West Virginia Medical Journal - 2021 - Quarter 1 | Page 50

INSIDE WVSMA

West Virginia State Medical Association Manuscript Guidelines
ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Education , Outcome Studies , Cost-Effective Analysis , Interventional Studies , Randomized Controlled Trials , Screening , and Diagnostic Test Studies
Guidelines :
• Cover letter : Must include title ; statement of value or uniqueness of manuscript to the literature ; disclosure of conflicts of interest ; and attestation that the paper has not been submitted or published elsewhere
• 3,000 words or less ( does not include abstract , references , or tables )
• 30 references or less
• No more than six authors
• No more than five visuals ( figures and tables combined ). Each visual must be accompanied by a descriptive caption near the area it references . Survey forms will not be included but must be referenced by an accurate hyperlink .
• Permissions for use of copyrighted material or patient data or photos
• May have an acknowledgment section to thank others who assisted in research or production of the manuscript
• Avoid repeating data from tables in the body of the manuscript , statements of economic benefit , and cost analysis ( unless data is included )
Manuscript Components :
• Title page ( includes title , short title , author names , titles and affiliations , and corresponding author , including mail and email addresses )
• Funding or IRB approval statement
• Abstract ( structured headings ) 250 words or less
• Introduction
• Materials and methods , including study design
• Statistics
• Results
• Discussion
• Conclusion
• References ( AMA Manual of Style 10th Ed .)
REVIEW ARTICLE
Accumulative results of multiple articles on a subject of interest to a general medical readership
Guidelines :
• Cover letter : Must include title ; statement of value or uniqueness of manuscript to the literature ; disclosure of conflicts of interest ; and attestation that the paper has not been submitted or published elsewhere
• Permissions for use of copyrighted material or patient data or photos
• 3,500 words or less ( does not include abstract , references , or tables )
• No more than three tables that include a descriptive caption above the table and should appear in the manuscript near the area it references
• 60 references or less
• No more than four authors
• May have an acknowledgment section to thank others who assisted in research or production of the manuscript
Manuscript Components :
• Title page ( includes title , author names , titles and affiliations and corresponding author , including mail and email addresses )
• Funding or IRB approval statement , if applicable
• Abstract ( unstructured ) 250 words or less
• Methods used to select , locate , and extract data from existing publications
• Section headings are topic dependent ( See the table in Writing for the Clinical Literature : Step-Wise Guide for the Novice Author )
• Summary ( 300 words or less )
• References ( AMA Manual of Style 10th Ed .)
CASE REPORT
Reports that are unique , present challenges , and provide learning points for a general medical readership . Submissions that do not add to the literature or present anything unique will be rejected without peer review .
Guidelines :
• Cover letter : Must include title ; statement of value or uniqueness of manuscript to the literature ; disclosure of conflicts of interest ; and attestation that the paper has not been submitted or published elsewhere
• Permissions for use of copyrighted material or patient data or photos
• 1,500 words or less ( does not include abstract , references , or tables )
• 20 references or less
• No more than four authors
• No identifying information about the patient or written consent from the patient will need to be provided
Manuscript Components :
• Title page ( includes title , short title , author names , titles and affiliations , and corresponding author , including mail and email addresses )
• Abstract ( unstructured ) 250 words or less
• Case presentation
• Discussion
• Conclusion
• References ( AMA Manual of Style 10th Ed .)
FOR ALL SUBMISSIONS : Please submit your manuscript to a plagiarism checker and state in your cover letter that no more than 10 % plagiarism was detected .
Submit a line-numbered Word document and an unnumbered PDF file at 1.5 spacing . Each file must include tables with titles and figures with captions in place within the applicable document area . Image files in . jpg format ( 300 dpi ). References should appear exactly as they do in JAMA .
Super-scripts must follow punctuation in the body of the manuscript without the use of parentheses or brackets .
SUBMIT YOUR MANUSCRIPT TO WVSMA . ORG / SUBMIT-AN-ARTICLE
48 • www . wvsma . org