The primary aim of WJMA is to provide scholars and readers from various fields of clinical medicine with a platform to publish high-quality meta-analysis and systematic review articles and communicate their research findings online. In order to ensure the quality, timeliness, fairness, and transparency of publication, WJMA has implemented a variety of measures as follows: 

First, authors are recommended to prepare their articles according to the appropriate international publication recommendations, including the PRISMA 2009 Checklist. It is recommended that non-native English-speaking authors improve the language quality of their manuscript before submitting. It is also recommended to all authors to perform automated similarity detection, such as with Similarity Check by CrossRef, to ensure the manuscript’s similarity is < 30%. Both of these two features are closely related to peer review and first-decision making for the manuscript. For all articles involving human studies and/or animal experiments, before their acceptance, author(s) must provide the related formal ethics documents that were reviewed and approved by their local ethical review committee. For full guidelines for authors, please visit: https://www.wjgnet.com/bpg/gerinfo/204.

Second, articles published in WJMA must undergo rigorous external, cross-international peer review. WJMA peer reviewers come from different countries, chosen independently by artificial intelligence technique or our Editorial Office, and not recommended by the authors, to ensure fairness and protect integrity of the peer review process. For the full peer-review process, please visit: https://www.wjgnet.com/bpg/gerinfo/241.

Third, designation of co-first authors and/or co-corresponding authors is permitted.  For the policy of allowing co-first authors and co-corresponding authors who made equal contribution to a manuscript, please visit: https://www.wjgnet.com/bpg/GerInfo/310.

Fourth, WJMA's acceptance of a manuscript for publication is based on its novelty, innovativeness, data accuracy, image reliability, clear language expression, and ethical requirements. 

Fifth, in general, for the majority of manuscripts submitted to any Baishideng journal, the first decision/peer review procedure can be done within 28 days from the date that the journal receives the manuscript, other than this the maximum time will not exceed 90 days; the second decision, from the author submission of the revised version to its final determination for acceptance/rejection can be done within 28 days, other than this the maximum time will not exceed 38 days; and most of the accepted papers can be published online within 20 days, other than this the maximum time will not exceed 30 days.

Finally, the peer review report, author’s response to the peer review report, biostatistics review certificate, copyright license agreement, institutional ethics committee approval document, informed consent document(s), conflict-of-interest statement, CrossCheck detection report, corresponding authors’ personal ORCID numbers, funding information, language editing certificate, and other relevant documents will be published online along with the article to allow for an open and transparent publishing process.

WJMA mainly publishes articles reporting research results and findings obtained through meta-analysis and systematic review in a wide range of areas, including medicine, pharmacy, preventive medicine, stomatology, nursing, medical imaging, and laboratory medicine.