Submissions

Author Guidelines

Consent form  (Download here)

Condition

Manuscript language

Manuscripts written in Thai or English are considered. The English manuscript should be edited by the native English speaker if it is submitted by non-native speakers. An English language approval letter should be accompanied with the English manuscript.  If the manuscript does not have an English language approval letter, please contact our editorial office at skamolth@medicine.psu.ac.th.

Publication charges

There are no page charges for submission or publication.

Ethics approval of research

Research involving human subjects should comply with the ethical standards on human experimental and with the Helsinki Declaration. The copy of Ethics approval of research on human subjects is required during submission. For Original articles and Case reports, details of ethical approval of research should be stated in the Material and Methods section. For studies involving animal participants, a document approving the experiments from an institutional committee must be included. All laboratory research should be conducted in laboratory accredited by Enhancement of Safety Practice in Research Laboratory in Thailand (ESPReL). The journal reserves the right to reject a manuscript with any research ethical issues or plagiarism.

Acknowledgement

If authors receive assistance for research or manuscript writing, authors should clearly describe in the: “Acknowledgement section”; after the main body and before the Funding sources section.

Funding sources

If authors receive financial support or sponsorship for the study research, Authors must give full details about the funding of any research relevant to their study; including: sponsor names and explanations of the roles of these sources in the funding sources section, before the conflict of interest section.

Conflict of interest

Authors must declare whether their articles have or do not have any potential, or existing, conflicts of interest either; after the main body or in the Acknowledgement section, before the references section. These declarations should include; but are not limited to: relationships with pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, device manufacturers, or other commercial entities, whose products or services are related to the subject matter of the manuscript submission. If the manuscript has no conflicts of interest, authors should state: “There are no potential conflicts of interest to declare.”

Review process

Primary review

After submission, manuscripts are first reviewed by journal manager and editor-in-chief. All manuscripts are screened using the ‘Turnitin’ (please see the details of plagiarism on the Publication Ethicts page). Manuscripts with incorrect formatting, unacceptable language or style will be returned to authors for correction before transference to the section editor.

Peer-review

PSU Medical Journal is a thrice-yearly peer-reviewed scientific journal, which uses the double-blinded peer-review process. The careful selection of relevant experts as reviewers will facilitate and speed up the review process. Therefore, our section editors will select at least 3 potential reviewers, who have been published or have areas of expertise relating to the submitted manuscript. The journal will not select reviewers from the author’s institutions. Acceptable manuscripts are those that have been accepted by 2 of the 3 reviewers, The editor-in-chief and the editorial board will examine and determine if the manuscript is suitable for publication, or requires further revisions. Requested revisions, by the section editors or the editor-in-chief to the author, may be requested during the revision process.

Authors will be asked to return a revised manuscript within one month except these is any other agreement between authors and editors. A revised paper must be accompanied by a rebuttal letter indicating point-by-point response to all comments raised by reviewers. Revision of a manuscript can be more than one round before being accepted or rejected for publication. Appealing rejected manuscript could be made via our online submission systems.

Manuscript types

PSU Medical Journal welcomes 7 types of manuscripts.

1. Selected editorials: These are invited by the editor-in-chief of the journal, and should be both written in English and structured as follows: Introduction, Main text, Conclusion, and References. Editorials should not be less than 1,000 words, but cannot exceed 1,500 words in total (Counting from Introduction to Conclusion) They should also keep cited references to a minimum.
2. Original articles or Systematic reviews
            2.1 Original articles: These should consist of no more than 3,500 words (from introduction to conclusion and including table and figure legends?), with no more than a total of 8 tables and/or figures, and limited to 40 references. Additionally, all efforts should be undertaken to keep the manuscripts as succinct as possible. Full reports should include separate sections entitled: Abstract, Introduction, Material and Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusion, References, Acknowledgements, Funding Sources and Conflicts of Interests. Abstracts should contain no more than 250 words.
              2.2 Systematic reviews: This format can be used for a review of a clearly formulated question, that uses systematic and reproducible methods to identify, select and critically appraise all relevant research, so as to collect and analyze data from the studies that are included in the review. The scope of the study is focused on medical and health science research. These should contain 6,000 words, with an eight tables and/or figures limit. The abstract should contain no more than 250 words, however, there is no limit on the number of references.
3. Case reports: This format can be used for submission of important, preliminary observations, technique modifications, or data that do not warrant publication as a full paper. Short reports should contain no sub-headings, and be no more than 2,000 words in length, with no more than 250 words in the abstract, three tables and/or figures, and ten references. Please follow the Guidelines for Writing a Clinical Case Report. Authors can access Heart Views 2017;18(3): 104-105 or URL:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5686928.
4. Review articles: PSU Medical Journal will consider reviews on relevant topics in medicine, medical education, medical innovation, and related areas. Typically, reviews will be submitted by leading authorities in such relevant fields. We encourage mini-reviews, providing concise reviews of focused topics containing no more than 6,000 words, eight tables, and/or figures, with no limit of references. Abstracts should contain no more than 250 words. In so saying, larger reviews will be considered.
5. Diagnosis by Image: A 2-3 page (around 1,200 words) with at least 1 Figure depicting radiologic pictures, photographs of clinical lesions, and pathological pictures. Aims of this article type are to share pictorial information that, with adequate clinical data, leads to a definite diagnosis of disease. On publication, the main figure and related clinical data will be on the first page, followed by the diagnostic details and additional information on the next pages. The manuscript will be fully evaluated by our standard reviewing process.
6. VIDEO publication: A port for the presentation of surgical techniques or other sequential information that is better presented in a 7-minute VIDEO format together with a 1-2 page text which contains a title, abstract, introduction, brief content of the clip, summary, and references. The VIDEO will be evaluated by referees, and there might be revisions until the quality is justified. The accepted VIDEO will be archived in the server of PSU Med J.
7. Large (secondary) data analysis: Re-analysis of public-available data or published data in a different angle or a different analysis pipeline that adds more value to that data. Use of secondary data must be done under full permission from the owner or the repository body (document must be provided). The manuscript must be submitted together with the pipelines or programming codes used in the analysis. Evaluation of the manuscript in this type will be done by at least two content expert and a data scientist.

Instructions for clinical image analysis section (5. Diagnosis by Image)

            The clinical image analysis section is intended to be an educational section through clinical quiz using radiological image, dermatological findings, electrocardiogram, electropherogram, etc. with short clinical profile for a spot diagnosis. Each article will contain 2-3 pages with the first page for clinical picture(s) and brief clinical presentation and the second page for the diagnostic answer.  

General formatting

• The manuscript must be submitted as an editable .doc or .docx file.
• Define acronyms/abbreviations upon first use in the main text.
• Use SI units as much as possible and abbreviate all units: L, mL, µL, cm, kg, h, min, s, etc.
• The name of radiological signs should be a standard nomenclature widely used in medical literature.

Title: (150-character maximum)

The title should not include the diagnosis which should be opened on the second page. The title might be a clinical problem e.g. ‘A young girl with intestinal obstruction’.

Authors and affiliations:

• Provide full unabbreviated affiliations, academic qualification, and institutional email addresses for all authors. Affiliations should reflect where the work was performed.

Introduction: (150-word minimum, 1,500-word maximum, 2-paragraph minimum)

• Provide clinical history and examination that lead to the investigation and are clues for the diagnosis.

High resolution clinical picture

• Preferred figure file types: .ai, .eps, .psd, .svg, .pdf
• .tiff and .jpg (not preferred) files must be at least 1,440 pixels x 480 pixels, or 300 dpi.

Diagnosis

• The final diagnosis from the clinical presentation together with information from the image(s).

Discussion

• Explanation for the diagnosis and discussion regarding related data, e.g., indication, sensitivity, specificity, and limitations. Additional pictures, table or drawing are possible.

Abstract: (150-word minimum, 300-word maximum)

• For this section, the abstract will be placed at the end of the paper.

Acknowledgments:

List acknowledgments and all funding sources for the work here.

Disclosures:

Ensure that all authors have disclosed all conflicts of interest.

References

Instructions for clinical section (6. Video publication)

            The VIDEO PUBLICATION section is intended, but not limited to surgical procedures presentation. Examples include tips and tricks in performing surgical procedures, laparoscopic techniques, endoscopic procedures, endoscopic findings. The VIDEO clip should be in high definition, and composed of Title, procedural steps, conclusions, and end credit. The length of the media should be between 5-10 minutes. Violation of patient privacy should be avoided. All media should have been approved for publication by the Human Research Ethics Committee of the institute.

Video part

            The VIDEO should be a high-resolution clip (minimum 800x600px; preferred 1024x768px; excellent 1280x720px or above). The acceptable video formats are: .avi .divx .flv .mpg .mov .mp4 .wmv. The total file size should not exceed 1 GB. Videos can be submitted along with the Cover Letter and manuscript text file at the time of submitting the files through the online webform of the journal. The clip can be submitted by uploading to a cloud site and providing a URL link for the journal to download or evaluate online.

            If human subjects (patients or any other individual) are shown in video/involved in research, authors must take written informed consent from all the subjects in a "Consent Form". The release form MUST be submitted when submitting the manuscript and video files for publication. If it is not possible to obtain a Release Form for any reason, the identifying features of human participants (e.g. face) must be blurred in the video so that the participants cannot be recognized.

Text part 

General formatting

• The manuscript must be submitted as an editable .doc or .docx file.
• Define acronyms/abbreviations upon first use in the main text.
• Use SI units as much as possible and abbreviate all units: L, mL, µL, cm, kg, h, min, s, etc.
• The name of a surgical operation should be a standard nomenclature widely used in medical literature. 

Title: (150-character maximum)

The title should include the operative procedure or the type of study design. Avoid the use of abbreviations.

Authors and affiliations:

• Provide full unabbreviated affiliations, academic qualification, and institutional email addresses for all authors. Affiliations should reflect where the work was performed.

Abstract: (150-word minimum, 300-word maximum)

Introduction: (150-word minimum, 1,500-word maximum, 2-paragraph minimum) 

Procedure: (1-page minimum, 5-page maximum)

The protocol text should provide a detailed description to enable the accurate replication of the presented methods by both experts and researchers new to the field. The procedure should be broken up into multiple clearly distinct sections.

In the text manuscript, the commercial names of research tools and names of their producers should be placed in the Table of Materials. The text manuscripts should avoid any descriptions that would amount to promotion or advertisement of companies or their products. For example, repeated statements of commercial instrument names should be avoided. If necessary, the commercial name of a research tool can be mentioned once, and a generic commonly acceptable name of this research tool should be used throughout the text. 

Providing a figure with a diagram/schematic of the method is recommended.

When appropriate, include an ethics statement before the numbered protocol steps, indicating that the protocol follows the guidelines of your institution’s human research ethics committee or animal care and use committee.

Format

• Break up the procedure into distinct sections: Patient preparation, Step 1, Step 2, Post-operative care, etc.
• Include a space between each numbered step or note in the protocol.
• Short notes (“NOTE:”) can be used sparingly to describe non-actionable items. Discussion of the method can be included in the Representative Results or Discussion section.
• Indicate any points at which the experiment can be paused and then restarted later. For these situations, indicate the choices at that point in the protocol.
• All methods that involve the use of human or vertebrate subjects and/or tissue sampling must include a statement that the research was performed in compliance with institutional guidelines at the beginning of the protocol section.
• For actions involving software usage, provide all specific details (e.g., button clicks, software commands, any user inputs, etc.) needed to execute the actions.

 Figures and tables:

• If a figure is adapted or republished from a previous publication, cite the original article in the figure legend. Reprint permission for the previously published/adapted figure is required.
• Ensure that all details are visible and that formatting is consistent throughout. All figures should be provided as individual files. Multipanel figures (A, B, C, etc.) should be submitted as a single image file that contains the entire figure.
• All microscopic images must include scale bars, ideally at the lower right corner.
• All data figures must include measurement definitions and error bars (if applicable). Define all error bars (SEM, SD, range, etc.).
  • Preferred figure file types: .ai, .eps, .psd, .svg, .pdf
  • .tiff and .jpg (not preferred) files must be at least 1,440 pixels x 480 pixels, or 300 dpi.
  • All tables should be provided as individual .xls or .xlsx files and submitted as tables. Avoid any coloring or formatting in the tables.

Figure and table legends:

             Each figure or table, including supplemental figures/tables, must have an accompanying legend consisting of a short title and a short description of each panel or a general description. Legends should be included as part of the manuscript and not be included in the figure file.

Discussion:

Thus, the Discussion section of the article should be focused on the procedure. Discuss the following with citations:

• Critical steps in the procedure
• Potential complications
• Limitations of the method
• The advantage of this technique, compared to conventional methods.

Acknowledgments:

List acknowledgments and all funding sources for the work here.

Disclosures:

Ensure that all authors have disclosed any and all conflicts of interest.

References

Instructions for secondary data analysis section (7. Large (secondary) data analysis)

            The ‘secondary data analysis’ section is intended to be a platform for medical data scientists to publish their valuable study of secondary data which can be publicly available large data, bioinformatic data, re-analysis of supplementary data (with permission). The section focuses on data analysis, from data preprocessing, data analysis, construction of a prediction model, and data visualization. Innovation is at the heart of the coding, program development and data visualization.

General formatting

• The manuscript must be submitted as an editable .doc or .docx file.
• Define acronyms/abbreviations upon first use in the main text.
• Use SI units as much as possible and abbreviate all units: L, mL, µL, cm, kg, h, min, s, etc.

Title: (150-character maximum)

Authors and affiliations:

• Provide full unabbreviated affiliations, academic qualification, and institutional email addresses for all authors. Affiliations should reflect where the work was performed.

Abstract: (150-word minimum, 300-word maximum)

• 3-5 keywords must be provided.

Introduction: (150-word minimum, 1,500-word maximum, 2-paragraph minimum)

• The introduction should refer to the data source and the reasons for this secondary analysis.

Methods

The method section should include 1. Data source (If publicly available data is used, permission must be shown on submission) 2. Analysis pipeline together with the name of all programs or packages used for the analysis and data visualization. Any illegal use of statistical programs is not acceptable. 3. If the analysis uses unpublished programs or packages, source code must be provided by link (e.g. Github, PyPi) or supplementary files. Test of the code might be a part of manuscript consideration.

Discussion

Discussion might focus on the novelty of data analysis and the results of analysis. 

Acknowledgments:

List acknowledgments and all funding sources for the work here.

Disclosures:

Ensure that all authors have disclosed any and all conflicts of interest.

References

Manuscript preparation

Prepare your manuscript using a word processing program, saved as a .doc file, using Microsoft Word. For items that accompany text (letters, figures, copyright forms, and so forth.), the file types: .jpg, .jpeg, .tif are allowed.

Cover letter and signatures

All manuscripts must be accompanied by a cover letter containing the following information:

1. The title of the paper
   - A brief description of the significance of the paper to the readers of PSUMJ.
   - A statement confirming that the material is original, has not already been published, and has not, nor will not, be submitted for publication elsewhere, so long as it is under consideration by PSUMJ.
   - Written disclosure of any relationships or support, which might be perceived as constituting a conflict of interest.
   - Name and signature of corresponding author(s)

2. Authorship
   There is no limit to the number of authors that may be listed. The authorship should be based on the criteria recommended by the international committee of medical journal editors (ICMJE). The corresponding author should confirm that the authorship of research publications accurately reflect all authors’ contributions to the work and reporting. All sources of funding along with any conflicts of interest must also be disclosed.

Manuscript formatting

1. Title page: This should include, in the following sequence: the title, a list of all authors with their degrees, the authors institutions- identified by superscripts in Arabic numerals. The corresponding author should be denoted by an asterisk, with address, e-mail and phone number in a footnote. The running title should be limited to 40 characters and contain at least 6 keywords.

2. Title: The manuscript title should be as succinct as possible. Titles should generally not include abbreviations, and not be longer than 40 characters (including spaces).

3. Abstract: The abstracts of original articles or systematic reviews must have a structured abstract that states the purpose, basic procedures, main findings and principal conclusions of the study. Divide the abstract with the headings Objective, Material and Methods, Results, and Conclusion. Case reports or review articles should have an unstructured abstract. For Thai article must have both Thai and English abstracts. 
4. Spacing: The text should be 12-point type, fully double-spaced, leaving a margin of 1 inch on all sides. Continuous line numbers (NOT restarting with each page) should be included throughout the manuscript, and pages should be numbered consecutively.

5. Abbreviations: Abbreviations are commonly overused, compromising the clarity of manuscripts. Authors are advised to keep abbreviations to a minimum, using them only when they are clearer than their long/full terminology (For example: PCR, DNA), however they should be avoided whenever possible, or when they are non-standard and idiosyncratic. Terms should be written out in full upon first usage, in both the abstract and text, with the abbreviation following in parentheses. After this first usage, the abbreviation must be used consistently. Plurals of abbreviations do not require apostrophes.

6. Keywords: Keywords must be listed after the abstract section, and should be between 3-6 words. For Thai article must have both Thai and English keywords.
7. Drug names: Proprietary names of drugs may not appear in the title, but may be used in conjunction with the generic name when the drug is first mentioned in the abstract, and again when first mentioned in the text. Thereafter, use only the generic name.

8. Names of organisms: Genus and species should be italicized. After the first usage the genus should be abbreviated with a single letter (For example: E. coli). For different species, within a genus, the genus should be fully written out upon first usage of each.
9. Figures: Figures should be numbered in Arabic numerals, and cited in the text. It should be noted that: a fee is required for color illustrations in print, however authors can select a black & white in print, without an attached fee. All figures should be 5 x 7 inches, with a resolution of at least 300 dpi. All figure must be accompanied by a brief legend.

10. Tables: Tables should be serially numbered in Arabic numerals, and cited in the text. Each table should be placed on a separate page, at the appropriate point in the text, or at the end of the manuscript.
11. References: References should be from published manuscripts, or manuscripts that have either been accepted or are pending publication (in press), these should be cited in the reference list. The reference formatting of PSUMJ uses the Vancouver style. All references should be cited by consecutive numbers in the text. The numbers should appear in superscripts, that appear after closing punctuation. In the reference list, the first 6 authors should be listed. If there are more than 6 authors followed by “et al.” The journal names, which appear in the reference list, should use the abbreviate journal, as in PubMed. All referenced documents should be in English. If referenced documents are in other languages, the author must translate them into English.

Examples of references

1. Journal
   - Hanprasertpong J, Geater A, Jiamset I, Padungkul L, Hirunkajonpan P, Songhong N. Fear of cancer recurrence and its predictors among cervical cancer survivors. J Gynecol Oncol 2017;28:e72.
   - Rujirojindakul P, Liabsuetrakul T, McNeil E, Chanchayanon T, Wasinwong W, Oofuvong M, et al. Safety and efficacy of intensive intraoperative glycaemic control in cardiopulmonary bypass surgery: a randomised trial. Acta Anaesthesiol Scand 2014;58:588-96.

2. Supplement
   - Lofwall MR, Strain EC, Brooner RK, Kindbom KA, Bigelow GE. Characteristics of older methadone maintenance (MM) atients [abstract]. Drug Alcohol Depend 2002;66(Suppl 1):S105.

3. Book
   - Fealy S, Sperliny JW, Warren RF, Craig EV. Shoulder anthroplasty: complex issues in the primary and revision setting. New York: Thieme; 2008.

4. Chapter
   - Waltzman SB, Shapiro WH. Cochlear implants in adults. In: Valente M, Hosfond-Dunn H, Roeser RJ, editors. Audiology treatment. 2nd ed. New York: Thieme; 2008;p.361-9.

5. Patent
   - Tintara H, inventor; Prince of Songkla University, assignee. Amniotomy training model. Thai petty patent 7488. September 18, 2012.

6. Journal article on the Internet
   - Sanders GD, Bayoumi AM, Holodniy M, Owens DK. Cost-effectiveness of HIV screening in patients older than 55 year of age. Ann Intern Med [serial on the Internet]. 2008 Jun [cited 2008 Oct 7]; 148(12). Available from: http://www.annals.org/cgi/reprint/148/12/889.pdf

7. Monograph on the Internet
   - Field MJ, Behrman RE. Where children die: improving palliative and end-of-life case for children and their families [monograph on the Internet]. Washington: National Academy Press; 2003 [cited 2008 Sep 26]. Available from: http://nap.edu/openbookphp?record_id= 10390&page=1

8. Homepage/Website
   - Cancer-Pain.org [homepage on the Internet]. New York: Association of Cancer Online Resources, Inc.; c2000-01 [cited 2008 Oct 3]. Available from: http://www.cancer-pain.org/

Contact

E-mail: skamolth@medicine.psu.ac.th

Official websites

PSUMJ@Thai Journals Online: https://he01.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/PSUMJ