Submissions

Author Guidelines

Preparation of manuscript

Manuscript should be prepared in accordance with the “Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts submission to Biomedical Journals” provided by International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. Manuscripts' file formats must include Microsoft Word 2007 or newer version. Do not submit your manuscripts in PDF format. The manuscript is required to be written in English, with numbered page, double-spaced, Using Time New Roman 9 point. Each page should have adequate margins (25 mm in both sides).
The manuscript should include: Title page; the Abstract; Introduction; Materials and Methods; Results; Discussion and References.

o Cover letter

Submission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously  that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere including electronically in the same form, in English or in any other language, without the written consent of the copyright-holder. A cover letter, that includes this assurance and is signed by all authors, must be included with each submission. 

o Title page

The title page must submit as a seperate file and must contain:
 The type of manuscript (original article, case report, review article, Letter to editor, Images, etc.)
 Title of article
 Running Title no more than 40 characters
 Author's full names, middle initials and last names
 Author's ORCID iD
 Highest academic degree of each author
 Each author‟s official academic and/or clinical title and affiliation (Department of …, School of …., University of …, City, Country)
 Telephone number and e-mails of all authors and also address and fax number of corresponding author
 Source(s) of support in the form of grants, equipment, drugs, or all of these
 Acknowledgement, if any. One or more statements should specify 1) contributions that need acknowledging but do not justify authorship, such as general support by a departmental chair; 2) acknowledgments of technical help; and 3) acknowledgments of financial and material support, which should specify the nature of the support. This should be included in the title page of the manuscript and not in the main article file.
 Registration number in case of a clinical trial and where it is registered (name of the registry and its URL)
 Conflicts of Interest of each author/ contributor. A statement of financial or other relationships that might lead to a conflict of interest, if that information is not included in the manuscript itself or in an authors' form
 A statement that the manuscript has been read and approved by all the authors, that the requirements for authorship as stated earlier in this document have been met, and that each author believes that the manuscript represents honest work, if that information is not provided in another form.

o Blinded Article

This page should include following:

 Abstract

All original articles must contain a structured abstract of not more than 250 words. The abstract should include: Background, Methods, Results, Conclusion and at least 3 to 7 Key words, chosen from the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) list of index medicus ( http://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/MBrowser.html ). Text in this page does not include any references. They should therefore be specific and relevant to the paper. Authors need to be careful that the abstract reflects the content of the article accurately. For randomized Controlled Trials the method of randomization and primary outcome measure should be stated in the Abstract.

 Introduction

This should summarize the purpose and the rationale for the study. It should neither review the subject extensively nor should it have data or conclusions of the study.

 Materials and Methods

It should include and describe the following aspects:

Ethics

When reporting studies on human beings, indicate whether the procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation (institutional or regional) and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000 (available at http://www.wma.net/e/policy/17-c_e.html). For prospective studies involving human participants, authors are expected to mention about approval of regional/ national/ institutional or independent Ethics Committee or Review Board, obtaining informed consent from adult research participants and obtaining assent for children aged over 7 years participating in the trial. The authors should ensure confidentiality of subjects by desisting from mentioning participants‟ names, initials or hospital numbers, especially in illustrative material. When reporting experiments on animals, indicate whether the institution‟s or a national research council‟s guide for, or any national law on the care and use of laboratory animals was followed. Evidence for approval by a local Ethics Committee (for both human as well as animal studies) must be supplied by the authors on demand. Animal experimental procedures should be as humane as possible and the details of anesthetics and analgesics used should be clearly stated. The ethical standards of experiments must be in accordance with the guidelines provided by the CPCSEA and World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki on Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Humans. The journal will not consider any paper which is ethically unacceptable. A statement on ethics committee permission and ethical practices must be included in all research articles under the „Materials and Methods‟ section.

- Study design:

1. Selection and Description of Participants: Describe your selection of the observational or experimental participants (patients or laboratory animals, including controls) clearly, including eligibility and exclusion criteria and a description of the source population.
2. Technical information: Identify the methods, apparatus (give the manufacturer's name and address in parentheses), and procedures in sufficient detail to allow other workers to reproduce the results. Give references to established methods, including statistical methods (see below); provide references and brief descriptions for methods that have been published but are not well known; describe new or substantially modified methods, give reasons for using them, and evaluate their limitations. Identify precisely all drugs and chemicals used, including generic name(s), dose(s), and route(s) of administration.
Reports of randomized clinical trials should present information on all major study elements, including the protocol, assignment of interventions (methods of randomization, concealment of allocation to treatment groups), and the method of masking (blinding), based on the CONSORT Statement (http://www.consort-statement.org).

- Statistics:

Whenever possible, quantify findings and present them with appropriate indicators of measurement error or uncertainty (such as confidence intervals). When data are summarized in the Results section, specify the statistical methods used to analyze them. Define statistical terms, abbreviations, and most symbols. Specify the computer software used. For all P values include the exact value and not less than 0.05 or 0.001. Mean differences in continuous variables, proportions in categorical variables and relative risks including odds ratios and hazard ratios should be accompanied by their confidence intervals.

 Results

Authors should report losses to observation (such as, dropouts from a clinical trial). Avoid non-technical uses of technical terms in statistics, such as 'random' (which implies a randomizing device), 'normal', 'significant','correlations', and 'sample'. This part should include the pertinent findings in a logical sequence with tables and figures as necessary. It must be presented in the form of text, tables and illustrations. The contents of the tables should not be all repeated in the text. Instead, a reference to the table number may be given. Long articles may need sub-headings within some sections (especially the Results and Discussion parts) to clarify their contents. Unnecessary overlap between tables, figures and text should be avoided.

 Discussion

The discussion should emphasize the present findings and the variations or similarities with other work done in the field by other workers. Conclusions based on the findings, evidence from the literature that supports the conclusions, applicability of the conclusions, and implications for future research. The detailed data should not be repeated in the discussion again. Emphasize the new and important aspects of the study and the conclusions that follow from them. It must be mentioned whether the hypothesis mentioned in the article is true, false or no conclusions can be derived.

 References

References should be numbered consecutively in the order in which they are first mentioned in the text (not in alphabetic order). Identify references in text and tables in superscript format. References cited only in tables or figure legends should be numbered in accordance with the sequence established by the first identification in the text of the particular table or figure. Use the style of the examples below, which are based on the formats used by the NLM in Index Medicus. Use complete name of the journal for non-indexed journals. Avoid using abstracts as references. Information from manuscripts submitted but not accepted should be cited in the text as "unpublished observations" with written permission from the source. Avoid citing a "personal communication" unless it provides essential information not available from a public source, in which case the name of the person and date of communication should be cited in parentheses in the text.
The commonly cited types of references are shown here, for other types of references such as newspaper items please refer to ICMJE Guidelines (http://www.icmje.org or http://www.nlm.nih.gov/bsd/uniform_requirements.html).

Article:

1. Standard journal article:

Parkin DM, Clayton D, Black RJ, Masuyer E, Friedi HP, Ivanov E, et al. Childhood leukaemia in Europe after Chernobyl:5 year follow-up. Br Cancer 1996;73:1006-12.

2. Article not in English:

Ayatollahi SMT, Khosravi A. A case-control study of migraine and tension-type headache's risk factors among Shiraz schoolchildren. Scientific Journal of Hamadan University of Medical Sciences and Health Services 2005;11(4(sn 34)):37-42.[Persian].

3. Organization as author:

The Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand. Clinical exercise stress testing. Safety and performance guidelines. Med Aust 1996;164:282-4.

4. No author given:

Cancer in South Aferica [editorial]. S Afr Med J 1994;84:15.

5. Issue with supplement:

Shen HM, Zhang QF, Risk assessment of nickel carcinogenecity and occupational lung cancer. Environ Health Perspect 1994;102 (Suppl1):275-82.

6. In press:

Leshner AL. Molecular mechanisms of cocaine addiction.N Engl J Med.In press 1996.

7. Journal article in electronic format:

Morss SS. Factors in the emergence of infectius disease.Emerg Infect Dis [serial online] 1995 Jan-Mar [cited 1996 Jun5];1(1):[24 screens]. Available from: URL:http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/EID/eid.htm.

Monograph in electronic format:

CDI, Clinical dermatology illustrated [monograph on CD-ROM].Reeves JRT, Maibach H. CMEA Multimedia Gorup, producers.2nd ed. Version 2.0. San Diego: CMEA;1995.

Computer files:

Hemodynamics III: the ups and downs of hemodynamics [computer program]. Version 2.2. Orlando (FL): Computerized Educational Systems;1993.

Book:

1. Personal author (s):

Norman IJ, Redfern SJ, editors. Mental health care for elderly people. New York: Church Lvingston;1996.

2. Books not in English:

Shariati M, Dadgari A, editors. Study guide: Preparation and its application in medical education. Tehran: Hayyan press;2007.[Persian].

3. Organization as author or publisher:

Institute of Medicine (US).Looking at the future of the Medicaid program. Washington: The Institute;1992.

4. Chapter in book:

Philips SJ, Whisnant JP. Hypertension and stroke. In:Laragh JH, Brenner BM, editors. Hypertension:Pathophysiology. diagnosis and management. 2nd ed. New York:Raven Press;1995.p.465-78.

Dissertations:

Kapan SJ. Post-hospital home health care:the elderly's access and utilization [dissertation]. St. Louis (MO) :Washington Univ.;1995.

Conference:

1. Conference paper:

Kimyra J, Shibasaki H, editors. Recent advances in clinical neurophysiology. Proceeding of 10th international congress of EMG and Clinical Neurophysiology;1995 Oct 15-19;Kyoto,Japan. Amsterdam:Elsevier;1996.

2. Conference proceedings:

Bengtsson S, Solheim BG, Enforcement of data protection, Privacy and security in medical informatics.In:Lun KC, Degoulet P, Piemme TE, Rienhoof O, editors. MEDIINFO 92. Proceeding of the 7th world Congress on Medical Informations;1992 Sep 6-10;Geneva, Switzerland. Amsterdam:North-Holland;1992.p.1561-5.

Web Site:

H1N1 flu (swine flu) :resources for pregnant women. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Web site. http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/pregnancy/. Updated December 14, 2009.Accessed July 25, 2010.

Web site references can be challenging because the availability of the information needed for a reference varies. Include the following elements, if available, in the order shown:
Author (s), if given (often, no authors are given). Title of the specific item cited (if none is given, use the name of the organization responsible for the site). Name of the Web site.URL.Published [date].Updated [date].Accessed [date].

 Tables

o Tables should be self-explanatory and should not duplicate textual material.
o Tables with more than 10 columns and 25 rows are not acceptable.
o Number tables, in Arabic numerals, consecutively in the order of their first citation in the text and supply a brief title for each.
o Place explanatory matter in footnotes of table, not in the heading.
o Explain in footnotes all non-standard abbreviations that are used in each table.
o Obtain permission for all fully borrowed, adapted, and modified tables and provide a credit line in the footnote.
o For footnotes use the following symbols, in this sequence: *, †, ‡, §, ||,¶ , **, ††, ‡‡.
o Tables with their legends should be provided at the end of the text after the references. The tables along with their number should be cited at the relevant place in the text.

 Illustrations (Figures)

o Upload the images in JPEG format. The file size should be within 1024 kb in size while uploading.
o Figures should be numbered consecutively according to the order in which they have been first cited in the text.
o Symbols, arrows, or letters used in photomicrographs should contrast with the background and should be marked neatly with transfer type or by tissue overlay and not by pen.
o Titles and detailed explanations belong in the legends for illustrations not on the illustrations themselves.
o When graphs, scatter-grams or histograms are submitted the numerical data on which they are based should also be supplied.
o The photographs and figures should be trimmed to remove all the unwanted areas.
o If photographs of individuals are used, their pictures must be accompanied by written permission to use the photograph.
o If a figure has been published elsewhere, acknowledge the original source and submit written permission from the copyright holder to reproduce the material. A credit line should appear in the legend for such figures.
o Legends for illustrations: Type or print out legends (maximum 40 words, excluding the credit line) for illustrations using double spacing, with Arabic numerals corresponding to the illustrations. When symbols, arrows, numbers, or letters are used to identify parts of the illustrations, identify and explain each one in the legend. Explain the internal scale (magnification) and identify the method of staining in photomicrographs.
o Final figures for print production: Send sharp, glossy, un-mounted, color photographic prints, with height of 4 inches and width of 6 inches at the time of submitting the revised manuscript. Print outs of digital photographs are not acceptable. If digital images are the only source of images, ensure that the image has minimum resolution of 300 dpi or 1800 x1600 pixels in TIFF format.

Sending a revised manuscript

Two files including the revised version of the manuscript and reply template file should be submitted online. When submitting a revised manuscript, contributors are requested to download “Reply Template” file and reply to the “referees‟ remarks along with point to point clarification. In addition, they are expected to mark the changes as colored text in the article.

 Reply Template 

Proof Reading

Computers print out is sent to the corresponding author for proof reading before publication in order to avoid any mistakes. Corrections should be marked clearly and sent immediately to the Journal office.