Author Center Home How to Determine Your Article Type Instructions for Submitting a NEW Manuscript Submit a New Manuscript Instructions for Submitting Images in Clinical Medicine FAQs About Submissions Editorial Office Contact Information

PREPARING YOUR MANUSCRIPT

Please prepare your manuscript according to our instructions in How to Prepare Your New Manuscript and How to Determine Your Article Type.

All text, references, figure legends, and tables should be in one double-spaced electronic document. You may either include figures in the text file or upload your figures separately. We prefer the former, but this may not work well for complicated graphics, which should be sent separately. Either insert all the figures or send each figure as a separate file.

Format your documents for U.S. letter (8 1/2 x 11 in or 21.8 x 28.2cm). Do not format for A4 letter, as it will not print properly.

For figures, it is permissible to send low-resolution images for peer review, although we may ask for high-resolution files at a later stage.

For Original Articles, there is normally a limit of 5 figures and tables (total) per manuscript. Additional figures and tables may be considered as supplements for Web-only publication.

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Any change in authorship after submission must be approved in writing by all authors.

Authors of original research articles are not required to submit a formal Financial Disclosure Form at the time of submission. We will request it later, if necessary. However, we do request that you note major conflicts of interest in your cover letter or in the Source of Funding text box.

All authors of review articles are required to submit our Disclosure Form for Review Articles and Editorials.

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Acceptable formats for pictures, photos, and figures are PDF, DOC, PPT, JPG, GIF, TIF.

Please be aware that we will convert all submissions to PDF for peer review.

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Most graphics programs will allow you to “save as” to Acrobat format. To save a Word or WordPerfect document as a PDF, you will need a PDF writer such as Adobe Acrobat, Adobe PDFWriter, or Acrobat Distiller. To check whether you have one, look at your list of printers. If a PDF writer appears, you are all set. Open the file and print to the PDFWriter.

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When you click on Submit a New Manuscript, a new browser window will open. You will need to complete the following steps:

• Title; type of manuscript; contact information for the corresponding author
• Information on the other authors; group name (if applicable); funding information
• Word count, Figure count, etc; Abstract (if applicable); cover letter (you may copy [Ctrl-C] and paste [Ctrl-V] from a word-processing program); Suggested reviewers (optional); Other Information (optional)
• Review your title page and your cover letter
• Upload your files
• When you receive your confirmation e-mail, check it to see that all your files have been received. If there is a problem, please contact our offices at 1-800-445-8080 (toll-free, U.S. and Canada) or 617-734-9800.

Once a manuscript assistant has checked the files and logged the manuscript into our database, you will receive an acknowledgment with your permanent six-digit manuscript number. Please use this manuscript number in all future communications with us and when using our manuscript tracking system, PaperTRAIL. If you do not receive this e-mail acknowlegment within two business days after submitting your manuscript, please contact us at 1-800-445-8080 or 617-734-9800.

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The Journal differentiates between (a) manuscripts that have been rejected and (b) manuscripts that will undergo further consideration after requested changes have been made.

Resubmission: If you have received a letter of rejection and wish the editors to reconsider their decision, you are “resubmitting.” Your file will be considered a new submission, and you will receive a new six-digit manuscript number. Please upload a letter with specific responses to the reviewers’ comments.

Revision: If the editors have asked you to make specific changes to your manuscript and return it for further consideration, you are sending a “revision.” You can use your previous six-digit manuscript number to simplify the online submissions process. Please refer to Submit a REVISED Manuscript.

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Authors of research articles should disclose at the time of revision any financial arrangement they may have with a company whose product is pertinent to the submitted manuscript or with a company making a competing product. Such information will be held in confidence while the paper is under review and will not influence the editorial decision, but if the article is accepted for publication, a disclosure statement will appear with the article.

Because the essence of reviews and editorials is selection and interpretation of the literature, the Journal expects that authors of such articles will not have any significant financial interest in a company (or its competitor) that makes a product discussed in the article.

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Manuscripts are examined by members of the editorial staff, and two thirds are sent to outside reviewers. We encourage authors to suggest the names of possible reviewers, but we reserve the right of final selection. Communications about manuscripts will be sent after the review and editorial decision-making process is complete; for potentially acceptable manuscripts, the period between the receipt of all reviews and an editorial decision is usually longer. Further information about the review process used by the Journal may be found in Tracking the Peer Review Process.

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The Massachusetts Medical Society is the owner of all copyright to any work published by the Society. Authors agree to execute copyright transfer forms as requested with respect to their contributions accepted by the Society. The Society and its licensees have the right to use, reproduce, transmit, derive works from, publish, and distribute the contribution, in the Journal or otherwise, in any form or medium. Authors may not use or authorize the use of the contribution without the Society’s written consent, except as may be allowed by U.S. fair-use law. Additional information is available on our copyright page.

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