The peer review process allows manuscript authors to comply with a variety of criteria to complete their manuscript as it provides constructive feedback from our staff of peer reviewers. The Reviewers assess the accuracy of a manuscript, the clarity and succinctness of writing, pertinence of the literature citations, and the significance of the research in a given domain. In a survey of authors of recently published papers, more than 90% of the authors indicated that a peer review had significantly improved the quality of their manuscript. Unlike an abstract submitted to a conference, a manuscript is seldom accepted for publication without at least a ”minor revision". Without a peer-review, there often exists a longer period of time between a submission and publication, and during the review process, many authors may have to face a ‘rejection’ without an adequate explanation or feedback. Pre-submission peer review before you submit your paper for publication at your target journal is one of the best ways you can accelerate your time to publication and prevent the re-review process.  

Proofreading is a process of checking and correcting language usage or grammatical errors along with providing a logical flow for your sentences. There is also an editor’s memo on the need for clarifying content meaning. After the editor makes necessary revisions, the corrected paper is sent back to the authors. 
By contrast, Quorum’s Reviewers analyze for errors in study design, methodological flaws, internally inconsistent data, unbalanced citations, and any biased interpretation of the data. Reviewers never make revisions, as the authors can revise their paper based on the Reviewer’s comments and suggestions provided in Quorum’s Review Report. The authors can also obtain additional information by referring to relevant papers the Quorum Reviewer recommends for the manuscript.

Quorum service strives to maintain a high quality in its review process and assesses the adherence of authors to the internationally accepted standards reporting guidelines. The checklist employs a separate ‘Reviewer checklist’ as well as ‘Questions reviewers ask’ presented in a Review Report. This allows a point-by-point addressing of the manuscript’s content for a thorough and methodical review. In addition, Quorum Review also provides bibliographic information as service to the authors. This process may directly lead to better outcome of the study by inducing the authors’ motivation.

At present, Quorum Reviewers do not make any direct revisions on your paper. Instead, reviewers judge the adequacy of the study for design and approach. They also provide feedback on viability of the data, effectiveness of description and interpretation of the data and any statistical analysis performed. It is quite difficult for reviewers to make direct revisions on data. Minor revisions may be suggested in the Review Report.

Many studies have shown that peer review maybe influenced by bias towards an authors’ area of research or prestige, and the authors background or national origin. This is why Quorum adopts the double-blind peer review as it provides objectivity and fairness and decreases bias by keeping the manuscript authors’ identity and background from being known to the review staff. This is intended to reduce bias in the review process and increase objectivity.

Quorum Review team consists of thought leaders in their fields of study with research background of their own. Many are current or former professors or faculty of major universities with relevant expertise and are from multiple backgrounds. With Quorum, you get access to our experts who have published extensively and successfully in peer-reviewed Science Citation Index (SCI) journals and some that have been editors for international journals. Quorum’s review will provide you constructive and valuable comments so that you can improve your manuscript before submission to the journal of your choice.

Of course, you can. In addition to peer review service, Quorum provides other services in a package form; these include: translation/proofreading, formatting, recommendation for suitable journals, paper submission to a journal of your choice, and paper re-submission/proofreading.

Yes, you can select any of items presented in the package. In the paper editing sequence, you can choose peer review before and after the proofreading process of your English manuscript.

Depending on the written quality of your paper (grammar and syntax), we recommend you choose Quorum Review after the translation/proofreading process.

To enable an accurate and objective review, we advise that you to send to us your manuscript and all the supporting materials that include figure captions and reference listings.

You do not need to do so. Although the authors information may be contained in a paper, Quorum’s double-blind review ensures anonymity of the authors and their affiliations.

USD 500$ per each reviewer. You can choose up to 5 reviewers. (for example, if you choose 3 reviewers, you will pay USD 1500$(+10% VAT will be added.)

Raw data is unnecessary. In the same way as with a journal’s peer review, Quorum Review analyses the current manuscript file only.

Re-review may be available, but you have to pay additional fee. In this case, please indicate “re-review” for our confirmation. 

Quorum Reviewers respect the confidentiality of peer review during or after the peer review process. Also, they will not use or reveal any details of a manuscript. Quorum Review staff respect the ethics standards of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) for peer review.  

Generally, Quorum Review is complete within 2 weeks of submission when a Review Report is sent to the authors. 

At present, a journal-tailored service is unavailable as we are exploring the possibility. We can notify you if such a service becomes available.

Accurate assessment about the strengths and weaknesses of a paper is essential in helping authors revise their paper. Using a standard checklist, Quorum‘s systematic review ensures transparency with section scores in the Review Report to provide a clear feedback. The list of 'Questions a reviewer asks’ presented in each section of the Review Report is used for an evaluation. Quorum’s peer reviewers use these evaluation criteria for their review. Although the compliance of the standard protocols such as CONSORT, STARD, and PRISMA is not included in the score calculation, authors can easily identify the items required or need addressing in their manuscript by these guidelines.

Although Quorum’s review adheres to a systematic review, there may be differences of opinion between an authors and the reviewer. If the authors are presenting material that is new in scope or content and different from existing background knowledge in a specific field, the reviewer may encounter a greater difficulty in making their review. If a reviewer completely misinterprets your paper or overlooks the merits of a manuscript, you can consult with Quorum Review about this matter or ask another reviewer to assess your paper.

There could be instances of a difference of opinion between our reviewers. As Quorum’s review offers practical, evidence-based guidelines, peer review is conducted by scientists who are chosen based on their areas of expertise, and their opinion has to be considered and it is ultimately left to the authors of the manuscript to decide on the advice they see fit. 

Quorum Review does give a score for a ‘paper’s impact’; however it does not place a great emphasis on this assessment as assessing a ‘paper’s impact’ depends on the reviewer’s subjective judgment and that may be variable and not easily assessed. Therefore, a low score should not discourage you and instead the score in combination with the other assessments in our Review Report should enable you to revise your manuscript to its full potential and carefully selection of a proper journal for submission.  

The success of your submission to the journal of your choice depends on many factors. To maximize the possibility of success, our reviewers are there to provide useful suggestions to improve your paper, but ultimately our process cannot guarantee success in having your paper published in the journal of your choice. We are aware that the acceptance rate for manuscripts varies significantly depending on the characteristics of a given journal. Some journals tend to accept a small percentage of submitted papers have extremely stringent selection criteria. For example, if a journal’s editor feels that the research is not pivotal or is simply outside of the scope of the publication, the submission may not be accepted for publication. By contrast, another journal will accept the paper only if the submission meets the criteria to increase scientific rigor. Quorum Review is oriented toward the latter case and promises on improving the quality of your submission.

When a manuscript is submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal, the journal’s reviewer tends to judge the significance of the research and the novelty of the study or its appropriateness for the scope of the journal. Quorum reviewers do not make the choice of which journal to submit as it only provides to improve your work. If your paper is rejected by a journal, there is the possibility that you may have misjudged the journal’s criteria in making your selection or that it was an over-optimistic selection. In addition, the problems raised in the reviewer’s comments or suggestions may not have been properly addressed or corrected. In case of a rejection, it is the responsibility of the authors to re-evaluate their options that may include providing more data or selecting another journal for submission. Quorum only strives to improve your submission and strictly plays an advisory role. 

Quorum Review provides an accurate, unbiased assessment of each component of their manuscript by providing a score. However, a high score does not necessarily mean that your target journal will accept your paper for publication. There are many factors that influence a journal’s decision on your paper, and we cannot predict the journal’s verdict on your manuscript. We only help you to put your manuscript on the best footing possible for submission. A high score should encourage you that your manuscript will have a good showing at the submission time.

If you are having difficulty in understanding a reviewer’s comments or conclusions, contact us to help you. In this case, with your enquiry, Quorum will contact the reviewer so that he/she may answer your questions in more detail.  

For our double-blind review process to work, we do not provide a direct contact with our reviewer staff; however, you may contact Quorum support at all times for clarification and questions.  

In this case, you can refer the literature references provided in the Review Report. Quorum Review provides a bibliography of relevant literatures custom-tailored to your manuscript. These citations will help you address the reviewer’s comments on methodology, state of knowledge in the field, and other areas relevant on revising and strengthening your manuscript. 

At present, these services are unavailable, but Quorum Review can notify you if we offer such a service in the future.

You do not need to do so necessarily. You may selectively revise the necessary parts of your paper. The comments from the reviewers only serve as guidance for you to use and the revision choices depend on you.

Quorum Review is limited to a one-time review only and a re-review is available for an additional fee. Should you request re-review, this is an independent request and thus, you must pay the additional fee, which is 60% of the initial review. In this case, please indicate a “re-review” for our confirmation.

In Quorum’s homepage under ‘Resources’, you will see a variety of useful links to websites and a list of published material for improving grammar and syntax.

These icons represent 5-block scores of each section calculated from the assessment of ‘Questions reviewers ask’. With these facial expressions, you can see each section score just at a quick glance. 

‘Questions reviewers ask’ are composed of the most frequent questions and major assessment items from reviewer guidelines or instructions that are referenced by reviewers in academic societies or journals. These items will be of help in writing your research report by breaking down your manuscript to components that can be addressed separately and re-checked for improvement.

Standard reporting protocols are in a format commonly used to summarize medical research and provide a guide for drafting research findings and methods. Currently, a number of research reporting protocols are available depending on the type of research analyzed. Of these, Quorum Review adopts the most widely used reporting guidelines - CONSORT, STROBE, PRISMA, TRENDS, and CARE.

All items in standard reporting protocols are not required for the acceptance of a paper in the journal, at the same time the protocols contain some items that are not adequate for analyzing the level of detail required. Also, a number of items in standard reporting protocols are similar to those of ‘Questions reviewers ask’. For these reasons, Quorum Review does not include any evaluation scores form the standard reporting protocols.  

The literatures recommended in the Review Report may be used for improving writing style, paragraph construction, and adherence to standard reporting; they also provide examples of various expression methods and confirmation of erroneous contents. With the bibliographic sources provided, you can further improve your paper through adopting a proper style of writing.