About the Journal
Historically, the journal Hansenologia Internationalis: leprosy and other infectious diseases (HI) began in 1933, with a written publication by the São Paulo Leprology Society of the Revista de Leprologia de São Paulo, which became, in 1936, the Revista Brasileira de Leprologia, a periodical that formed a broad base and launching platform for the modern leprosy doctrine. Nowadays, publications are digitized and fully available at BVS Hanseníase.
Curated by the Health Institute, in 1975, as a proposal by Dr. Abraão Rotberg to transform and rename the Revista Brasileira de Leprologia, Hansenologia Internationalis was created. Thus, in the first issue, 1976;1(1):3-6, letters of encouragement from the Health Secretary and the Health Minister were found, in addition to congratulations from the great scientists in the field. In 1989, in the editorial of issue 14(1):1, Dr. Diltor V. A. Opromolla announced that the editorial office of the journal becomes the responsibility of Hospital Lauro de Souza Lima, today known as Lauro de Souza Lima Institute, a Leprosy reference Center for the Ministry of Health and PAHO/WHO.
Since its creation, renowned researchers from the field were in the editorial process forefront, with the support of a vast editorial team and national and international ad hoc reviewers.
The journal is the scientific dissemination body of the Brazilian Association of Hansenology, and, since 2005, it has published supplements with the annals of abstracts from congresses and symposiums held by this society.
Considering scientific and technological advances, the editorial world is constantly demanding greater expertise from people involved in scientific dissemination, to make it democratic, open, and, accessible to users of that literature. Thus, following the scientific development and in a continuous process of improvement, in the year 2009 the journal, which was published only in a printed format, becomes available in an online format as well, with open access, a fact that provided quality information to a broad audience, increasing the visibility of search results. In 2018 it starts publishing its issues in the continuous flow modality, aiming to speed up the communication process and dissemination of research, and, in 2021, as a member of the Portal of Scientific Journals of the São Paulo State Secretariat of Health, adopts the Open Journal System (OJS) management and publication system for scientific journals, a free software widely accepted by the Brazilian community of scientific editors.
Currently, the HI journal is the only Brazilian and Latin American current publication whose main theme is leprosy, being one of the few scientific journals of its kind in the world, with regular circulation and with all issues available in full text in an online and free format.
Goal
The HI is an official vehicle for scientific, multidisciplinary, and open access dissemination of Lauro de Souza Lima Institute, belonging to the Coordination of Health Services of São Paulo State Health Secretary. The purpose of the journal is to disseminate scientific publications in the field of leprosy and other infectious diseases with dermatological manifestations, including epidemiology and control, clinical medicine and therapy, disability prevention and rehabilitation, history, human rights, social sciences and health education, molecular biology and genetics, immunology and microbiology, management, technological innovation in health, dermatopathology and neurodiagnosis of leprosy.
As an open-access journal, all content is available electronically and free of charge, at no cost to the reader or their institution. Readers may read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or reference the full texts of the articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without seeking prior permission from the publisher or author, since they respect the usage license of the Creative Commons that was used, giving authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly recognized and cited, as defined as open access by Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI).
HI is also in line with the principles of Open Science, contributing to the construction of scientific, participatory, transparent, shared knowledge and with greater democratization of knowledge. Its publication policies are based on concepts related to open access, publication of preprints, and open research data policies.
Target Audience
Professionals and students of Health Sciences and related fields, such as dermatologists, neurologists, psychiatrists, infectologists, leprologists, family health doctors, nurses, occupational therapists, psychologists, social workers, nutritionists, biologists, biomedical doctors, pharmacists/pharmacists-biochemists, nurses, professionals working in public health, epidemiologists, historians, and sociologists.
Periodicity
The journal publishes in a continuous flow mode, in which the article is published right after it has been evaluated, approved, and laid out, that is, there is no need to wait for the complete composition of issues or serial issues. This modality promotes speed in the communication process and availability of research with numerous advantages for all scientific information users. The issue is published in the following order:
- Editorial;
- Original articles;
- Review articles;
- Clinical studies;
- Case report;
- Experience report;
- Viewpoints;
- Brief communications;
- Guides, protocols, guidelines, standards, technical manual, and action and/or intervention proposals;
- Interviews;
- Letters to the editor;
- Obituary
Languages
HI publishes original articles in Portuguese, Spanish, and English. If originally written in English or Spanish, a Portuguese version must be accompanied. The titles, abstracts, and keywords of the manuscripts in Portuguese, English, and Spanish are mandatory.
The editorial team reserves the right to make changes to the manuscripts, to maintain the homogeneity and grammatical quality of the publication, respecting the style and authors’ opinions.
Prior spelling review, the accuracy of references in the listing, and correct citation in the text and references are the responsibility of the authors.
Fee waiver policy
There is no charge to authors for manuscript submission, evaluation, and publication.
Copyright Statement
This journal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The rights belong to the author and this license allows others to distribute, remix, adapt and build on his work, even for commercial purposes, if they credit the author for the original creation. It is the most flexible license of all available licenses. It is recommended to maximize the dissemination and use of licensed materials.
The HI journal allows the author to retain the copyright of articles accepted for publication without restrictions, thus, the journal is exempt from responsibility for possible violations of Law nº 9.610/1998, Copyright Law.
Peer review policy
The original manuscripts received will be analyzed by the editor-in-chief, then by members of the Executive Editorial Committee who carry out a formal review, called desk review, to analyze whether the manuscript is following the journal's rules, regarding the thematic scope and similarity check with anti-plagiarism tools.
If approved in this first stage, the manuscript will be forwarded to at least two specialists for peer review. If necessary, a third specialist may be invited, if previous evaluations result in doubts, whether to manuscript acceptance or not. HI uses the double-blind peer review system, where reviewers do not know the authors' names and affiliations. Likewise, reviewers' reports with suggestions provided to authors are anonymous. The suitability of the manuscript for publication will be evaluated exclusively based on criteria of scientific excellence.
To ensure the application of the double-blind peer review system, manuscripts must be prepared by the authors in a way that they don’t reveal their identity, therefore, it is necessary to remove authors' names and affiliations from the main manuscript file. This information should only be included on the cover page, according to the template.
Authors can follow the progress of evaluation activities logged into the system by accessing the “See pending submissions” icon on the Submission tab.
Plagiarism and scientific integrity
The authors must guarantee the texts’ originality sent to the journal and all references to works by different authors must be duly cited in the body of the text and referenced at the end of the work.
Focusing on the integrity of the contents it publishes, all manuscripts will be submitted to free programs designed to verify similarity, during desk review, carried out by members of the Executive Editorial Board.
Submissions that show the presence of plagiarism will be rejected and the authors will be notified of the reason for cancellation. If the identification occurs through a complaint after publication of the article, the file will be removed from the system and in its place will contain a document informing the reason why the text was removed.
The editorial team bases its plagiarism analysis on the international guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and the Basic Guidelines for Integrity in Scientific Activity of the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq).
If the text has previously been presented at scientific events or as a result of academic work, the submitted text must not be the same as the original version, which is an expansion of the initial work. The authors must inform on the title page the reference to the event where it was presented or the work to which it is related.
Manifestation of conflicts of interest
The authors will be responsible for recognizing and informing possible financial conflicts, of commercial and/or associative interest, related to the material used in the work or others that may influence them, declaring the existence or not of such conflicts in the Declaration of Authorship and responsibility, in the moment of submission. Reviewers should also inform the editor of any conflicts that may influence or hinder their evaluations.
Retraction policy
HI follows the Retraction Guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). The retraction of a scientific article is a warning mechanism that research presents a problem or failure to correct the record and scientific memory.
Ethics in research involving humans and animals
Publication of articles that bring research results involving human beings is subject to compliance with ethical principles contained in the Declaration of Helsinki, of the World Medical Association. Also, compliance with specific legislation of the country in which the research was carried out regarding research involving human beings and/or animals, respectively, must be observed. In the case of Brazil, the legislation of the National Commission of Ethics in Research (CONEP) and the National Council for the Control of Animal Experimentation (CONCEA).
Articles whose results involve human beings and/or experimental animals must contain clear information on compliance with this regulation, in the last paragraph of the Material and Methods section of the manuscript, and annex, the authors must send the respective opinions of the Research Ethics Committee signed by the commission.
About the principles of Diversity, Equity, Equality, and Accessibility (DEIA), HI suggests the use of SAGER Guidelines (Sex and Gender Equity in Research).
The Editorial Board of the journal reserves the right to request additional information about ethical procedures performed in the research.
Preprints
Preprint consists of a manuscript deposited before the publication process in a peer-reviewed scientific journal, on preprint servers for open and immediate evaluation by experts, a tool used by researchers as an alternative for rapid diffusion, visibility, and establishment of originality.
HI, a journal may accept manuscripts previously made available on preprint servers. However, authors must inform the virtual location of it (link and DOI), on the title page for the knowledge of the editors. These manuscripts will only be submitted to blind review, considering that the reviewers may be aware of the authors’ identity. If the manuscript is accepted for publication, the authors must obligatorily and immediately withdraw the document from the preprint repository or indicate there the link of the version published in the HI journal.
Open research data
The journal suggests that research data should be submitted to open data repositories. Therefore, the author must inform, on the title page, if the research data were published, and in which repository.
Privacy Policy
The names and addresses informed in this journal will be used exclusively for the services provided by this publication, not being made available for other purposes or to third parties. Hansenologia Internationalis fully complies with the General Data Protection Law (LGPDP) - Law nº 13.709/2018
Archiving
This journal uses the LOCKSS system of the Public Knowledge Project (PkP) to create a distributed filing system among the journals of the São Paulo State Health Secretariat, allowing the creation of permanent journal files for preservation and restoration purposes. The journal is also part of the Cariniana network. Brazilian Network of Digital Preservation Services of the Brazilian Institute of Information in Science and Technology (IBICT). See also: Keepers.
Editorial Policies
The editorial policies of this journal are registered in the: Diadorim: diretório de políticas editoriais das revistas científicas brasileiras and Sherpa Romeo.
