, accept with minor revision, major revision, or reject. All authors will recieve a detailed justification for the publication decision.
If invited to submit a revised version of the paper, authors are required to address all reviewers' comments or to submit a justification for those that are ignored. Occasionally, a reviewer maybe asked to look at the revised version of a paper for which they had provided substantial comments on the original version.
Reviewers are selected from the journal’s contacts, and from searches of bibliographic databases for the most relevant experts in the field. Efforts will be made to identify at least one person who is familiar with the country or context of the work described to ensure that opinions are obtained on the appropriateness for the situation as well as the technical details.
The entire process of peer review and revision of the paper has a target timeline of 6 weeks to 2 months.
In cases where authors strongly disagree with the decision of the editorial team to reject their paper, an appeal can be lodged with the Editor. The appeal will be referred to the Editor in Chief of the Health and Medical Publishing Group, who will review the editorial decision-making process and provide feedback to both editors and authors on the outcome.
If you would like to be added to the journal's roster of reviewers please contact the Editor, Prof Debashis Basu (Debashis.Basu@up.ac.za), with your name, contact details and keywords describing your areas of expertise and country experience.
Already a registered user? Login to the journal website and edit your profile to include 'Reviewer' as a role. Kindly express your interest to serve as a reviewer in an email to submissions@hmpg.co.za, specifying your user login.
An invitation to review will be sent via email from the Editorial Manager system, and will provide submission details such as the manuscript title and abstract. Reviewers will be asked to indicate their acceptance/decline to review by a specified date, and a date by which the review should be completed will also be provided. Reviewers can respond to the invite either by clicking on the relevant link in the email or by logging in to their Reviewer role on the SHS Editorial Manager website, where they will see that they have a pending New Reviewer Invitation. Reviewers who accept the invite to review can access the full text article, by logging into Editorial Manager or via the link to the reviewers’ ‘pending assignments’ found in the automated acknowledgement email (received in response to the their acceptance to review). The article will be blinded and in PDF format. Once completed, reviewers will submit their review and recommendation on the Editorial Manager website.
Login to the SAJPH/SHS Editorial Manager website in the Reviewer role.
Southern African Journal of PUblich Health incorporating Strengthening Health Systems is published quarterly.
Southern African Journal of Public Health incorporating Strengthening Health Systems incorporating is an Open Access Journal and provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge. In accordance with the definition of the Budapest Open Access Initiative all content published by the SAJPH/SHS is made free to users without any subscription or other charges. Users are permitted to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full text of these articles, or use them for any other lawful, non-commercial purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author.
The posting of comments to published articles requires registration with this journal website. Only constructive comments that relate to the published material will be permitted. Posted comments solely represent the opinions of the respective user and not those of the SAJPH/SHS, and do not imply endorsement by the SAJPH/SHS. The SAJPH/SHS reserves the right to remove comments without notice that are abusive, threatening, defamatory, contain advertising or spam, or violate another user’s privacy. The SAJPH/SHS reserves the right to revoke the privileges of users that post inappropriate material. Such material may be brought to the attention of the publisher (publishing@hmpg.co.za). The SAJPH/SHS reserves the right to modify this policy without notice.
No charges apply upon article submission. Similarly, no charges apply upon publication (article processing charges).
Additional services are available to prospective authors, including: protocol reviews; writing support; and full submission-to-publication support. Click here for further information.
The SAJPH/SHS is published under an Attribution-Non Commercial International Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY-NC 4.0) License. Under this license, authors agree to make articles available to users, without permission or fees, for any lawful, non-commercial purpose. Users may read, copy, or re-use published content as long as the author and original place of publication are properly cited.