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Submission guidelines

Contents

Instructions for Authors

General

The “Wiener Medizinische Wochenschrift”, WMW, is an international, medical, peer-reviewed journal in English and German.

Humanistic Tradition and Topicality

“From the microscope to clinical application!”, this aim as formulated by one of our most celebrated authors of the past, Theodor Billroth, is continued today by inte¬grating the whole field of experimental medical work and clinical practice into the Journal. We feel a responsibility to maintain this tradition of a humanistic and holistic view of medicine, thereby addressing questions of ethics, history and theory of medical science. As stated in the first issue from 1851, one of the primary aims of the WMW is to communicate the latest results of medical research to the practising physician.

Authors and Audience

The WMW is a forum in which scientists from all Central European countries communicate their research finding and clinical results. We publish both original articles and reviews on a broad spectrum of clinical and pre-clinical medicine of interest to physicians in research and practice.

Topical Issues

The WMW presents papers within the successful framework of thematic issues which are compiled by guest editors, dealing in-depth with selected topics, such as dementia, geriatric oncology, Helicobacter pylori and phytomedicine. Particular care is taken to insure that the thematic issues reach the relevant medical audience.

Rapid Publication

The manuscripts submitted to our journal are subjected to a double-blind peer-review process. As a rule, manuscripts are sent out to two independent reviewers. Currently the vast majority of the authors receive a decision about their manuscript within 8 weeks of submission. Currently 12 issues are published annually. Manuscripts may be submitted in English or German, however we encourage submission of original articles in English.

Manuscripts submitted for publication must contain a statement to the effect that all human studies have been reviewed by the appropriate ethics committee and have

therefore been performed in accordance with the ethical standards laid down in an appropriate version of the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki. It should also be stated clearly in the text that all persons gave their informed consent prior to their inclusion in the study. Details that might disclose the identity of the subjects under study should be omitted.

Conflict of interest

Authors must indicate whether or not there is a fi nancial relationship between them and the organization that sponsored the research. This note should be added in

a separate section previous to the reference list. If no confl ict exists, authors should state: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.

The Editor in Chief reserves the right to reject manuscripts that do not comply with the above-mentioned requirements. The author will be held responsible for false statements or for failure to fulfi l the abovementioned requirements.

A paper is accepted for review on the understanding that:

➧ the manuscript has not been and will not be submitted simultaneously to another journal, in whole or in part,

➧ it reports previously unpublished work,

➧ all named authors have agreed to submit the paper to WMW in its present form,

➧ if the paper is accepted, all the authors will observe the terms of the License to Publish.

Every paper is assessed by two independent referees on whose recommendation the Editor’s decision on acceptance or rejection will be based.

Editorial Procedure

Authors are requested to submit their articles online. Please log directly onto the site

http://wmw.edmgr.com/

and upload your manuscript following the instructions given on the screen. The Editorial Office is automatically alerted by the system immediately after your manuscript has been received.

In case you encounter any difficulties while submitting your manuscript online, please get in touch with the editorial office by clicking on ‘‘contact us’’ from the tool bar.

Ethical Responsibilities of Authors

This journal is committed to upholding the integrity of the scientific record. As a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) the journal will follow the COPE guidelines on how to deal with potential acts of misconduct.

Authors should refrain from misrepresenting research results which could damage the trust in the journal, the professionalism of scientific authorship, and ultimately the entire scientific endeavour. Maintaining integrity of the research and its presentation is helped by following the rules of good scientific practice, which include*:

  • The manuscript should not be submitted to more than one journal for simultaneous consideration.
  • The submitted work should be original and should not have been published elsewhere in any form or language (partially or in full), unless the new work concerns an expansion of previous work. (Please provide transparency on the re-use of material to avoid the concerns about text-recycling (‘self-plagiarism’).
  • A single study should not be split up into several parts to increase the quantity of submissions and submitted to various journals or to one journal over time (i.e. ‘salami-slicing/publishing’).
  • Concurrent or secondary publication is sometimes justifiable, provided certain conditions are met. Examples include: translations or a manuscript that is intended for a different group of readers.
  • Results should be presented clearly, honestly, and without fabrication, falsification or inappropriate data manipulation (including image based manipulation). Authors should adhere to discipline-specific rules for acquiring, selecting and processing data.
  • No data, text, or theories by others are presented as if they were the author’s own (‘plagiarism’). Proper acknowledgements to other works must be given (this includes material that is closely copied (near verbatim), summarized and/or paraphrased), quotation marks (to indicate words taken from another source) are used for verbatim copying of material, and permissions secured for material that is copyrighted.

Important note: the journal may use software to screen for plagiarism.

  • Authors should make sure they have permissions for the use of software, questionnaires/(web) surveys and scales in their studies (if appropriate).
  • Research articles and non-research articles (e.g. Opinion, Review, and Commentary articles) must cite appropriate and relevant literature in support of the claims made. Excessive and inappropriate self-citation or coordinated efforts among several authors to collectively self-cite is strongly discouraged.
  • Authors should avoid untrue statements about an entity (who can be an individual person or a company) or descriptions of their behavior or actions that could potentially be seen as personal attacks or allegations about that person.
  • Research that may be misapplied to pose a threat to public health or national security should be clearly identified in the manuscript (e.g. dual use of research). Examples include creation of harmful consequences of biological agents or toxins, disruption of immunity of vaccines, unusual hazards in the use of chemicals, weaponization of research/technology (amongst others).
  • Authors are strongly advised to ensure the author group, the Corresponding Author, and the order of authors are all correct at submission. Adding and/or deleting authors during the revision stages is generally not permitted, but in some cases may be warranted. Reasons for changes in authorship should be explained in detail. Please note that changes to authorship cannot be made after acceptance of a manuscript.

*All of the above are guidelines and authors need to make sure to respect third parties rights such as copyright and/or moral rights.

Upon request authors should be prepared to send relevant documentation or data in order to verify the validity of the results presented. This could be in the form of raw data, samples, records, etc. Sensitive information in the form of confidential or proprietary data is excluded.

If there is suspicion of misbehavior or alleged fraud the Journal and/or Publisher will carry out an investigation following COPE guidelines. If, after investigation, there are valid concerns, the author(s) concerned will be contacted under their given e-mail address and given an opportunity to address the issue. Depending on the situation, this may result in the Journal’s and/or Publisher’s implementation of the following measures, including, but not limited to:

  • If the manuscript is still under consideration, it may be rejected and returned to the author.
  • If the article has already been published online, depending on the nature and severity of the infraction:

    - an erratum/correction may be placed with the article

    - an expression of concern may be placed with the article

    - or in severe cases retraction of the article may occur.

The reason will be given in the published erratum/correction, expression of concern or retraction note. Please note that retraction means that the article is maintained on the platform, watermarked “retracted” and the explanation for the retraction is provided in a note linked to the watermarked article.

  • The author’s institution may be informed
  • A notice of suspected transgression of ethical standards in the peer review system may be included as part of the author’s and article’s bibliographic record.

Fundamental errors

Authors have an obligation to correct mistakes once they discover a significant error or inaccuracy in their published article. The author(s) is/are requested to contact the journal and explain in what sense the error is impacting the article. A decision on how to correct the literature will depend on the nature of the error. This may be a correction or retraction. The retraction note should provide transparency which parts of the article are impacted by the error.

Suggesting / excluding reviewers

Authors are welcome to suggest suitable reviewers and/or request the exclusion of certain individuals when they submit their manuscripts. When suggesting reviewers, authors should make sure they are totally independent and not connected to the work in any way. It is strongly recommended to suggest a mix of reviewers from different countries and different institutions. When suggesting reviewers, the Corresponding Author must provide an institutional email address for each suggested reviewer, or, if this is not possible to include other means of verifying the identity such as a link to a personal homepage, a link to the publication record or a researcher or author ID in the submission letter. Please note that the Journal may not use the suggestions, but suggestions are appreciated and may help facilitate the peer review process.

Authorship principles

These guidelines describe authorship principles and good authorship practices to which prospective authors should adhere to.

Authorship clarified

The Journal and Publisher assume all authors agreed with the content and that all gave explicit consent to submit and that they obtained consent from the responsible authorities at the institute/organization where the work has been carried out, before the work is submitted.

The Publisher does not prescribe the kinds of contributions that warrant authorship. It is recommended that authors adhere to the guidelines for authorship that are applicable in their specific research field. In absence of specific guidelines it is recommended to adhere to the following guidelines*:

All authors whose names appear on the submission

1) made substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data; or the creation of new software used in the work;

2) drafted the work or revised it critically for important intellectual content;

3) approved the version to be published; and

4) agree 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.

* Based on/adapted from:

ICMJE, Defining the Role of Authors and Contributors,

Transparency in authors’ contributions and responsibilities to promote integrity in scientific publication, McNutt at all, PNAS February 27, 2018

Disclosures and declarations

All authors are requested to include information regarding sources of funding, financial or non-financial interests, study-specific approval by the appropriate ethics committee for research involving humans and/or animals, informed consent if the research involved human participants, and a statement on welfare of animals if the research involved animals (as appropriate).

The decision whether such information should be included is not only dependent on the scope of the journal, but also the scope of the article. Work submitted for publication may have implications for public health or general welfare and in those cases it is the responsibility of all authors to include the appropriate disclosures and declarations.

Data transparency

All authors are requested to make sure that all data and materials as well as software application or custom code support their published claims and comply with field standards. Please note that journals may have individual policies on (sharing) research data in concordance with disciplinary norms and expectations.

Role of the Corresponding Author

One author is assigned as Corresponding Author and acts on behalf of all co-authors and ensures that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately addressed.

The Corresponding Author is responsible for the following requirements:

  • ensuring that all listed authors have approved the manuscript before submission, including the names and order of authors;
  • managing all communication between the Journal and all co-authors, before and after publication;*
  • providing transparency on re-use of material and mention any unpublished material (for example manuscripts in press) included in the manuscript in a cover letter to the Editor;
  • making sure disclosures, declarations and transparency on data statements from all authors are included in the manuscript as appropriate (see above).

* The requirement of managing all communication between the journal and all co-authors during submission and proofing may be delegated to a Contact or Submitting Author. In this case please make sure the Corresponding Author is clearly indicated in the manuscript.

Author contributions

In absence of specific instructions and in research fields where it is possible to describe discrete efforts, the Publisher recommends authors to include contribution statements in the work that specifies the contribution of every author in order to promote transparency. These contributions should be listed at the separate title page.

Examples of such statement(s) are shown below:

• Free text:

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by [full name], [full name] and [full name]. The first draft of the manuscript was written by [full name] and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Example: CRediT taxonomy:

• Conceptualization: [full name], …; Methodology: [full name], …; Formal analysis and investigation: [full name], …; Writing - original draft preparation: [full name, …]; Writing - review and editing: [full name], …; Funding acquisition: [full name], …; Resources: [full name], …; Supervision: [full name],….

For review articles where discrete statements are less applicable a statement should be included who had the idea for the article, who performed the literature search and data analysis, and who drafted and/or critically revised the work.

For articles that are based primarily on the student’s dissertation or thesis, it is recommended that the student is usually listed as principal author:

A Graduate Student’s Guide to Determining Authorship Credit and Authorship Order, APA Science Student Council 2006

Affiliation

The primary affiliation for each author should be the institution where the majority of their work was done. If an author has subsequently moved, the current address may additionally be stated. Addresses will not be updated or changed after publication of the article.

Changes to authorship

Authors are strongly advised to ensure the correct author group, the Corresponding Author, and the order of authors at submission. Changes of authorship by adding or deleting authors, and/or changes in Corresponding Author, and/or changes in the sequence of authors are not accepted after acceptance of a manuscript.

  • Please note that author names will be published exactly as they appear on the accepted submission!

Please make sure that the names of all authors are present and correctly spelled, and that addresses and affiliations are current.

Adding and/or deleting authors at revision stage are generally not permitted, but in some cases it may be warranted. Reasons for these changes in authorship should be explained. Approval of the change during revision is at the discretion of the Editor-in-Chief. Please note that journals may have individual policies on adding and/or deleting authors during revision stage.

Author identification

Authors are recommended to use their ORCID ID when submitting an article for consideration or acquire an ORCID ID via the submission process.

Deceased or incapacitated authors

For cases in which a co-author dies or is incapacitated during the writing, submission, or peer-review process, and the co-authors feel it is appropriate to include the author, co-authors should obtain approval from a (legal) representative which could be a direct relative.

Authorship issues or disputes

In the case of an authorship dispute during peer review or after acceptance and publication, the Journal will not be in a position to investigate or adjudicate. Authors will be asked to resolve the dispute themselves. If they are unable the Journal reserves the right to withdraw a manuscript from the editorial process or in case of a published paper raise the issue with the authors’ institution(s) and abide by its guidelines.

Confidentiality

Authors should treat all communication with the Journal as confidential which includes correspondence with direct representatives from the Journal such as Editors-in-Chief and/or Handling Editors and reviewers’ reports unless explicit consent has been received to share information.

Summaries

The paper must be accompanied by a short summary in English and German, each ¬limited to 150 words.

Keywords

Provide up to 5 keywords in English and German (a keyword may be a noun phrase consisting of 3 or more words). Keywords should be self-sufficient to allow the classification of the paper by subject area and to function as heads in a volume’s index of keywords. Choose them according to Index Medicus, do not merely duplicate words from the title.

References

References may be made to published work and papers in press. Reference citations are not permitted in the abstract of a paper. Authors are responsible for the accuracy of all literature citations. Work in progress, in preparation, unpublished work, and personal communications should be cited as footnotes to the text. References should be listed numerically in the text in the order of appearance as parenthesized consecutive numbers, e.g., [1, 2]. Where there are more than two references, the citation should appear as hyphenated numbers, e.g., [1–3]. References should be typed double-spaced in numerical order of citation. Abbreviations of journals should conform to those used in Medline. The following formats must be used:

Journal article with one, two, or three authors: all of the authors are listed.

Journal article with more than three authors: only the first three authors are listed following “et al”.

Journal article in press (manuscript has been accepted for publication): Journal name (in press).

Abstracts: Authors, Title, Journal, Volume, Page, year, abstract number (e.g., Proc Am Soc Clin Oncol 2007;25:215s (abstr 4571))

References should be quoted according to the Vancouver Format (Ref.) e.g.

Journal article

–––––––––––

Smith JJ. The world of science. Am J Sci 1999;36:234–5.

Book

Blenkinsopp A, Paxton P. Symptoms in the pharmacy: a guide to the management of common illness. 3rd ed. Oxford: Blackwell Science; 1998.

Book chapter

–––––––––––

Wyllie AH, Kerr JFR, Currie AR. Cell death: the significance of apoptosis. In: Bourne GH, Danielli JF, Jeon KW, editors. International review of cytology. London: Academic; 1980. pp. 251–306.

Article by DOI

–––––––––––

Slifka MK, Whitton JL (2000) Clinical ¬implications of dysregulated cytokine production. J Mol Med (in press). DOI: 10.1007/s001090000086

Online document

––––––––––––––

Doe J (1999) Title of subordinate document. In: The dictionary of substances and their effects. Royal Society of Chemistry. Available via DIALOG. http://www.rsc.org/dose/title of subordinate document. Cited 15 Jan 1999

Always use the standard abbreviation of a journal‘s name according to the ISSN List of Title Word Abbreviations, see http://www.issn.org/en/node/344

Figures and Tables

The number and final size of illustrations and tables must be kept to the minimum required for clarification of the text. Do not give the same data in both tables and graphs. Do not use any pie charts. Do not integrate figures or tables into the text. Number figures and tables consecutively in separate series. In addition to the number, each figure must have a legend and each table must have a title. All figures and tables must be cited in the text.

Plan figures to fit into the column width of 81 mm. The maximum space available on one page is 169 by 240 mm. Scale the length, width, point size of type and symbols, and line weights of a figure propor¬tionally. At the final size of a figure, no capital letter or symbol should be smaller than 1.5 mm and no line weight should be less than 0.25 mm. Group the legends for figures on a separate sheet.

Give the title and any footnotes of a table directly above and below the table.

Type of Publications

Full papers and Reviews should be written as concisely as possible without impairing the clear and precise presentation of the subject matter. Both form and content of the paper should be carefully checked to exclude the need for corrections in proof. A charge will be made for changes intro¬duced after pagination of the manuscript.

Short Communications should be pre¬pared as described above except for the following: the average length of Short Communications should not exceed 1500 words and a maximum of 2 figures or tables is accepted. The summary should not exceed 80 words. Short Communi¬cations can only be accepted or rejected.

Letters to the Editor are welcome, should be a maximum of 750 words, and may include a table or figure and references.

Proofs

Correspondents will be sent page proofs. Changes should be kept to a minimum. All costs of corrections and alterations – other than those of typesetter’s errors – exceeding 10% of the costs of typesetting will be ¬charged to the author.

Offprints

The publisher will supply the correspondent with 2 complimentary copies of the relevant issue. Along with the page proofs, an order form with a price list for offprints will be sent to the correspondent. The prices are valid for orders placed when the proofs are returned.

Open access publishing

To find out more about publishing your work Open Access in Wiener Medizinische Wochenschrift, including information on fees, funding and licenses, visit our Open access publishing page.

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