The Journal of Hospital Ethics -MedStar Washington Hospital Center

Editorial Group

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Evan G. DeRenzo, PhD
Ethicist & Editor, Emeritus
John J. Lynch, MD Center for Ethics
MedStar Washington

MANAGING EDITOR
Christian Carrozzo, PhD (c)
Educator & Editor
John J. Lynch, MD Center for Ethics
MedStar Washington
Department of Philosophy
University at Albany
State University of New York

MEDICAL EDITOR
Jack A. Sava, MD
Chief, Trauma
Director, Gold Surgery Team
MedStar Washington
Associate Professor of Surgery,
School of Medicine
Georgetown University Medical Center

NURSING EDITOR
Lucia Wocial, PhD
Senior Clinical Ethicist
John J. Lynch, MD Center for Ethics
MedStar Washington

BOOK REVIEW EDITOR
Patrick Herron, DBe
Montefiore Einstein Center for Bioethics,
Albert Einstein College of Medicine

CONTENT EDITORS
Fred King, MSLS
Medical Librarian
MedStar Washington

S. Layla Heimlich, MSLIS
Medical Librarian
MedStar Washington

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT
Nikki Glover
Administrative Coordinator
John J. Lynch, MD Center for Ethics

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Ben Krohmal, JD
Director, John J. Lynch, MD Center for Ethics
Associate Professor, School of Medicine,
Georgetown University Medical Center

Editorial Advisory Board

Amanda Anderson, PhD, MPA, RN
Doctoral Research Assistant, University at Buffalo, School of Nursing

Amanda Bush, MA, BSN, RN
Regional Nurse Wellness Specialist, MedStar Health, Center for Wellbeing

Chee M. Chan, MD, MPH
Medical Director, Intermediate Care Unit, MedStar Washington

Maria Susana Ciruzzi, JD, MSc, PhD,
Clinical Ethicist, The St. Jude Bioethics Program, St. Jude Children’s Hospital

O. Mary Dwyer, JD, MA
Assistant Professor, Department of Bioethics, Case Western Reserve School of Medicine

Laura K. Guidry-Grimes, PhD
Associate Ethicist, Center for Bioethics, Cleveland Clinic

Josh Hyatt, DSH, MBE, MHL
Adjunct Professor, Massachusetts College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences

Jack Kilcullen, MD, JD, MPH
Physician, Medical Critical Care Service, INOVA

Eran Klein, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor, Department of Neurology, Oregon Health & Sciences University

Tim Lahey, MD, MMSc
Director of Medical Ethics, Infectious Disease Attending and Professor of Medicine, University of Vermont Medical Center

Jason Lesandrini, PhD
Assistant Vice President of Ethics, Advanced Care Planning and Spiritual Health, WellStar Health System

Stephen Peterson, MD
Physician, Department of Psychiatry, MedStar Washington

Jack Schwartz, JD
Former Chief Council for Opinions and Advice, Maryland Attorney
General’s Office

Lindsay Semler, DNP, RN
Executive Director of Clinical Ethics, Brigham and Women’s Hospital

Eric A. Singer, MD
Assistant Professor, Section of Urologic Cancer, Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School

Carol Taylor, RN, MSN, PhD
Senior Research Scholar, Kennedy Institute of Ethics and Professor, School of Nursing & Health Studies, Georgetown University

Eli Weber, PhD, MA
Bioethics Director, Kaiser Permanente, San Bernardino, California

Editorial policies and guidelines

JoHE adheres to the editorial standards and authorship criteria recommended by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) and is produced with guidance from the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME). We welcome submissions of completed manuscripts as well as abstract paper proposals by authors with academic or professional expertise in relevant fields. For complete information regarding JoHE’s editorial policies and guidelines, please see the following sections on Manuscript Submission, Peer-Review Process, Conflicts of Interest, Data Sharing, Policy on the Use of Artificial Intelligence, Errata and Corrigenda, Editorial Disclaimer, Advertising Policy, Open Access, Copyright, Indexing, and ISSN. 

Manuscript Submission
Please limit manuscript submissions to a range of 4000-6000 words, and abstract paper proposals to 250 words. All manuscripts should be anonymized for peer review and include an abstract of no more than 250 words. Abstracts for original studies (empirical work) should be organized in the following manner: Background, Methods, Results, Conclusions. In addition, submissions should include 3-5 keywords for greater discoverability in search engines, databases, and other indexing systems. Manuscripts should be anonymized for review and include a separate cover letter with the title of the article, name of each author, contact information, institutional affiliation(s), and a statement declaring any conflicts of interest (see “Conflicts of Interest”). All submissions should adhere to the American Medical Association Manual of Style (11th Edition). Whereas book reviews are solicited by the Editorial Group, all other submissions to the journal will be reviewed for publication with the understanding that they are not under consideration, accepted for publication, or published elsewhere. To facilitate the review process, all manuscripts should be submitted as MS Word documents and should adhere to JoHE's complete set of editorial policies and guidelines as stated on this page at the time of submission. Please use JoHE's Manuscript Submission Checklist when submitting a manuscript for review. All manuscript submissions should be sent to Christian Carrozzo christian.carrozzo@medstar.net.

Peer-Review Process
Manuscript submissions are subject to two external, double-blind peer reviews by individuals chosen for their expertise in relation to the content of the manuscript. Should these two reviews result in inconsistent recommendations as to the general acceptance of the manuscript, a third reviewer may be selected to determine the submission's suitability for publication. Reviewers follow a guided peer-review process for the determination of a manuscript's acceptance, need for revision, as well as rejection, in addition to being provided the opportunity to return qualitative feedback to submitting authors (for additional information regarding this process, please contact the Managing Editor). Editors are not involved in decisions regarding papers they have authored or co-authored. Should any member of JoHE's Editorial Group or Editorial Advisory Board submit a manuscript for consideration, the manuscript will undergo the same double-blind peer review process and be held to the same publication standards as any other submission.

Conflicts of Interest
JoHE requires authors to declare all competing interests in relation to their work. All submitted manuscripts must include a conflict-of-interest statement declaring any competing interests (financial and non-financial). Where authors have no competing interests, the manuscript should include the following statement: “The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.” Editors may ask for further information relating to competing interests. A competing interest exists when the author(s) interpretation of data or presentation of information may be influenced by their personal or financial relationship with other people or organizations.

Data Sharing
Consistent with the National Institute of Health’s (NIH) policy on data management and sharing, the Editorial Group of the John J. Lynch, MD Center for Ethics supports data sharing as essential to scientists’ ability to expedite the translation of research results into knowledge, products, and procedures to improve human health. The Editorial Group of JoHE firmly believes that the sharing of scientific data “accelerates biomedical research discovery, in part by enabling validation of research results, providing accessibility to high-value datasets, and promoting data reuse for future research studies” https://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-21-013.html. As such, where JoHE publishes an article involving original research, while complying with the above federal regulations, all relevant data should be made as widely and freely available as possible while safeguarding the privacy of any participants and protecting confidential and proprietary data.

Human and Non-Human Animal Rights and Informed Consent
JoHE occasionally publishes original research articles. When such an article appears, the Editor-in-Chief will attest that the study, whether involving human research participants or non-human animals, has complied with local and United States (US) federal regulations governing such studies as well as international guidance and/or regulations where applicable. This attestation will be based on a letter from the relevant US Institutional Review Board(s) (IRB), (including, where relevant, evidence of informed consent if involving human participants) international guidance of the Declaration of Helsinki, and/or the US Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee(s) (IUCUC), confirming approval or exemption.

Policy on the Use of Artificial Intelligence
Any and all text generated by artificial intelligence (AI) will not be accepted for publication in JoHE. In addition, any accompanying AI-generated figures, images, and graphics cannot be used unless with explicit permission from JoHE's Editorial Group. AI cannot be listed or claimed as an author or co-author (i.e., AI does not qualify as an author). Submission of AI-generated materials is only allowed when an AI system was used as part of an original study's formal research design or methods. Nevertheless, in such cases, the author(s) must include a clear description of the model or device used (i.e., its name, version, extension numbers, manufacturer) as well as disclose within JoHE's Manuscript Submission Checklist at the time of submission that AI was included within the applied methods of the relevant study.

Errata and Corrigenda
Errata are defined as errors introduced to the article by the publisher after acceptance and publication. All related corrections or changes to errata are communicated to the author(s) by the Editorial Group and, ideally, are identified and corrected by the publisher before final production. Errata discovered after publication will be noted in a subsequent issue of the journal. Corrigenda are defined as changes to the article that the author wishes to publish at any time after acceptance and publication. Authors in this position should contact the Editorial Group, who will consider the impact of the suggested change and decide on a course of action.

Editorial Disclaimer
The opinions and perspectives offered in JoHE reflect only the views of the authors and editors, and do not represent the views of others within the MedStar Health system or other institutions or organizations with which any of the members of the JoHE Editorial Advisory Board are affiliated.

Advertising Policy
The Journal of Hospital Ethics does not accept advertising or sponsorship for products or services of any kind.

Indexing
The Journal of Hospital Ethics is currently indexed for research access in the following databases: EBSCO CINAHL Complete, EBSCO CINAHL Ultimate, ProQuest (Clarivate), and the Philosopher’s Index.

Open Access, Copyright, and ISSN
JoHE is an open access journal. Given JoHE’s institutional funding, its status as “Diamond” open access means no article processing fees for authors nor subscription fees for readers. Submitting authors whose work is accepted for publication in JoHE will never be asked for payment of any kind. As an open access, peer-reviewed journal, JoHE publishes its content under a version of the Creative Commons license that does not allow the material to be used for commercial purposes and prohibits that any modifications/derivations of the material be distributed (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Open distribution is strictly limited to the published material as it stands without any related commercial charges or content modifications of any kind. Authors of all material accepted for publication will be required to assign copyright to the publisher. The following ISSN assignments have been made under the auspice of the Library of Congress (OCLC: 136972691): JoHE (Print) ISSN 1938-4955, JoHE (Online) ISSN 1938-4920 © Copyright 2012-2025 The John J. Lynch, MD Center for Ethics. All rights reserved.