ISSN 0120-4157
printed version

INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS

• Scope and policy
• Form and preparation of manuscripts
• Sending of manuscripts
• Checklist

Biomedica is the quarterly journal of the Instituto Nacional de Salud of Colombia [Colombia’s National Health Institute]. Its purpose is to publish the results of original research that contributes meaningfully to knowledge in health and biomedical sciences.

Biomedica will publish scientific papers written in Spanish or English, in the following categories:

Original articles: unpublished manuscripts resulting from biomedical research which presents new information about specific aspects and provides relevant contribution to scientific knowledge.

Short communication: report of partial or final results of research whose rapid disclosure is of great importance, or whose content does not fulfill the requirements to consider it as an original article.

Technical note: Detailed description of a new laboratory technique or of modifications done to an established technique, emphasizing the advantages that the process has, or the importance of the innovation developed.

Essay: a philosophical, literary or scientific manuscript that presents an author’s documented opinion about a specific topic or a topic of current interest.

Commentary: a manuscript about an article published in the Journal.

History: a manuscript that emphasizes on historical personalities or facts, and their contributions to the development of biomedical sciences or health policies.

Topic review: shows the current state of the art on a specific topic; includes two categories:

· presented by professionals interested in a particular topic. For this option, authors must send a proposal indicating why the topic selected is relevant to the readers of Biomedica. It must include a brief description, some key references, its probable size and the approximate number of illustrations.

In any case, the review must include an abstract with emphasis in the meaning of recent findings, an introduction to the pointed topic showing past landmarks and present developments, and appropriate subtitles with the purpose of facilitating reading of the paper. The review must include a critical review of published literature, and authors’ own data. The development of the topic is left to the authors’ discretion, but it is advised that the authors include tables, graphics and figures for a better understanding of the text.

Images in biomedicine: an illustrated paper with photographs which shows and explain in a didactic way a concept, a structure, a disease or a biomedical diagnosis. It must include a short commentary emphasizing the importance of the illustrated topic.

Make your own diagnosis: The purpose of papers presented in this category is to challenge the diagnostic ability of readers, using illustrations or photographs of clinical data, or microscopic findings. It has two parts, the clinical presentation and the corresponding findings in the first part, and the correct diagnosis in the second part. The latter appears in a separate page and must be accompanied by an updated comment on the disease entity it pretends to illustrate.

Case presentation: examples of diseases from clinical cases that have some attractive particularity or point to a special feature of them, with a brief review of the pertinent literature.

Letters to the editor: readers can request explanations or present comments about the papers published in the journal. The decision about the publication of the received letters is discretional of the Editorial Board.

Book review: are brief critical writings of books about health and biomedicine.

All manuscripts submitted for publication in Biomédicawill be reviewed by the Editorial Board and sent for peer review to at least two experts; to facilitate this, the authors must send the names and e-mail addresses of four suggested reviewers. The editors will inform the principal author that the paper has been received. Later, the Editorial Board will send him the reviewers’ comments and will let him know the final decision about publication of the paper. Authors must include statements in the paper declaring any potential conflicts of interest and mentioning the financial sources of the research work.

Biomedica journal reserves the right to accept or reject the papers, and will make recommendations for improving their presentation.

Once the authors receive the reviewers’ comments, they must answer them one by one, besides incorporating the corresponding modifications in the text. If in the six weeks following the date when the reviewers’ comments were sent to the authors Biomédica has not received the authors’ reply to them, the paper will be withdrawn.

The original manuscripts of articles accepted to be published will remain in the journal files at least for one year after their publication.

Once the paper has been accepted for publication and after editing and style correction, authors will receive the galley proofs, which have to be carefully reviewed and returned to the editors no later than 48 hours after receipt by the authors. Once the paper has been published, the principal author will receive 5 copies of the corresponding journal issue for free.

Please follow the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors that are published as "Uniform requirements for manuscripts submitted to biomedical journals" in Ann Intern Med 1997; 126:36-47 or http://www.icmje.org/index.html. A Spanish version is available in the website of the Revista Panamericana de Salud Publica (Pan American Journal of Public Health), http://publications.paho.org/spanish/descriptions.cfm

 The manuscript has to include the following sections:

Presentation page: besides the title of the manuscript and the running title for the headlines of the pages, this section must include the complete names of authors, their institutional affiliation and the name of the institution which carried out the research. It must also include the name of the corresponding author with his or her postal address, telephone and fax numbers and e-mail address.

Abstracts: the manuscript must include a structured abstract (introduction, objective, materials and methods, results and conclusions) in both Spanish and English, not longer than 250 words. The use of references is not allowed in the abstract, and the inclusion of abbreviations and acronyms in it is not recommended.

Key words: No more than six or ten keywords in each language must be included. Authors are advised to verify the English keywords in the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) of the Index Medicus in http://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh7meshhome.htm, and the Spanish keywords in Descriptores en Ciencias de la Salud (DeCS) of the Latin American and Caribbean Health Sciences index, in http://decs.bvs.br

Text: All manuscripts including the presentation page, abstracts, references, tables and the headlines of figures and tables, must be written in double space, by just one side of the page, without extra spaces between paragraphs. Leave only a single space after the end of each paragraph. Use Arial font size 12 and do not justify the text. Use italic letter for scientific terms; please do not underline them.

Electronic format: send the manuscript as an MS Word file. Graphics made with the Power Point or MS Word programs have low resolution. They are useful for printing purposes only if they are images made of lines, do not have shadows, no grays, no colors and a printed copy in laser high quality printer has been sent; do not include in electronic format images not fulfilling these conditions.Illustrations are printed in a single column (75 mm) or in two columns (153 mm); therefore, illustrations must be sent in print size. If illustrations are in color and are mailed in electronic format, they must be sent in CMYK files in .eps (Encapsulated Postscript) format; the best resolution for CMYK files is 300 dpi if the image does not include text. If the image includes text the recommended resolution is 600 dpi and if it is in black and white the recommended resolution is 1200 dpi. The favorite font for graphics is Helvetic. If your files are Macintosh, please convert them into one of the already mentioned formats. Do not forget to include a list of the files sent and write the programs in which they were done.

Bibliographic references: Please adhere strictly to the guidelines of the "Uniform requirements for manuscripts submitted to biomedical journals" available at www.icmje.org Assign a number to each reference related in the manuscript, tables and figures in ascending order. Write reference numbers within parenthesis and not as indices (superscript). Personal communications, unpublished data, manuscripts in preparation or submitted for publication and abstracts presented at congresses or other scientific meetings must not be numbered but rather referred to in the text within parenthesis. Consult the periodical publications list of Index Medicus (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/tsd7serials7lij.html) for an exact abbreviation of the journal referred. If the journal does not appear, write the complete title of the journal. Include only the first six authors of the article, followed by et al. The inclusion of national and Latin-American references is recommended. For this purpose, please consult Lilacs, Latindex, Sibra, or Colciencia’s indices, and other pertinent bibliographic sources.

Tables and figures: do the tables using the word processing tool for this purpose. Do not do columns or tabulations within the text of the manuscript. Remember to send a page with the files names. For black and white figures (diagrams, drawings or illustrations) send an original and two copies. If they are black and white photographs three copies of excellent quality must be sent. If they are transparencies, send the original plus two paper prints (photocopy or scanner), of the same image to facilitate mailing of the material. In microscopy preparations, remember to mention the stain used and the magnifications according to the objective used, but do not include the ocular magnification value.

The manuscript has to be sent together with a letter signed by all authors in which they certify that all of them know its content and agree to it being submitted for publication to Biomedica. It must also mention explicitly that the manuscript has not been published previously, nor submitted for publication to any other journal. The original document and the two copies requested must be sent to the editors to the following address:

Revista Biomédica

Instituto Nacional de Salud
Avenida Calle 26 No. 51-60
Bogotá D.C., Zona 6, Colombia

With the purpose of verifying that authors have complied with the publication guidelines of Biomédicawe request you to fill in this check list and sent it to us together with your paper.

Category

Original article ______Short communication ______ Technical note _____

 Tepic review ______  Historical paper ______          Essay   ______

 Commentary ______ Images in biomedicine  ______

 Case presentation______       Make your own diagnosis        ______

 Alter to the Editor______                   Book review                ______

1. Presentation

• Text written in double space, in Arial font size 12 points, on just one side of the page, letter size.
• Pages numbered consecutively
• Mail three printed copies of the manuscript and a copy in 3.5" disk; please specify the programs used and the versions, plus the file names.

2.  Title

• Title in Spanish and English (maximum 165 characters)
• Running title in the same langage used in the text of your paper (Spanish or English) (maximum 50 characters)
• Include the authors names with their institutional affiliations; do not mention current positions or academic titles.
• The corrresponding author has provided complete information: name, postal address, phone number, fax number, e-mail address

3.  Abstracts

• Include a structured abstract both in Spanish and English, with a maximum length of 250 words and the following subtitles: Introduction, Objective, Materials and methods, Results, Conclusions. The inclusion of a structured abstract applies only for original articles and short communications.

4. Keywords (6 to 10 per manuscript in each language)

• Include only keywords in Spanish and English which have been previously verified in the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) of the Index Medicus in http://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh7meshhome.htm, and, for the Spanish keywords, in Descriptores en Ciencias de la Salud (DeCS) of the Latin American and Caribbean Health Sciences index, in http://decs.bvs.br

5. Structure of an original article

  Include the following parts:

• Introduction
• Materials and methods
• Results
• Discussion
• Acknowledgements
• Declaration of conflict of interests
• Financial support
• References

6.  Figures

• Include each one in separate page.
• Include the corresponding legends in separate pages.

7.  Tables

· Each table must be included in a separate page.

· Tables must be made in the simplest table format of MS Word and printed in laser printer.

· Number them consecutively in their order of appearance in the text.

· Include the corresponding title for each table.

8. Photographs

• Send three printed copies
• On the back of each printed photograph write its identification (number) and orientation.
• They corresponding legend must be included in a separate page.

9. References

• The references have to be numbered consecutively according to the order of citation along the text.
• Biomedica´sguidelines for citing references have been strictly adhered to.

10. Use of abbreviations

• The first time they appear along the text the complete term must be written in its original language with the corresponding abbreviation in parenthesis.

11. Nomenclature

• The names of genus and species are written in italics.
• The scientific names of microorganisms names are written complete the first time they appear in the text, as well as in the title and in the abstracts; afterwards just use the first letter of the genus followed by a dot and the complete name of the species.

12. General considerations:

• Include a letter signed by all the authors.
• Whenever papers present results of research on human subjects or animals, an explicit mention, at the end of the Materials and methods section, stating that Ethical clearance for carrying out the study was requested and obtained from an institutional Review Board must be included.
• Authors must certify to the Editorial Board of Biomédicathat the personas whose names have been mentioned in the materials acknowledgements section are fully aware of this and agree on it.
• All papers must include a Declaration of Conflicts of Interest and mention of the Financial Sources.
• In Spanish decimal figures are separated with a comma, not with a dot, from entire numbers.

Text that specifies the format and the forms of original shipment for the journal, establishes the standards of presentation of the journal and for bibliographic references of the journal, etc.