Submissions

Author Guidelines

The Editorial Process
The submitted manuscripts are taken up for review for possible publication assuming that they have not been simultaneously submitted or already accepted or published elsewhere. The initial review is conducted by the Editors. Manuscripts lacking significant originality, important message and those with serious flaws are rejected. The other manuscripts are sent to two or more experts in the field for review and they are blinded for the identity of the contributors. The reviewer's comments and acceptance or rejection of the manuscript will be informed to the contributors in 8 to 10 weeks. The accepted articles will be copy edited for format, spelling, grammar, punctuation, etc.

Types of Manuscripts and word limits

Original articles: This includes case series, randomised control trials, interventional studies, studies involving screening and diagnostic procedures, studies of outcome analysis, studies involving cost-effective analysis and surveys with high response rate. Word limit is 2500 excluding references and abstract.

Review articles: This includes systematic critical assessment of literature and other data sources. Word limit is 3000 excluding references and abstract.

Case reports: This includes report of new cases, very rare cases and very interesting cases. There should not be just reporting of cases; but their clinical significance or implications should be emphasised. Word limit is 1000 excluding references and abstract; with up to 10 references.

Letter to the Editor: This includes short decisive observations, including brief reporting of rare and interesting cases. Word limit is 400 with up to 4 references.

Other Sections: Include Editorials, Perspective articles, History articles, Class room articles, which are by invitation from the Chief Editor.

Limits for number of images and tables: The number of tables and figures is limited to one per 500 words for all categories of manuscripts.

The templates for all types of manuscripts are available in the Journal's website and authors are requested to use them.

Authorship criteria
Authorship should be based on substantial contributions to:
• concept and design or data acquisition or data analysis and data interpretation;
• preparation of manuscript, critical revision and contribution to the intellectual content;
• final approval of the manuscript version to be published.

Mere fund acquisition for the study or data collection or general supervision of the research project do not qualify for authorship.

All the authors must have contributed substantially to the work and must be able to take responsibility of the respective portions of their contributions. The authors should be named in the order of their relative contribution towards the study or the manuscript writing. This order cannot be changed after submission of the manuscript without the written consent from all the authors.

Number of authors

• Original papers: Maximum of six from a single institution
• Case reports and review articles: Maximum of four
• Images and letter to editor: Maximum of three

There must be a written justification if the number of authors exceeds these limits.

Preparation of the Manuscript
Font style and size: Time New Roman Size 12 for the text and 14 for the titles.
Double spacing without justifying. The language and spelling style should be British English.
-Pages should be numbered serially starting from the Title Page.

Title Page

This should contain:
- Title of the article (which should be short, relevant to the manuscript and informative)
- Type of the article (Original paper/review article/case report, etc.)
- Running title (short title) with less than 50 characters
- Names of authors (Name followed by initials/Last name, First name and initials of middle name) with the highest academic degree. Prefixes like Dr, Prof, etc. are avoided.
- The name of the department(s) and institution(s) where the work has been carried out.
- Corresponding author's name, address, phone number, e-mail address, and Orcid Id.
- Total number of pages, table, photographs and word count for the text (excluding abstract and references).
- Sources of support/grant/equipment support, etc., if any.
- If already presented in a conference/meeting, name of the conference/meeting, place and date of presentation.

Abstract Page
- This should carry the full title of the manuscript and abstract.
- The word limit for the abstract is 250 for original articles/review articles, 150 for case reports.
- The abstract are structured with introduction and aim, methods and materials, results and conclusions.
- Keywords 3 to 10 are provided below abstract.

Manuscript Pages

Introduction
This should state the purpose of the study/article and the basis and rationale for the study.

Method
- This should state nature of study
- observational/experimental/trial, etc.,whether prospective/retrospective.
- Selection of the subjects (patient/experimental animals) including controls.
- Details of the methods, apparatus ( with the manufacturers name and address) and procedures. - References should be quoted for established methods including statistical methods.
- New or less known methods should be described in detail with the rationale and limitations
- Generic names of drugs and chemicals used, including dose, route of administration should be stated.
- Randomized control trials should give the details of the protocol, methods of randomization, concealment of allocation to treatment group and the method of blinding/masking as per the CONSORT statement (Moher D, Schulz KF, Altman DG: The CONSORT Statement: Revised Recommendations for Improving the Quality of Reports of Parallel-Group. Randomized Trials. Ann Intern Med. 2001;134:657-662, also available at http://www.consort-statement.org).
- Reports of human studies should state that the procedures in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible Institutional/Regional Ethical Committee on human studies and with the Helsinki Declaration, 1975 revised in 2000 (http://www.wma.net/e/policy/17-c_e.html). Patients' identity including name, initials, hospital number,etc. shall not be disclosed.
- Reports involving animal experimentation shall state about the approval from Institutional Ethical Committee and adherence to the national law on the care and use of laboratory animals.
- Statistical methods used should be stated in detail.

Results
- The results are shown in sequence in the form of text, tables/illustrations, wherever required.
- The data shown in the tables shall not be repeated in the text. - Only important observations are summarized/ emphasized.

-All Tables and Figures should be cited in the article.

Discussion
- New and important aspects of the study and and the implications for the future research are stated.
- There shall not be any repetition of the statements and data from the introduction and results section.
- The observations and conclusions of this study are compared and related to the other similar or relevant studies.
- False and unsubstantiated claims on cost or economic benefits shall be avoided.
- New hypotheses drawn from the study shall be stated and labeled as such, if required.

Conclusion

-It should provide a generalised conclusion about the findings of the study in about 4-5 lines.

Acknowledgements
- This shall be at last page of the manuscript.
- This may include: General support from faculty that need acknowledging, not amounting to authorship. technical help, financial and material support with the actual naure of support.

Conflicts of Interest and Sources of Funding

-These should be declared before References in the manuscript.

-Conflict of interest includes financial, institutional, personal and other relationships that might influence decision making. It is mandatory for authors to disclose all probable conflicts of interest in the manuscript. In case, there is no conflict of interest, this should also be clearly mentioned.

- Authors have to mention all sources of funding in the manuscript.

References
- Numbering is done consecutively in the text (not in alphabetical order)
- The references are identified in the text, tables and legends by Arabic numerals in superscript.
- The titles of the journals shall be mentioned in the abbreviated form as per the style used in the Index Medicus. Complete name of the journal is stated for non-indexed journals.
- Abstracts shall not be used as references.
- Commonly cited types of references are shown below:
Journal

1. Huie MJ, Casazza GA, Horning MA, Brooks GA. Smoking increases conversion of lactate to glucose during submaximal exercise. J Appl Physiol. 1996;80(5):1554-9. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
2. Holick MF. Sunlight and vitamin D for bone health and prevention of autoimmune diseases, cancers, and cardiovascular disease. Am J Clin Nutr. 2004 Dec;80(6):1678S-88S. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Book

1. Park K. Preventive and Social Medicine. 17th ed. Jabalpur: Banarasidas Bhanot Publishers; 2002.
2. Larson R, Wilson S. Adolescence across place and time: Globalization and changing pathways to adulthood. In: Lerner R, Steinberg L, editors. Handbook of adolescent psychology. 2nd ed. New York: Wiley; 2013. p. 297-330.

Tables
- Tables shall be self-explanatory and shall not be repeated in text.
- Tables shall have not more than 10 columns and 25 rows.
- Tabled should be numbered in Arabic numerals consecutively in their order of citation in text.
- A brief title should be given for each table.
- Abbreviations used in the table should be explained in the foot notes
- Tables borrowed, adapted or modified from other sources should be duly acknowledged after due permission.

Illustrations (Figures)
- Jpeg is the most suitable format, though the other formats (tiff, gif) are also acceptable.
- For already published figures, due permission should be obtained and the same acknowledged in the manuscript. Legends for Illustrations - Figures are numbered in Arabic numerals and legends typed with double spacing with word limit of 40.
- When symbols, arrows or letters are used to identify parts of the illustrations, each one should be explained in the legend. - The internal scale, magnification and the method of staining should be mentioned in photomicrographs.
- The tables and charts should be provided at the appropriate place in the text and not at the end of the manuscript.

Protection of Patients' Rights to Privacy
Identifying information should not be published in written descriptions, photographs, CT scans, etc., and pedigrees; if the information is essential for scientific purposes written informed consent is required from the patient or guardian. Informed consent for this purpose requires that the patient be shown the manuscript to be published. When informed consent has been obtained, it should be indicated in the article and copy of the consent should be attached with the covering letter.