Instructions for Authors

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General Submission Policies

Updated January 14, 2024

SPECIAL NOTE:
Manuscripts that do NOT comply with these instructions
may be rejected or returned to the author for corrections before undergoing review.

To submit a manuscript, please log in to our Author Center.

For any problems with your submission please contact the Journal Administrator.

Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal (Rambam Maimonides Med J) is an Open Access peer-reviewed international scientific online general medical journal published four times per year. The Journal publishes original articles, reviews, perspectives, Rambam Grand Rounds and symposia as well as special essays concerning ethical and societal aspects of medicine. All manuscripts undergo peer review and professional copy editing.

NO FEES are charged for submission or publication of a manuscript.
This journal is solely supported through donations. All donations are gratefully acknowledged.

The Journal is an EBSCO and CrossRef member with articles indexed by Scopus, Journal Citation Reports (JCI), PubMed, Cabell's Scholarly Analytics, Emerging Sources Citation Index, the Directory of Open Access Journals, and Google Scholar.

Please see our Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement for more information. 

Copyright

All articles published in Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal are open access and distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License except where otherwise noted. The journal charges no subscription, submission, publication, or processing fees.

Open Access authors retain the copyrights of their papers, but authors allow anyone to download, reuse, reprint, modify, distribute, and/or copy articles in Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal, so long as the original authors and source are properly cited.

No permission is required from the authors or the publishers, except for material obtained from previously copyrighted publications that must remain under the original copyright restrictions and obtain the copyright owner's permission.

Originality and Plagiarism

The editorial policy of the Journal is guided by the high standards of scientific quality and integrity, responsibility, and human compassion that constitute the Maimonides's (Rambam’s) scholarly and ethical heritage. The Journal focuses on clinically relevant biomedical research and issues central to the provision of optimal health care to patients, disease prevention, and public health.

Manuscripts are accepted for review with the stipulation that they are submitted solely to Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal. The Journal will not consider for review manuscripts that have been published elsewhere, even if in another language, in another Open Access publication, or manuscripts that are being considered by another publication, or are in press. All submissions are checked for plagiarism via Crossref Similarity Check, powered by iThenticate—the industry standard for originality verification.

Crossref Similarity Check logo

   

Authorship and Contributorship

Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal defines an author or co-author of a manuscript as someone who fulfills all four of the following criteria:

The author or co-author has:

  1. Made substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
  2. Drafted or revised the work in a critical manner for important intellectual content; AND
  3. Given approval for the final version of the manuscript for publication; AND
  4. Agreed to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

If a potential co-author does NOT meet ALL of the above criteria, the corresponding author should list this persona as a contributor, specifying their contribution, and list them in the acknowledgments.

As a condition of authorship, all authors must have seen and approved the submission of the manuscript and be willing to take responsibility for the entire manuscript. The principal/corresponding author will be required to submit a Covering Letter along with the manuscript, on behalf of all the co-authors (if any). The author(s) will confirm that the manuscript (or any part of it) has not been published previously or is not under consideration for publication elsewhere. Furthermore, any illustration, structure, or table that has been published elsewhere must be reported, and copyright permission for reproduction must be obtained. Authors are expected to obtain the required permissions for reuse and cover any related costs for obtaining those permissions.

Ethical Oversight

Research manuscripts should include a statement that approval for human research was received from the appropriate ethics review board, including confirmation of informed consent was obtained from patients or subjects (parents or guardians where appropriate) involved in the research.

Conflict of Interest

Authors should disclose on the title page of the manuscript any potential, perceived, or real conflict of interest, especially any financial arrangement (e.g., grants received, advisory board memberships, shareholdings) with a company whose product is discussed in the manuscript.

Recommended Reviewers

The review process can take anywhere from one to three months, due to the difficulty in finding an expert willing to spend the time needed to review a manuscript. Hence, your knowledge of other experts in the field is essential. All manuscript submissions require your provision of the names, affiliations, and e-mails of at least three experts who would be qualified to evaluate your paper. The potential reviewers should be experts in the field relating to your paper, not personal friends or colleagues from your institute. The Journal makes every effort to expedite this process by seeking their own additional reviewers.

You will be notified as soon as we receive a response from the reviewers. At that time your paper may be accepted, rejected, or a revision (substantial or minor) may be requested.

Manuscript Categories

Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal will publish the following types of papers:

Original Articles
Original articles are the Journal’s primary mode of scientific communication. Peer review of original articles will be handled by the most appropriate editor. Original Articles should not exceed 5,000 words of body text and are limited to 75 references.

Review Articles
All review articles, even if invited, are peer-reviewed. Reviews should not exceed 8,000 words of body text and are limited to 150 references.

Research Letters
Case reports, case series, and clinical observations will be considered but published as Research Letters. All research letters are peer-reviewed. Research letters should not exceed 1,500 words and are limited to 1 table, 1 figure, and 10 references. No abstract or keywords are required, and text should be formatted in one continuous section.

Letters to the Editor
Letters to the editor pertaining to papers published in The Journal within the past year or to related topics should not exceed 1,200 words and are limited to 10 references. Provide a unique title for the Letter on the title page with complete contact information for the author(s). Double-space the text of the letter. References, including reference to the pertinent article(s) in the Journal, should conform to the reference style for manuscripts. Letters are not subject to external peer review; however, they are reviewed for appropriateness by the Editorial Board.

Submission of Manuscripts

Manuscripts should be submitted online via the Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal online Author Center. New users should first create an account. After logging on, submissions should be made by clicking Submit a New Manuscript. The submission website has been designed to allow uploading your manuscript, text, and figure files in JPEG, GIF, PPT, TIFF, RTF, DOC and DOCX formats. The server will generate a PDF file to be used for review by the Editorial Board and external reviewers.

Preparing Manuscripts

  • All manuscripts must be accompanied by a cover letter that justifies publication of the submission (see details below).
  • Manuscripts must conform to the "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals." 
      
  • Text should be supplied in a format compatible with Microsoft (MS) Word for Windows (PC). Charts and tables are considered textual and should also be supplied in a format compatible with MS Word.
      
  • Manuscripts must be typed in a 12 point font, double-spaced with 1" (2.5 cm) margins. They MUST include, in a single file, a title page, abstract, text, acknowledgment, references, table(s), and figure legends, with no content in the headers or footers.
       
  • All figures (illustrations, diagrams, photographs) should be supplied in JPEG, JPG, GIF, TIFF, PPT, PPTX, DOC, and DOCX format. If accepted for publication, we need to receive the original SOURCE file (digital file if a photo, file used to generate your figure for line graphs, charts, etc.) so we can edit them, if necessary.

  • If a table or figure has been copied or modified from another published table or figure, you should obtain permission for reuse and the original source should be properly acknowledged in the caption.
       
  • Assemble the manuscript, in one file, in this order: Title Page, Abstract, Text, Acknowledgments, References, Tables and Figure Legends.
     
  • Be sure to include the FULL names of all authors (First and Last name), their degrees, and affiliations.

Cover Letter
A cover letter must accompany all submissions and include the following information:

  • A statement justifying publication of your research. Since Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal is an international general medical journal, please explain in your cover letter why your article is relevant to our general readership. If your paper is similar to other previously published papers (i.e., similar studies, similar reviews, etc), please explain in your cover letter why your manuscript deserves to be published. Reasons justifying publication could be, for example, novel information, novel interpretation, or the need to reinforce findings for which the current literature is limited.

  • A statement that all authors have read and agreed to the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (the full legal text of the license is available here), and the corresponding author is able to sign it on behalf of all the authors;
      
  • A statement that the work is not and will not be submitted to any other journal while under consideration by Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal;
      
  • Disclosure of any prior publications or submissions with any overlapping information; a copy of the work(s) must be provided; or a statement that there are no prior publications or submissions with any overlapping information;
      
  • A statement of any potential conflict of interest, real or perceived, and of the role of the study sponsor, if any; this must also appear on the title page;
      
  • A statement that each author listed on the manuscript has seen and approved submission of this version of the manuscript and takes full responsibility for the manuscript.

  • A statement advising whether or not content (tables, figures, or text) has previously appeared in any type of publication, and a commitment to obtain the necessary permission if the paper is accepted for publication.

Title Page
The first page of the manuscript must contain the following information:

  • The title of the paper, precise and brief (maximum of 130 characters).
      
  • A short version of the article title (maximum of 50 characters).
      
  • The full names and highest academic degree (even if only a BSc or Diploma) of ALL authors, department, and institutional affiliations.
      
  • Name, address, telephone, fax, and email address of the corresponding author.

IMPORTANT NOTE to ALL AUTHORS:  Please make sure that the private names, middle names, and family names (surnames) are correctly presented in the submission table AND on the cover page. All manuscripts are indexed by Last Name (Surname), and if this information is not correctly presented, it could be difficult to find the author via PubMed, SCOPUS, or via other indexing platforms.

  • Potential conflict of interest.
      
  • List of abbreviations. 

Abstract with Key Words
Abstracts (maximum 250 words) are required for original articles and review articles. The abstract of original articles should be structured and divided into Objective, Methods, Results, and Conclusions. Structured abstracts are not required for Review Articles (maximum abstract length 250 words).

Three to six keywords should be provided for indexing purposes. Use Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) terms as a guide.

Text
Typical main headings include Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion.

Abbreviations
Please keep abbreviations to a minimum. Complex terms used frequently in the manuscript may be abbreviated. Abbreviations are placed in parentheses at first use in the abstract and again at first use in the text. Authors should provide a list of abbreviations on the title page.  

Laboratory Values
Laboratory values should be described in metric mass units. The International System of Units (SI units) can be provided in parentheses immediately after metric units.

Drug, Equipment, and Medical Devices Nomenclature
Trade names of drugs and other products must not appear in the article title. The trade name may appear once in the abstract and once in the introduction or methods section; all other mentions of the product must be in the form of the generic name.

When referring to drugs, equipment, medical devices, and other products, the trademark or registered trademark should appear on first usage, along with the name of the manufacturer, city, state, and country of manufacture.

Acknowledgements
On a separate page, preceding the References, contributions made by colleagues who are not authors of the paper should be acknowledged. This page should also include acknowledgements of published material reproduced with permission, as well as any related grant support received. 

References

Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal uses the Vancouver style of referencing, as follows:

  1. References must be double-spaced and numbered sequentially as they appear in the text.
      
  2. References first cited in a table or figure legend should be numbered so that they are in sequence with references cited in the text at the point where the table or the figure is first mentioned.
      
  3. Citations are to be inserted in superscripted Arabic numerals, not in parentheses.
      
  4. Superscripted references should be placed after the punctuation of sentences (after a period, comma, etc.)
       
  5. All references must be completely typed out at the end of the article on a new page. Please do not use the footnote or endnote functions in your word-processing program.
       
  6. Abbreviations of journal titles conform to those used in the National Library of Medicine's Index Medicus.

  7. Please add the DOI number for each paper (if available), at the end of the reference.
     
  8. The style and punctuation of references follow the format illustrated by the following examples (if 6 or fewer authors or editors, list all; if 7 or more, list the first 3 and add "et al"):

    Journal articles
    1.     Ciechanover A, Heller H, Elias S, Haas AL, Hershko A. ATP-dependent conjugation of reticulocyte proteins with the polypeptide required for protein degradation. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 1980;77:1365-8. doi: 10.1073/pnas.77.3.1365
    2.     Adams SM, Bosch E, Balaresque PL, et al. The genetic legacy of religious diversity and intolerance: paternal lineages of Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula. Am J Hum Genet 2008;83:725-36. doi: 10.1016/j.ajhg.2008.11.00

    Books
    3.      Jones KL. Smith's Recognizable Patterns of Human Malformation. 5th ed. Philadelphia, Pa: WB Saunders Company; 1997.

    Chapter in a Book
    4.     Bergman JM, Skorecki KL. Chronic Kidney Disease. In: Fauci AS, Braunwald E, Kasper DL, et al. eds. Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine. 17th ed. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill; 2008:1761-72.

    Websites
    5.     International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. Uniform requirements for manuscripts submitted to biomedical journals. Updated October 2008. Available at: http://www.icmje.org. (accessed February 11, 2009).

    Note regarding academic references to Jewish theological and rabbinical sources

    DO NOT         give more than one reference per number.

    DO NOT     list references in the footnotes.

    DO NOT     include footnotes with additional textual information. This information must be incorporated as part of the text itself in your submission, and not as an additional note/footnote, or other format.

    Please refer to the following manuscript for examples on how to format your paper and references when referring to Jewish theological and rabbinical sources:

    Rambam Maimonides Med J 2015 October; 6(4): e0037. doi: 10.5041/RMMJ.10222

    Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal 2010 July; 1(1): e0008. doi: 10.5041/RMMJ.10008

 Tables

  • Tables should be double-spaced on a separate page within the main document file following the References page(s). Please try not to submit the tables in a separate file.
       
  • Each table should include a title/caption, and be sequentially numbered with Arabic numerals in the order of their citation in the body of the text.
       
  • Tables should have column headings. Tables should be created using the Table function in Microsoft Word processing software. Excel tables will not load properly. Do not use tabs or spaces to create columns.
       
  • All abbreviations used in the table should be explained in a footnote. Table footnotes should be placed on the same page as the table, immediately following it. The special symbols to be used for tables are as follows: *, †, ‡, §, ¶, #, ** (repeated), †† (repeated), etc.
        
  • If any data therein have been previously published, credit should be given to the original source. If the Table is completely obtained from previously copyrighted publications, permission from the copyright owner should be obtained, the source of the copyrighted material should be fully acknowledged and its copyright restrictions mentioned (see "Additional Copyright Information," below). 

Figure Legends

  • Each illustration must be provided with a legend.
      
  • List all figures sequentially, as they appear in the text, with Arabic numerals.
      
  • ALL symbols, signs, or letters used to identify parts of a photograph, or other illustration must be explained.
       
  • ALL abbreviations must be spelled out.

  • Legends should be double-spaced on a separate page within the main document file following the Table page(s).

  • If an illustration has been previously published, the legend must give full credit to the original source (full citation), and a statement that permission has been granted and by whom should appear in the figure legend (see "Copyright"). 

Figures

  • A reasonable number of black-and-white and color illustrations are acceptable.
      
  • Figure legends must be separate from the figures (see "Figure Legends" above).
      
  • Each figure must be submitted online in a separate file (not embedded in the manuscript document) when uploaded to the manuscript submission system.
      
  • The author should notify Rambam Maimonides Med J if the submitted material has been published elsewhere. It is then the responsibility of the author to obtain authorization to republish the submitted material in Rambam Maimonides Med J. 
       
  • All illustrations must be clear and legible. Patterns or shadings must be distinguishable from each other and dark enough for reproduction. Lines, symbols, and letters must be smooth and complete. Illustrations may be original drawings in black ink with typographic lettering; typewritten or freehand lettering is unacceptable.
       
  • Acceptable formats for pictures, photos, and figures are JPEG, JPG, GIF, TIFF, PPT, PPTX, DOC, and DOCX; when providing digital graphical files, please make sure that they are at least 300 dpi resolution. 
       
  • Please submit the original artwork or data source files (Excel, PowerPoint, etc.), so that the figures can be edited, if necessary.

Supplementary Materials
Supplementary material is an online appendix provided by the authors to give readers additional information about their work. This appendix should contain materials that substantially enhance the main article only. Supplemental materials are used to give readers access to data that cannot be represented in the article due to page limitations. An article that includes supplemental material is meaningful without the extra data, but its value to the reader is enhanced with the addition of the supplemental material. Supplementary material is reviewed with the article and is expected to be of the same high quality as any Rambam Maimonides Med J article, since the supplemental material is an integral part of the article.

Supplementary material should be uploaded in a separate file and marked as "Additional Material for Review."

Additional Copyright Information
Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal requires all authors to agree to its open access Creative Commons Attribution License. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction of the article in any medium (except where otherwise noted), provided the original work is properly cited.

PLEASE NOTE: Some articles (especially Reviews) may contain figures, tables, or text taken from other publications that have appeared in copyrighted material. The Journal will publish these materials only after receiving written permission for their use from the copyright owner, along with complete information as to source. The copyright holder should be informed that the copyrighted material will be published under a copyright license in a Creative Commons licensed article except for parts that remain under the original copyright restrictions. Thus, any copyrighted material will be duly defined as such and its source will be fully acknowledged.

Please do not submit any figures or tables that have been previously copyrighted, unless you have express written permission from the copyright holder to publish such material in Rambam Maimonides Medical Journal.

For any questions related to the submission of your manuscript, contact the Journal Administrator.

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