Original Paper (Research Paper/Clinical Trials):

• Abstracts should not exceed 300 words and should be structured in four sections: Objectives, Methods, Results, and Conclusion.
• Main manuscript should aim for a maximum length of about 3000 words and 75 references, and it should be structured in five sections: Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and Conclusion.
• The journal only allows for a maximum of 6 authors for the Original papers. The presence of the additional authors must be justified by submitting a cover letter explaining the contributions.
• ABJS endorses the CONSORT statement. According to the CONSORT checklist and statement, a declaration of transparency should be made for each research article. (Website: http://www.consort-statement.org/)

Current Concepts Review:

• Current Concepts are by invitation only. These should focus on a specific topic. The publication will be up to the decision of the Editorial Board. Review articles should have a format that includes an abstract (unstructured), followed by the introduction, body of the text (arbitrary subheadings), and conclusion (or summary).
• The abstract should not exceed 300 words and must be written as one unstructured paragraph.
• Authors should aim for a maximum length of about 3000 words, minimum of two additional materials (two tables, one table plus one image), and 75 references. 
• The journal only allows for a maximum of 6 authors for the Current Concept Reviews.

Scoping Review, Systematic Review, Meta-analysis:

• Researchers may conduct scoping reviews instead of systematic reviews where the purpose of the review is to identify knowledge gaps, scope a body of literature, clarify concepts or investigate research conduct. Scoping reviews still require rigorous and transparent methods in their conduct to ensure that the results are trustworthy.
• Abstracts should not exceed 300 words and should be structured in four sections: Objectives, Methods, Results, and Conclusion.
• Authors should aim for a maximum length of about 3000 words, minimum of two additional materials (two tables, one table plus one image), and 75 references, and it should be structured in five sections: Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and Conclusion.
• These studies should adhere to the PRISMA guideline.
• The journal only allows for a maximum of 6 authors for the Current Concept Reviews.

Case Reports:

• The Abstract should not exceed 150 words and must be written as one unstructured paragraph.
• Case reports should be no longer than 1,500 words. Case reports require the body of the manuscript to be divided into three sections: Introduction, Case Report(s), and Discussion/Conclusion.
• The journal only allows for a maximum of 3 authors for the Case reports.
• It is possible to follow the guidance of CARE (for case reports):  http://www.care-statement.org/downloads/CAREchecklist-English.pdf
• There is no limit to the number of figures and tables.

• These are short papers presenting original and significant material for rapid dissemination.
• Short Communications are limited to 1000 words and are not subdivided. The paper should contain an unstructured abstract, main body, and references and include no more than six figures or tables combined. The abstract is limited to 100 words. 

• The Abstract should not exceed 150 words and must be written as one unstructured paragraph.
• The main text includes 1. Introduction 2. Surgical Technique 3. Discussion.
• Technical Notes should be no longer than 1,500 words.
• In the Introduction, the reason for reporting the techniques should be clear and cohesive. The Technical Note section should include relevant elements and technical descriptions. Discussion should focus on the techniques and pertinent literature.
• References should not exceed 10.
• The journal only allows for a maximum of 3 authors for the Technical Notes.
• There is no limit to the number of figures and tables.

Letter to the Editor:

• Letters to ABJS are accepted and edited at the Editor's discretion. Letters should reference the title and authors of the article they are in response to and should be no longer than 500 words with no more than ten references. It must have an unstructured Abstract. Letters to the Editor will be sent to the article authors for response. The Editor-in-Chief's final decision on whether Letters to the Editor and the answer are published.

• Letters of general interest, unlinked to items published in the journal, can be up to 500 words long. Letters are not usually peer-reviewed, but they will be subject to editorial scrutiny before any decision to publish is made. 

• Survey studies are currently accepted for consideration as a Letter to the Editor.
• The Abstract should not exceed 150 words and must be written as one unstructured paragraph.
• The journal only allows for a maximum of 3 authors for the Technical Notes.
• References should not exceed 10.
• Only two additional materials (one table and one figure, or two tables, or two figures) are permitted. 

In Brief:

• These are short papers summarizing interesting recent publications on a specific topic.
• The Abstract should not exceed 150 words and must be written as one unstructured paragraph.
• The word count should be limited to less than 1000 words, and less than 30 references, including at least a table summarizing the recent advances and findings. References must not be older than seven years from paper submission.

Case Illustrations and Obituaries:

• An Abstract, Introduction, and Methods section should be submitted. There is no word limit for these article types. We  publish obituaries only from former editorial board members.

Videos: 

• Please include a brief written summary (Technical videos outline) of your video that can be displayed as a summary alongside the video. The Technical video Outline can be found on the website homepage.
• Your video should be informative and not promotional in tone. We seek videos with content that can be understood by and appeals to a broad audience.
• When using text to show the name and title of an individual, include proper names rather than abbreviations.
• Videos approximately three minutes or less tend to be viewed more completely than longer videos.
• For media, you must have created and/or have permission to use all content, including video and still imagery, words, and music.
• The easiest way to share video files is to upload a .mov or .mp4 file on the website while submitting as a SUPPLEMENTARY FILE. Video resolution must be at least 1080p (1920 x 1080) or 4K (3840 × 2160). If the video is 1080p and will appear on the main University website, we will request a still image at least 3840 × 2160 pixels to use as a cover image for the video.
• For the videos to appear best, we invite you to record yourself using a 16:9 aspect ratio (landscape/horizontal) video, not vertical. That often means you'll flip your phones sideways to achieve this.

Manuscript Preparation (General)

We highly recommend reviewing guidelines before preparing your scientific manuscript. Two valuable guidelines are the Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals (http://www.icmje.org/urm_main.  TML) by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) and the EASE Guidelines for Authors and Translators of Scientific Articles to be Published in English (http://www.ease.org.uk/guidelines/index.shtml) by the European Association of Science Editors (EASE).

Manuscripts must be prepared in English, Times New Romans font, font size 12, double-spaced lines, continuous line numbering, margins set at 2.5 cm, and left-hand justified only. All Lines and pages should be numbered, with Page numbers at the bottom and center of the page. Insert the Short Title in the header of the page and use Page Break to separate each section of Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusion, References, and Figure Legends. 

• Use Brackets for Figure and Table numbers in Bold, e.g., [Figure 1] 
• Use Italic style for P values with CAPITAL P.
• Note: et al. within the text should be italicized.
• Numbers: numbers less than ten should be spelled. Thus five should be written 'five.' Numbers greater than ten should be in Arabic numerals; therefore, 3,456 (not three thousand, four hundred and fifty-six). It is better to avoid starting a sentence with a number.
• Measurements: Use Standard International metric units.(e.g. meter instead of foot)
• Follow-up: In reporting surgery results, follow-up of less than one year is usually unacceptable.

ABSTRACT: Use a structured abstract for Original Articles with the following headings. The entire abstract (excluding keywords and level of evidence) should not be more than 300 words.

o Title of Paper (Capitalize Each Word)

o Objectives: Describe the rationale, importance, or objective of the study in one or two sentences. 

o Methods: Describe the procedures conducted to achieve the objective of the study with details concerning how data were obtained and analysed. 

o Results: The most important results and analysis of the study should be presented with specific experimental data. Relevant numerical data should be included. 

o Conclusion: The conclusions derived from the results should be described in one or two sentences, and must match up with the objective of the study. 

o Keywords: 5 keywords should be listed in the following order: anatomical name (illness), diagnosis, and treatment. Authors are recommended to use the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH). 

o Levels of Evidence: A Level of Evidence (I-V) must be provided for all clinical studies (not required for laboratory/ basic science studies). Please use this document to identify the ‘Level of Evidence’ for your article. Please define and add it after the keywords

Manuscript Preparation (ORIGINAL PAPER) 

Main Text: Articles should be divided into Introduction, Methods, Results (or Summary of Cases), Discussion, and Conclusions. for more instructions, see the section below.

Introduction:

Here, state the purpose of the study reported and summarize the rationale for the undertaking.

Methods: 

This section should provide enough information for the reader to understand the method(s) without reference to another work. Methods can be written in continuous prose with generous use of paragraphs or sub-headings. The following issues should be covered:

• Demographics of the patients or subjects

• Inclusion and exclusion criteria

• Study design

• Interventions, treatment

• Methods of measurement

• Statistics

• Compliance with the ethical standards in the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki for all papers

• Document approval of the study by the local institutional review board (IRB) and state that informed consent was obtained.

• In case of interventional clinical trials, provide the trial's registration number and the name and URL of the registry.

• No data or images revealing the identification of patients or healthy volunteers should be presented in the manuscript. If identifying data or images are deemed vital, a signed consent form from the patient/volunteer or person authorized to give consent, permitting publication in both print and electronic versions of the journal, must be available. The form can be downloaded from the (the patient consent form)

Results:

In this section, concisely summarize the study findings. It is important to avoid including methods or discussion in the results section. The reader should be helped to see exactly what has happened, using a combination of text, tables, and figures. The expert advice of a statistician should be used. Good visual presentation is often the best way of making the data precise. Figures should look good, and the legend should explain the figure without referencing the text. Often journals allow for supplementary data to be published online only—this is a helpful way to publish large tables and additional figures.

Discussion:

In this section, concisely emphasize the study's major findings and their significance. The hypothesis raised in the introduction should consider the results obtained in the study. The discussion should explain why the results support the hypothesis and why they do not. It is important not to present actual results in the discussion. The results should be considered with other published articles. It is essential to identify the study's limitations and suggest directions for future research.

Conclusions:

In this section, major study findings should be addressed, and their potential clinical implications should be stated.

REFERENCES

• The journal reference style has recently changed. The journal follows the American Medical Association (AMA) Manual of Style (11th Ed, 2020). This was created by editors of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) and specifies writing and citation styles for scholarly works in medicine. A condensed 3-page version of this manual that covers citing and referencing is available at this link. Free online citation generators can help authors automatically generate citations in the AMA format (citethisforme, bibguru, mybib, edubirdie & papersowl). The AMA format is also available in the EndNote.
• Authors are responsible for the accuracy of references. All references must be cited in the text. Always consult the primary source and never cite a reference you have not read. Please cite only essential references.

• Two sites that will put your citation information into AMA style are citationmachine.net and easybib.com.

Journal articles:

• • Author Last Name First Initial Middle Initial. Title of article. Accepted Abbreviation of Journal Title Year; Volume:Inclusive Page Numbers. doi.(if available)
  • In listed references, the names of all authors should be given unless there are more than 6, in which case the names of the first 3 authors are used, followed by “et al.”.
  • Examples
    Morris JL, Kraus DM. New antiretroviral therapies for pediatric HIV infection.
    J Pediatr Pharmacol Ther  2005;10:215-247.

Overholser BR, Kays MB, Forrest A, et al. Sex-related differences in the pharmacokinetics of oral ciprofloxacin. J Clin Pharmacol 2004;44:1012-1022.

Roumie CL, Zillich AJ, Bravata DM, et al. Hypertension treatment intensification among stroke survivors with uncontrolled blood pressure. Stroke 2015;46:465-470. doi:10.1161/STROKEAHA.114.007566.

Internet sites:

• • Authors (if indicated). Organization responsible for the site. Title of page or document. Available at: URL. Accessed Month day, year.
  • Examples
    Food and Drug Administration.  MedWatch.  Available at:  http://www.fda.gov/medwatch/index.html.  Accessed June 13, 2007.

American Diabetes Association.  Gestational diabetes.  Available at:  http://www.diabetes.org/gestational-diabetes.jsp. Accessed June 13, 2007.

Books:

• • Editor’s Last Name First Initial Middle Initial followed by “eds”. Title of Book. Edition number. City of publication, State Abbreviation: Name of Publisher; Year.
  • Example
    Tisdale JE, Miller DA, eds. Drug-Induced Diseases: Prevention, Detection and Management. 1st ed. Bethesda, MD: American Society of Health-System Pharmacists; 2005.

Book Chapter:

• • Chapter Author Last Name First Initial Middle Initial. Title of chapter. In: Name of Book. Edition Number. Editors Last Name First Initial Middle Initial, eds. City of publication, State Abbreviation: Name of Publisher; Year.
  • Examples
    Calis KA, Sheehan AH. Formulating effective responses and recommendations:  A structured approach. In: Drug Information: A guide for pharmacists. 4th ed. Malone PM, Kier KL, Stanovich JE, eds. New York: McGraw Hill; 2012.

Scott SA. The prescription. In: Remington: The Science and Practice of Pharmacy. 21st Edition. Beringer P, Gupta PK, DerMarderosian A, et al., eds. Philadelphia PA: The University of the Sciences in Philadelphia; 2005.

Other:

Personal Communication Example – written as statements within the text, including email and listserv messages; permission should be obtained from the author:

In a conversation with A. H. Sheehan, PharmD (August 2007)…

There have been no reports of toxic reactions…(J. Smith, MD, email communication, June 1, 2006)

Government Agency Publication Example
US Department of Health and Human Services. National Heart Lung and Blood Institute Obesity Education Initiative Expert Panel on the Identification, Evaluation, and Treatment of Overweight and Obesity in Adults. Washington, DC: U.S. Public Health Service, 1998.

Poster Presentation Example
Schellhase EM, Abel SA, Carlstedt BC. An interdisciplinary collaboration: the development of a pharmacology course for a doctor of physical therapy program. Presented at: American Society of Health-System Pharmacists Annual Meeting; June 2, 2003; San Diego, CA.

Citations in the text of your manuscript:

• Citations are to be included for any information quoted or paraphrased from a source.

• All citations should be marked in consecutive numerical order by means of superscript Arabic numerals.

• Place the number directly after the fact, idea, or quotation that is being cited.

• If a reference is used multiple times in one document, use the same number throughout the document.  

• Use superscript numerals outside periods and commas, and inside colons and semicolons. Example: The derived data were as follows^3,4:

• Use commas (without space) to separate multiple citation numbers in text, but use a hyphen if you are citing consecutive citation numbers. Example: As reported previously,^1,3-8,19

• When referring to authors in the text, use last names only. If the reference Citations in the reference list

• References should be numbered according to the citation order in the text.

• Authors: List their last name and the initials of their first and middle names. Separate author names with commas. Do not use periods between initials. If there are one to six authors, list all authors. If there are seven or more authors, list the first three and then abbreviate with et al.  

• Editors: Follow the same rules as authors for formatting and determining how many editors to list. After the list of editor names, include "ed." (if one editor) or "eds." (for two or more).  

• Items without authors or editors: begin the citation with the title of the item.  

• Title: List full article/ chapter title. Capitalize only first letter of first word, acronyms, and any proper nouns.

• Abbreviate journal names using National Library of Medicine Abbreviations.  

• Capitalize first letter of every word of Abbreviated Journal Name and Book has 2 authors, use both their last names. If the reference has more than 2 authors, use the first author’s last name followed by “et al” (Latin phrase meaning “the others”).  Example: Smith¹ reported…; Example: Smith and Johnson² reported… Example: Smith et al³ reported…

• Unpublished works and personal communications should not be included in the reference list, but may be included in the text by enclosing within parenthesis.

• Avoid placing a superscript reference citation immediately after a number or a unit of measure. Example: The 2 largest studies to date included 35 patients² and 40 patients.³

• If you are using a figure/table from another source, cite it after the legend/ title.  Example: Figure 1. Structure of salbutamol.⁷

•If you use a direct quotation from another work, you should enclose the quotation within quotation marks.  Example: The engineer announced that “the house was built on solid ground."³⁸

TABLES AND CHARTS

This should be created in Excel or Microsoft Word (using "Insert Table").

Tables must be editable; tables not editable will be returned.

Each table should be submitted separately, with the table legend in the first row of the table.

Do not include the table legend at the end of the manuscript.  All tables should be cited in the text sequentially (They should be inserted in brackets: [Figure 1 and 2] [Figure 1; Table 2].

Abbreviations used in tables must be addressed scientifically. Instructions are the same for charts.

Literature review tables should be listed from the left side, starting with the first author's last name, et al., and the publication date. References listed in a literature review table must also be addressed in the Reference section of the manuscript.

FIGURES

Figures and images of the radiologic studies should be reproduced in their best quality. Authors are responsible for providing high-resolution images. If images do not meet our requirements, we will return them and ask for higher quality.

File Requirements: Acceptable format is JPEG/PNG with a minimum of 300 dpi. Submit each figure separately and name it correctly (i.e., Figure1.jpg). For figures containing more than one part, use letters.

Charge for Printing Color Figures: The journal's current policy requires no charge to include black and white or color figures in the print version of the paper.

Photographs and Graphs: Remove all information that reveals the identity of study participants. If there is a potential risk of identification, the participant must be informed and sign the patient consent form (link to patient consent form). Y and x-axis of the graphs should be addressed.

Original Figures: Authors should assign transfer, all copyright ownership of previously unpublished figures to the ABJS by signing the Copyright form (link to copyright form).

Previously published figures and tables: Authors must ask for signed permission from the copyright owner to reproduce the figure or table if they have already been published in another journal before.

Forms for Submission

Note: All mentioned forms below should be completed and submitted with the manuscript, as instructed in the Manuscript Preparation section.

Author`s Contribution Form (It is named as "copyright form" in submission files combo box list"):  The copyright transfer form is to be completed by authors submitting manuscripts to the Journal of Archives of Bone & Joint Surgery. This form should be downloaded, printed, and signed by the corresponding author on behalf of all authors and then uploaded during submission. The corresponding author is responsible for the accuracy and completeness of the submitted information. 

Conflict of Interest Form: This form should be downloaded by Acrobat Reader software and be completed. No need to be printed for completion. 

Publishing Cost Agreement Form (Includes language editing service, mandatory for the Iranian-based articles only)

Manuscript Acceptance

Review process: Scientific papers accepted for publication in scholarly journals are subject to peer review. For most journals, this is an electronic process. Manuscripts are usually reviewed by a minimum of two reviewers selected from a reviewer database according to specific expertise, the editorial board, PubMed, and editorial choice. The reviewers are encouraged to complete the review within three weeks. The reviewers assess the paper's suitability for publication against defined criteria. The reviewer is looking for a paper written with clarity in good English. It should be original and the conclusions supported by robust statistics and ethically sound data. The paper should present a coherent story. It is important that the paper fits the aims and scope of the journal. The journal's Editor-in-Chief will make the final decision regarding publication, based upon the reviewer's comments. Some consideration may be made to the article's potential contribution to the impact factor and whether the paper is likely to be cited and downloaded. If the paper is not accepted for publication, a revision may be requested. Authors must review and respond to the recommendations made by the reviewers and the journal's editor before resubmitting the article.

Notice: our editors adhere to the principles of the Singapore Declaration, and the authors are advised to familiarize themselves with the statement:

http://www.singaporestatement.org/statement.html

Page proofs: The corresponding author will receive page proofs for final checking. Authors may order reprints from the publisher at the time of printing. Orders submitted after the issue is printed are subject to considerably higher prices.

Timelines: After acceptance, an email will be sent to the author, and timelines of the acceptance date and print date will be informed. The Editor-in-chief will decide when to publish a paper.

Publication process: After the editor has accepted a paper for publication, it is transferred electronically to the production office. Typically, the paper is copyedited, and any minor errors in spelling and grammar are corrected. The paper is then typeset in the journal style, and a proof of the paper is produced. The proofs are emailed to the corresponding author to make corrections. The publisher checks all corrected papers and then uploads them onto the ABJS journal website.

• For ABJS, the papers will be freely accessible to all non-subscribers

Manuscript Rejection 

• Manuscripts failing to meet the criteria discussed in this document will be returned to the author.

• The editorial Board will shed light on why they decided to reject a manuscript, and their points of view will be enclosed in an Email to the correspondence.

Manuscript Withdrawal 

Articles that have been published shall remain exact and unaltered as far as is possible. However, circumstances may arise where an article is published that must be retracted or removed later. Such actions must not be undertaken lightly and can only occur under exceptional circumstances, such as:

Article Withdrawal: Used for Articles in press, which represent early versions of articles and sometimes contain errors, or may have been accidentally submitted twice. O occasionally, the articles may represent infringements of professional, ethical codes, such as multiple submissions, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data, or the like.

Article Retraction: Infringements of professional, ethical codes, such as multiple submission, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data, or the like.

Article Removal: Legal limitations upon the publisher, copyright holder, or author(s).

Article Replacement: Identification of false or inaccurate data that, if acted upon, would pose a serious health risk.

Special Considerations

Authorship: We agree with the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) that authorship should reflect all 4 of the following criteria:

• "Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work" AND

• "Drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content" AND

• "Final approval of the version to be published" AND

• "Agreement 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. (http://www.icmje.org). Listed authors are held responsible for their contributions to the paper and must sign the Copyright Assignment Form.

Group Authorship: In multi-central or multinational clinical trials, one or more investigators should be selected to represent the group and take responsibility for the contents. Authors also should meet all four criteria for authorship mentioned before. They all must sign the Copyright Assignment Form. Use the phrase: "on behalf of the [name of the study group]" for each representative author. Write the other researchers' names and affiliations in an appendix.

Authors in Clinical Trials: The author must state a disclosure for access to all data and their analysis in studies sponsored by a drug manufacturing company or a surgical device producer. This disclosure should be submitted as a letter when the main manuscript is submitted. The author should state that the manufacturer did not influence what was reported in the manuscript.

Corresponding Author: The corresponding author holds and guarantees the transparency of the study. This person represents all authors for communicating with the journal and the reviewers. In case of manuscript acceptance, questions will be asked from this person regarding the study data and proofs, so the correspondence needs to respond to the Emails on time.

Confidentiality of Patient Identity: No names, initials, dates of birth, or any clues that lead to identifying the patient or healthy volunteer should be revealed in the manuscript. This information could be text, figures, imaging studies, or tables.

IRB Approval: In the Methods section of the manuscript, you should state that the relevant institutional review board (IRB) or ethics committee approved the study protocol. The human subject identifier code should be presented to us.

Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses: Systemic reviews and meta-analyses should be provided according to the PRISMA statement (http://www.prisma­ statement.org/statement.htm) beforehand.

Studies Involving Human Stem Cells and DNA Recombinants: such Studies must follow the principles set in the Guidelines for Research Involving Recombinant DNA Molecules issued from US National Institutes of Health (http://grants.nih.gov/ grants/guide/notice-files/not-od-02-052.html). Authors should disclose the protocol in the methods section.

Scientific misconduct: In any case of scientific misconduct, or the suspicion of this matter, the ABJS will forward that manuscript to an appropriate authority (like the authors' institution) for investigation. After the investigation has been done, the ABJS will act (such as retraction of a published article if scientific misconduct is proven).

Plagiarism: We strongly recommend submissions of works that have not been published before. We check for plagiarism and duplication (https://www.doccop.com/index.html). If such duplicate publication or plagiarism exists, authors must notify the Editor-in-chief when submitting their manuscript. The accepted threshold for this journal is up to 15%, and more than this percent is not acceptable. All contents should provide a clear reference to the previous work. U e quotation marks for addressing an identical work or others. Paraphrase or quote as long as the original work is referenced. For longer quotations, the author should ask permission from the copyright. (ABJS will execute further steps in case of any conflicts. http://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts)

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Contact Information

Editorial Office

Archives of Bone and Joint Surgery Group, Ahmadabad Blvd, Ghaem Medical Center and Teaching Hospital, Mashhad, Iran

Tel-Fax : +985138417453

Email: abjs@mums.ac.ir