Guide for Authors
L. Henry Edmunds, Jr, MD
Editor,
The Annals of Thoracic Surgery
3440 Market St
Suite 306
Philadelphia, PA
19104-3325
Tel.: (215) 349-5542
FAX: (215) 614-0416
E-mail:
ats@uphs.upenn.edu
Website:
http://www.atseditorialoffice.org
Table of Contents
1.
General Description of Content
2.
Mechanics
of Submitting a Manuscript
3.
General Information for Formatting Manuscripts
4.
Categories of Manuscripts and Word Limits
5.
Order of
Content Within Manuscripts
-
Title Page
Abstract
Text
Acknowledgments and Disclosures
References
Tables
Figure Legends
Illustrations
6.
Protection of Human and Animal Subjects
7.
Conditions
for Publication Form
8.
Miscellaneous
1.
General Description of Content
•
The Annals of Thoracic Surgery publishes original articles on
topics
in thoracic and cardiovascular surgery and features such
as case reports, "how to do it" articles, image reports, new
technology evaluations,
STS workforce reports, review articles,
articles on our surgical heritage, book reviews, invited editorials,
correspondence, commentary
and four Continuing Medical Education
(CME) activities each month. The electronic issue of the
journal posted on CTSNet (
http://ats.ctsnetjournals.org)
is the journal
of record.
2. Mechanics of Submitting a Manuscript
• All manuscripts,
correspondence, and editorial material must
be submitted to the online editorial office at
http://www.atseditorialoffice.org.
Authors must register with an e-mail address
and password to submit manuscripts online. Unregistered
authors can "create a new account"
(ie, register) by
following the instructions at the editorial office website. The
registration process requires registrants to create
a password
which is used thereafter to access the website.
• Every submission, regardless of category, must include: a
cover
letter, indicating the category of article (see below);
the
complete manuscript, including title page, abstract, text, tables,
acknowledgments, required disclosures (see below),
references and
illustrations. All of this material is entered via
the editorial office website,
http://www.atseditorialoffice.org.
• Early in 2012,
all
authors of
submitted papers in all categories
will be required to complete the "
Conditions
for Publication
Form"
online
via the editorial office website
(
http://www.atseditorialoffice.org).
Corresponding authors will be requested
to supply the e-mail addresses of every author when manuscripts
are submitted to the website.
Later in the review
process, each author will receive e-mail notification to log into
the website and complete the Conditions
Form. The e-mail
request will include the manuscript tracking number and
instructions for the author to locate and submit the completed
Conditions Form directly to the editorial office website. Authors
will need their personal password to the editorial office
website to
complete this task.
3. General Information for Formatting Manuscripts
• Submit
manuscripts, prepared in Microsoft Word, through
the editorial office website after signing in or creating a new
account. Enter the "Author
Area" and follow the instructions for
submitting "Entry data," a cover letter, a complete manuscript
file, including abstract and tables,
if any, and figure files, if any.
Each figure needs to be uploaded according to the specifications
in "Illustrations" (Section 5) as
an image file, separate from the
manuscript file. The system will generate a single PDF for review
purposes that includes your manuscript
file and any image files.
Please see "Order of Content Within Manuscripts" (Section 4)
for all of the elements to be included in the
manuscript you
submit for review.
• In addition to the uploading of your manuscript file and any
image files, separate entry
of some metadata information (eg,
the manuscript title, author names, abstract, etc.) is required
during the online submission process.
Thus, be sure to enter
the metadata where asked, but also to include this information
within your manuscript file as well.
•
Under "Entry data," indicate the number of authors in the box
and justify more than 10 authors.
• Arrange manuscript as follows:
(1) title page, (2) abstract, (3) text,
(4) acknowledgments, (5) disclosures if required, (6) references
(do
not use EndNotes),
(7) tables and (8) figure legends. Number
pages consecutively, beginning with the title page as page 1 and
ending with the legend page.
Do not number manuscript lines.
Do not embed tables in the text.
• Manuscripts should be typed
double-spaced throughout
(including
title page, abstract, text, references, tables, and legends)
with one (1) inch (2.5 cm) margins all around.
• Microsoft
Word is the preferred software program. Manuscripts
written in 11 point Arial or Times New Roman fonts are
preferred and more reliably
convert to PDF files during
electronic submission. (Note: Do not submit your manuscript
in PDF format, which cannot be processed by the
editorial
office online manuscript tracking system.)
• American rather than British spelling should be used
throughout the manuscript,
including that within illustrations.
4. Categories of Manuscripts and Word Limits
•
Original articles should not exceed 4500 words, which includes
all words submitted regardless of location within the
manuscript.
The counted words include title page, abstract,
text, acknowledgments, disclosures, tables, figure legends
and
references.
The combined total of illustrations and tables
should not exceed 10 and the number of references should not
exceed 40.
•
New
Technology articles are limited to 2500 words including
title page, abstract, text, acknowledgments, disclosures, tables,
figure
legends
and references
. The number of tables should not
exceed three; the number of illustrations should not exceed six
if tables are included; eight, if there are no tables. The number
of references should not exceed 10. All New Technology
papers require
an Acknowledgment, which discloses funding
sources and includes a freedom of investigation statement.
•
Case reports
and "
how to do it" articles are limited to a total of
1500 words including title page, abstract, text, acknowledgments,
disclosures,
figure legends
and references
. These reports should
not include tables; if essential a table should be justified in the
cover letter and not have more than four columns and eight
rows. The word count of the table is included in the 1500 word
limit. Case
reports should not be combined with "reviews of the
literature." References are limited to eight. A "how to do it" article
should be
a description of a useful surgical technique and contain
descriptive, illustrative material describing the innovation.
•
Images
in cardiothoracic surgery are limited to 300 words
including title page, text and references, and to two, possibly
three, figures.
The entire contribution must fit on one printed
page of
The Annals.
•
Review articles are limited to 6500 words,
and all words are counted
regardless of location within the manuscript. The word count
includes title page, abstract, text, acknowledgments,
disclosures,
tables, figure legends and
all references
. The total number of
references should not exceed 80.
•
Surgical Heritage articles are limited to 4500 words and describe
breakthrough achievements which created and directly led to
new surgical therapy for thoracic diseases. These articles may or
may not include biographical pre?L cis of the architects of the
achievement.
The category is designed to interest our entire
readership and therefore does not include obituaries; tributes;
anecdotes of isolated
procedures which were not further developed;
or vignettes of interesting history or discovery.
• Correspondence (Letters to
the Editor) and commentaries are
limited to 500 words. Do not include tables and subtract 100
words for each illustration.
•
Editorials are limited to 2500 words including references. Subtract
100 words for each illustration and 300 words for each table.
5. Order of Content Within Manuscripts
(Items in order from front to back; pages
must be numbered)
•
Title Page
(first page)
Title. The title is
limited to 100 characters (including spaces) for
original articles and to 80 characters (including spaces) for all other
categories of
manuscripts. The title may not contain acronyms or
abbreviations. All submissions, including correspondence, must
have a title.
Running
Head. Supply a short title of 40 characters or less (including
spaces).
Authors. List all authors by first name, all initials,
family name and
highest earned academic degree (eg,MD)or degrees (eg,MD,PhD).
Institutions and Affiliations. List the name
and full address of all
institutions in which the described work was done. List departmental
affiliations of each author affiliated with
that institution
after each institutional address. Connect authors to departments
using numbered superscripts.
Meeting Presentation.
If the paper has been or is to be presented
at the annual meeting of The Society of Thoracic Surgeons or the
Southern Thoracic Surgical
Association, provide the name, location,
and dates of the meeting.
Keywords. Provide up to 5 keywords selected from the appended
list to describe the manuscript.
Do not use any keywords
that are not on the list
. Be sure to select the same keywords from
the list provided as part
of the online submission process.
Word Count. Provide the electronic total word count of the entire
manuscript including title
page, abstract, text, acknowledgments,
disclosures, tables, figure legends and entire reference
list.
Corresponding Author.
Provide the name, exact postal address
with
zip or postal code, telephone number, fax number and e-mail address
of the author
to whom communications and requests for reprints
should be sent after publication. The corresponding author must
have a graduate degree;
accept responsibility for the integrity of the
submitted work; and attest that no undisclosed authors contributed
to the manuscript.
•
Abstract
(second page)
Original articles. Provide a structured abstract,
no longer than
250 words, divided into four sections: Background, Methods,
Results, and Conclusions. These subject headings
are not part
of the adjacent sentence, which must be a complete sentence.
Avoid abbreviations and acronyms. Indicate the abstract word
count below the abstract.
New Technology. Provide a structured abstract,
no longer than
175 words, divided into four
sections:
Purpose, Description,
Evaluation, and
Conclusions. Avoid abbreviations and acronyms.
Indicate the abstract
word count below the abstract.
Case reports, "how to do it" articles, review articles, and our
surgical heritage articles. Provide an
unstructured
abstract of
no more than 100 words.
Images, correspondence, commentaries and editorials. No abstract
is required.
•
Text
(third page, after title page and abstract and continuing
up to "Acknowledgments")
Text should be organized as follows:
Introduction, Patients
and
Methods (or
Material and
Methods),
Results, and
Comment.
Cite references, illustrations, and tables in numeric order by
order of mention
in the text.
Avoid abbreviations. Consult the
American Medical Association
Manual of Style, 10th edition, for recommended
abbreviations.
Define abbreviations at first appearance in the text.
If 8 or more
abbreviations or acronyms are used, provide a separate
table of
abbreviations and acronyms.
Measurements and weights should be given in standard metric
units.
Statistical
nomenclature and data analysis. Follow the "Guidelines
for Data Reporting and Nomenclature" published in The
The Annals of Thoracic
Surgery (1988;46:260.1). Statistical models and
formulas used in the analysis of data should be stated in the last
paragraph(s)
of "Patients and Methods."
Footnotes. Type footnotes at the bottom of the manuscript page
on which they are cited.
Suppliers. Credit suppliers of drugs, equipment, and other commercial
material mentioned in the article within parentheses in text
by providing
the company name, city and state or city and country
if outside the United States.
•
Acknowledgments
and Disclosures
Grants, financial support and technical or other assistance are
acknowledged at the end of the text
before the references.
All
financial support for the project must be acknowledged and will be
printed in the article. Conflict
of interest disclosures are indicated
on the "
Conditions
for Publication Form," which must
be completed by all authors. This information will appear in a
conflict box at the bottom
of the first printed page of the
article.
A disclosure statement is required for all studies that received
financial, property or
intellectual aid from a commercial
source for all categories of articles printed in
The Annals. The
disclosure statement must
state the source(s) of all funds used
to support the study or to perform an evaluation and whether
or not property or tested technology
was purchased, borrowed
or donated to the study. In addition, the authors must state
that they had full control of the design of the
study, methods
used, outcome parameters and results, analysis of data and
production of the written report. These statements are mandatory
for all articles and conflicts of interest disclosures are
published with the article. (See the "
Conditions
for Publication
Form" for definitions of financial support and freedom of
investigation. Note that undisclosed authors must
be identified
on the "
Conditions for Publication Form.")
•
References
Identify references in the text using Arabic numerals in
brackets on the line (do
not use superscripts or EndNotes). Do
not cite personal communications, manuscripts in preparation,
and
other unpublished data as references.
Type references double-spaced after text or acknowledgments beginning
on a
separate sheet. Number consecutively in the order in
which they appear in the text. The references must not be linked to
the manuscript
with EndNotes because that formatting is not
compatible with automated publication production processes.
Journal references
should provide
inclusive page numbers;
book
references should cite
specific page numbers.
Authors
are solely responsible for accuracy, completeness and
non-duplication of references and for the correct spelling of names
of all authors.
Journal abbreviations should conform to those used in
Index Medicus.
The style and punctuation of the references should
follow the
formats outlined in the examples below:
Journal Article
8. McKhann GM, Selnes OA, Grega MA, Bailey MM, Baumgartner
WA, Zeger SL. Subjective memory symptoms in surgical and
nonsurgical coronary artery patients: 6-year follow-up. Ann Thorac
Surg 2009;87:27.35.
(List
all authors if 6 or fewer; otherwise list first 3 and add "et al.")
Chapter in Book
12. Vinten-Johansen
J, Zhao Z-Q, Guyton RA. Cardiac surgical
physiology. In: Cohn LH, Edmunds LH Jr, eds. Cardiac
Surgery in the Adult. 2nd ed. New York,
NY: McGraw-Hill;
2003:53.84.
Internet Address
3. 1996 NRC Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals.
Available
at
http://www.nap.edu/readingroom/books/labrats/ contents.html
. Accessed November 9, 2011.
•
Tables
Tables should be typewritten
double-spaced on separate sheets
(one to each page). Do not use vertical lines. Each table
should
be numbered (Arabic) and have a title above. Legends and
explanatory notes should be placed below the table. Abbreviations
used
in the table follow the legend in alphabetic order.
Lower case letter superscripts beginning with
"a"
and following
in alphabetic order are used for notations regarding
statistics. Exact
p values must be used; "NS" is obsolete.
Tables should
be self-explanatory, and tabulated data should
not be duplicated in the text or illustrations.
Tables must be
submitted as part of
the text file and not as illustrations.
•
Figure Legends
Figure
legends should be numbered (Arabic) and typed
double-spaced
in order of appearance beginning on a separate sheet.
Identify
(in alphabetical order) all abbreviations appearing in the
illustrations at the end of each legend. Give the type of stain and
magnification
power for all photomicrographs.
Cite the source of previously published (print or electronic) material
in the legend and indicate
permission to republish has been
obtained. Proof of permission must be surface mailed or faxed to
the editorial office once the manuscript
is submitted online.
•
Illustrations
Images or figures are submitted
online as one or more separate
files that may contain one or more images. Within each file
containing images, use the figure number (eg,
Figure 1A) as the
image filename. The system accepts image files formatted in
TIFF, JPG and EPS. Powerpoint (.ppt) files are also accepted,
but
you must use a separate Powerpoint image file for each Powerpoint
figure. Please obtain technical help if you are unfamiliar
with
image files. Call
The Annals editorial office (215-349-5542)
during business hours 9 am.5 pm, Eastern time U.S., Monday
through
Friday, if you cannot obtain technical help.
Illustrations may not be separately copyrighted or have a
copyright logo. Illustrations
may have a discrete signature of
the artist if permitted by the payer of the illustrative work.
Symbols, letters, numbers and contrasting
fills must be distinct,
easily distinguished and clearly legible when the illustration
is reduced in size. Most illustrations will
be reproduced
at a width of one column (8.25 cm; 3-1/4 inches).
Black, white and widely crosshatched bars are preferable;
do
not use stippling, gray fill or thin lines.
Written permission from unmasked patients appearing in
photographs must be
obtained by the authors and must be
surface mailed or faxed to the editorial office once the manuscript
is submitted online.
Color
illustrations. Color illustrations no longer incur a color
surcharge and are usually preferable over black and white
illustrations.
All photomicrographs must be submitted in color.
Original illustrations. If your manuscript is accepted for publication
and
the electronic art you have submitted online is not acceptable
for reproduction purposes, you may be required to send a set of
original
illustrations to the editorial office. You will be instructed
accordingly by the staff. These illustrations will not be returned.
6. Protection of Human and Animal Subjects
•
Human Investigation
When human subjects or information about human subjects are
involved in the study, whether retrospective or prospective, indicate
review
by the relevant Institutional Review Board (IRB) or Ethics
Committee (EC) or comparable group. The IRB or EC, not the
author, makes review
decisions for every study involving human
subjects or information about human subjects. The investigator
should retain and not submit
the decision letter granting IRB
approval. Study approval and patient consent or waiver of the need
for consent must be stated in the
first paragraph under "Patients
and Methods."
•
Humane Animal Care
When animals are used as subjects, institutional approval
of the
protocol is necessary and authors should include a statement in
"Methods" indicating that investigators complied with the 1996
"Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals"
(See
http://www.nap.edu/readingroom/books/labrats/contents.html), recommended
by the U.S. National Institutes of Health, or with equivalent guidelines
administered by the author's governmental regulatory body.
When
no formal ethics review process is available, authors must
state that humane care was provided in animal experiments, in
accordance with
either of the above guidelines.
7. Conditions for Publication Form
• The
Society of Thoracic Surgeons and
The Annals require all
authors to adhere to the highest ethical standards of our
profession.
Ethical breaches include scientific misconduct
(falsification or fabrication), plagiarism and redundant publication
and are described
more fully in Ann Thorac Surg
1999;68:1 and Ann Thorac Surg 2007;84:717.9.
• Early in 2012,
all
authors of submitted
papers in all categories
will be required to complete the "
Conditions
for Publication
Form"
online
via the editorial office website
(
http://www.atseditorialoffice.org).
Corresponding authors will be requested
to supply the e-mail addresses of every author when manuscripts
are submitted to the website.
Later in the review
process, each author will receive e-mail notification to log into
the website and complete the Conditions
Form. The e-mail
request will include the manuscript tracking number and
instructions for the author to locate and submit the completed
Conditions Form directly to the editorial office website. Authors
will need their
personal password to the editorial office
website
to complete this task.
•
Undisclosed Authors. The corresponding author must vouch
for the absence of any undisclosed
authors or reveal their
identities and explain their contributions.
• Freedom of Investigation.
Each author must indicate
whether
or not he or she has had full freedom of investigation before,
during, and after the study. Freedom of investigation is
defined
as freedom from outside interests in controlling the
design of the study, acquisition of data, collection, analysis
and interpretation
of data, and having freedom to fully disclose
all results. Except for New Technology articles, statements
regarding freedom of investigation
do not appear in the
published manuscript.
•
Scientific Responsibility. Each author is required to certify
that he or
she has participated sufficiently in the work to
take
responsibility for a meaningful share of the content of the
manuscript.
Each author must specify his/her contributions to
the work and
at least one author, usually the corresponding or
senior
author, must vouch for the accuracy and completeness
of all of the data reported in the manuscript. Except for New
Technology articles,
statements regarding Scientific Responsibility
do not appear in the published manuscript.
•
Relationships With Industry and
Sources of Funding for the
Study. These are defined on the "
Conditions
for Publication
Form." All authors must disclose all financial relationships,
occurring within the preceding 12 months
prior to submission,
which can be construed as influencing information
within the article.
Individual disclosures will appear
in a Conflict
of Interest statement on the first page of the published
article. Disclosures relating to funding of research appear in
"Acknowledgments" at the end of the text before the references.
All original scientific articles, editorials, reviews, and
New Technology
articles must state sources of funding for the
work described in the article in "Acknowledgments."
•
Exclusive Publication
Statement. Each author must certify that
none of the material in the manuscript has been published
previously in either print
or electronic form, and that none of
the material is currently under consideration for publication
elsewhere. This includes symposia,
transactions, books, articles
published by invitation, posting in electronic format, and
preliminary publications of any kind except
an abstract of 400
words or fewer.
•
Copyright Transfer. Authors of articles submitted to
The Annals
must transfer
copyright of the entire article, including artwork,
photographs and other matter, to The Society of Thoracic Surgeons.
Illustrative work
(art, drawings, and photographs) may
not be separately copyrighted. The copyright transfer becomes
binding upon acceptance of the article
for publication. Elsevier
Inc. administers reproduction permission requests on behalf of
The Society of Thoracic Surgeons. No part of
the material
published in
The Annals may be reproduced elsewhere without
written permission from Elsevier Inc.
• If
any previously published table(s), illustration(s) or photograph(
s) are used in an
Annals' article, it is the authors'
responsibility
to obtain
written permission from
the copyright
owner to reproduce the material in
The Annals in print and/or
electronic
media. The written permission must be sent to
The
Annals' editorial office for the record.
•
Written permission
from unmasked patients appearing in
photographs is also required and must be sent to
The Annals'
editorial office for the record.
8. Miscellaneous
•
NIH Initiative
The National Institutes of
Health requires that all investigators
funded by the NIH submit or have submitted for them an
electronic version of their final, peer-reviewed
manuscripts
upon acceptance for publication. The electronic manuscript is
sent to the National Library of Medicine's PubMed Central
(
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc),
where it is made publicly
available no later than 12 months after the official date of
publication (
http://publicaccess.nih.gov).
•
Randomized Controlled Trials
The Annals of Thoracic Surgery endorses the CONSORT Statement
regarding randomized
controlled trials
(
http://www.consort-statement.org) and recommends that investigators who plan to publish
their work in
The Annals review the CONSORT E-Flowchart
and Checklist (available at
http://www.consort-statement.org/consort-statement/overview0/)
before enrollment of subjects begins. Randomized
controlled trials should be free of bias and of misleading
information due to, for example,
insufficient numbers of
subjects and failure to define primary and secondary endpoints.
The Checklist succinctly and comprehensively
defines
the attributes of a well-designed and reported randomized
controlled trial. Authors who submit reports of
randomized controlled
trials to
The Annals should also
submit a completed CONSORT Flowchart and Checklist,
leaving blank the page number of any item
that wasn't done
as part of the study; no study is expected to have addressed
all the items on the checklist. These documents are intended
to be used for review purposes only, and will not be
published.
•
Registration of Clinical Trials
The Annals
of Thoracic Surgery supports mandatory registration of all
publicly or commercially funded clinical trials, including Phase I
and
II trials, as a condition for publication. Information regarding
requirements for registration of a clinical trial may be found at
http://www.icmje.org/#clin_trials.
Information for registering a clinical
trial is available at
http://prsinfo.clinicaltrials.gov. The trial registration
number
should appear at the end of the abstract.
•
Archiving Submissions in Editorial Office Online Manuscript
Tracking System
The editorial office will delete unpublished manuscripts from the
online system 6 months after the final decision is rendered. Manuscripts
of published articles will be deleted 12 months after acceptance.
Required supplementary data to be surface mailed or faxed to
the editorial office:
• The "
Conditions for
Publication Form" signed by all authors with
appropriate boxes checked.
[Note: When in early 2012 electronic submission
of the Conditions
Form is activated, authors will receive e-mail notification
to log onto
The Annals' editorial office website
to complete
the "
Conditions for Publication Form"
online.]
• Written permission from the publisher to reproduce previously
published illustrations or tables.
• Written
permission from unmasked patients appearing in photographs.
Updated January 2012