Journal of the American College of Radiology

The Journal of the American College of Radiology (JACR) publishes high-quality, in-depth material on diagnostic radiology and nuclear medicine, interventional radiology, and radiation oncology consistent with ACR membership interests in clinical practice, practice management, health services research and policy, and education and training. JACR does not publish basic, translational, or clinical research, case studies, or clinical reviews as this material is well served by numerous other imaging journals.

Please submit manuscripts on the journal's editorial site ( http://ees.elsevier.com/jacr/). For questions about the submission process, contact Betsy Colgan, JACR Senior Managing Editor, 703-715-4381, bcolgan@acr.org. For questions concerning particular submissions, authors are encouraged to discuss their ideas with the Editor-in Chief, Dr. Bruce Hillman, or the Associate Editors, as listed on the JACR masthead:

All articles: Bruce Hillman, MD: e-mail: bjh8a@virginia.edu; tel: 434-982-0211
Education: Martha B. Mainiero, MD; e-mail: mmainiero@lifespan.org; tel: 401-444-5184
Health Services Research and Policy: Ruth C. Carlos, MD, MS; e-mail: rcarlos@umich.edu; tel: 734-936-8872
Radiation Oncology: Peter A. S. Johnstone, MD; e-mail: pajohnst@iupui.edu; tel: 317-944-8809
Clinical Practice: Richard Duszak Jr, MD; e-mail: rduszak@duszak.com; tel: 901-414-2830
Practice Management: Michael N. Brant-Zawadzki, MD; e-mail: mbrant@hoaghospital.org; tel: 949-764-5942
Physics: Mahadevappa Mahesh, MS, PhD; e-mail: mmahesh@jhmi.edu; tel: 410-955-5115
International: Birgit Ertl-Wagner, MD: e-mail: Birgit.Ertl-Wagner@med.lmu.de; tel: 011-49-89-7095-3250

Submission
Submission of a manuscript implies that the work described has not been published previously (except as an abstract or academic thesis), that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all authors, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form in English or in any other language, without the written consent of the copyright holder, the American College of Radiology ( ACR).

Conflicts of Interest
Along with the manuscript submission, the corresponding author (and all co-authors) must complete the ICMJE form for disclosure of potential conflicts of interest and submit these along with the other manuscript files. The ICMJE form may be accessed at http://www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf. The form can be downloaded, saved, filled out, and then submitted, along with the other manuscript files, to http://ees.elsevier.com/jacr. Visit this link ( http://www.icmje.org/ethical_4conflicts.html) for an explanation of what constitutes a conflict. The corresponding author is responsible for communicating this information to all co-authors and uploading the forms along with all other submission files. All conflicts of interest also must be detailed on the title page.

Copyright
Upon acceptance of a manuscript, authors will be asked to transfer copyright to the ACR. A letter will be sent to the corresponding author confirming acceptance of the manuscript, and a form facilitating transfer of copyright will be provided. If excerpts or images from other copyright works are included, the author(s) must obtain written permission from the copyright owners and credit the source(s) in the articles. Copies of letters granting such permission must be submitted with the manuscript.

Manuscript Preparation
JACR uses as a guide the "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals" ( http://www.icmje.org/index.html), as well as the American Medical Association Manual of Style. All submissions should include:
• A brief cover letter which should draw the attention of the Editor to any special considerations that might affect the external review of the manuscript.
• A title page with the following information:

• Corresponding author's institutional affiliation, mailing address, e-mail address, telephone, and fax number
• Co-authors' institutional affiliation (include city and state)
• Conflict of interest information for all authors

Manuscript Assembly
Manuscripts must be submitted in Word format. Manuscripts should be formatted for 8.5" x 11" (215 x 280 mm) pages with margins of at least 1" (25 mm) on all four sides, double-spaced throughout. The manuscript should be organized in the following sequence: cover letter; title page, with names of all authors and their institutional affiliations and mailing address, e-mail address, telephone, and fax number of the corresponding author; text with references; figure legends; and tables. For original articles only, authors must include an abstract, key words, and one-sentence summary.

Authorship
Authorship credit should be based only on significant contributions to conception and design, or acquisition of data or analysis and interpretation of data, drafting the article or revising it critically, and final approval of the version to be published. The sequence of the author byline should be agreed upon by all the coauthors. Any changes in authorship following submission of a manuscript must be explained in a letter to the Editor-in-Chief that is signed by all coauthors to indicate their consent to the change. This includes the deletion and addition of authors as well as any change in the order of authors.

Continuing Medical Education (CME)
The journal selects at least one original article each issue as a CME offering for readers. The journal staff will contact the corresponding author of the selected article and request his/her assistance in generating questions and answers about the article content for online CME participation.

Types of Eligible Submissions

Original Articles
JACR publishes full-length original articles on clinical practice, management, health services and policy, including, cost-effectiveness, and education. All full-length original article manuscripts submitted to JACR are peer-reviewed by one or more reviewers selected by the Editor-in-Chief. Original articles should either be reviews of important topics or detail original research of interest to the journal.

Reviews should be approximately 12 to 20 double-spaced manuscript pages (12-point typeface), written in essay style, broken up by subheads. Authors should take a critical approach to their sources of information rather than simply relate what their sources say. Some opinion is allowed as long as it clearly is identified as opinion.

For articles detailing new research, length will vary according to the subject and complexity. Authors may use the conventional approach of separating introduction, methods, results, and discussion or employ essay formatting if this approach results in a more cogent manuscript.

New Requirement for Original and Review Articles: Concluding Section: The concluding section of original and review articles should comprise 3 to 6 bulleted statements under the subhead "Take Home Points." These should be short, declarative statements indicating the most important conclusion from your study. This information can be inserted at the end of the manuscript file (before acknowledgments or references) or placed in a separate file and uploaded with your other manuscript files.

Original articles require a free-form or structured abstract of up to 250 words; a summary sentence either from the article or written in addition that summarizes the article; three to five key words for indexing purposes; and references to support contentions appearing in the text.

Columns
The Editor-in-Chief will recruit a cadre of authors to write recurring columns on specific subjects. Columns should be no longer than 1500 words, submitted as double-spaced manuscript pages (12-point type). References are encouraged when appropriate but not required. The Editor-in-Chief will work with columnists to ensure that published articles are of the highest quality.

Opinion
JACR encourages the submission of commentary regarding aspects of radiology or health care that are part of the journal's purview. Generally, these will be shorter writings, approximately 3 to 9 double-spaced manuscript pages (12-point type).

Letters-to-the-Editor
The Editor-in-Chief welcomes letters commenting on previously published articles of no more than 500 words. Accepted letters will be forwarded to the primary author of the article discussed in the letter to allow a reply. Letters and replies will be published together. The Editor-in-Chief encourages the authors of letters and those replying to adopt a civil and interesting style.

Brief Communications
The Editor-in Chief welcomes unsolicited submissions to specific features of the journal. These should be shorter articles (less than 2,000 words). Features include:

• The Voice of Experience - VOE columns should relate an institutional experience addressing a specific issue or problem. VOE manuscripts should have three sections: 1. Description of the problem; 2. What was done; 3. Any outcomes to support the success or failure of the effort.
• A View from Abroad - VFA manuscripts should detail topics reflective of medical or radiological practice in countries other U.S. The objective is to encourage comparative assessment.
• The Resident and Fellows' Column - RFC submissions should comment on particular aspects of training or how training relates to practice.

Abbreviations and Symbols
Use only standard abbreviations. Avoid abbreviations in the title and abstract. The full term for which an abbreviation stands should precede its first use in the text unless it is a standard unit of measurement. Units of measurement should be reported in the metric system in terms of the International System of Units (SI). (SI).

References
Every reference cited in the text should be listed in the reference list and vice versa. Any references cited in the abstract must be given in full. Unpublished results and personal communications should not be in the reference list but may be mentioned in the text. Citation of a reference as "in press" implies that the item has been accepted for publication. Indicate references by number(s) in square brackets in line with the text. Number the references in the list in the order in which they appear in text. Abbreviations for periodicals cited in the references should follow the style of Index Medicus and can also be accessed at http://www.nlm.nih.gov. The references must be verified by the author(s) against the original documents. References are to follow the Vancouver style; listed below are the correct formats for a [1] journal article; [2] book; and [3] chapter in an edited book. For journal articles list up to six authors. If there are more than six authors, list the first three followed by et al. The following are three examples::

[1] Hibbard CT, Campbell S, Sabbagha RE, et al. Demonstration of tissue interfaces within the body by ultrasonic echo sounding. Br J Radiol 1961;34:539-49.
[2] Ringsven MK, Bond D. Gerontology and leadership skills for nurses. 2nd ed. Albany (NY): Delmar Publishers; 1996.
[3] Phillips SJ, Whisnant JP. Hypertension and stroke. In: Laragh JH, Brenner BM, editors. Hypertension: pathophysiology, diagnosis, and management. 2nd ed. New York: Raven Press; 1995. p. 465-78.

Tables
Each table should be double spaced and supplied on a separate page. Tables should be numbered consecutively in the order of their first citation in the text. Each table must have a title, and table columns must have a short or abbreviated heading. Explanatory matter should be placed in footnotes, not in the heading. Explain in footnotes all nonstandard abbreviations that are used in each table. For footnotes use the following symbols, in this sequence: *, †, ‡, §, ||, ¶, **, ††, ‡‡.

Identify statistical measures of variations, such as standard deviation and standard error of the mean. Do not use internal horizontal and vertical rules. Be sure that each table is cited in the text. If data are used from another published or unpublished source, obtain permission and acknowledge them fully. Tables must be submitted as part of the text file and not as illustrations.

Figure legends
A caption must be supplied for each illustration including drawings and graphs. All captions must be listed on one or more pages at the end of the document. The caption must describe all labels (symbols, arrows, numbers, or letters) placed on the illustration.

Figures
Figures need to be provided electronically. Number illustrations consecutively in the order in which they are referred to in the text. Figures should be submitted in separate files from the manuscript.

A detailed guide on electronic artwork is available on our website: www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions . All illustrations should be uploaded as separate files. Uniform lettering, sizing, and logical naming for the artwork files is strongly encouraged. Line graphs and bar charts should be sent in bitmap TIFF files with a minimum resolution of 1200 dps or as EPS files with a preferred line width of 1 pt (minimum line width of 0.5 pt). Bitmap images should be sent as TIFF files and not placed within EPS files. Pictures, photographs, and micrographs should be sent as grayscale TIFF files with a minimum resolution of 300 dpi without lettering and 500 dpi with lettering.

Color illustrations
Electronic color artwork should be sent as CMYK-encoded TIFF images (RGB-encoded color images will be difficult to match for color in print). If you submit usable color figures with your article, the figures will appear in color on the web regardless of whether these figures are reproduced in color in the print version. For color reproduction in print, you will receive information regarding the costs from Elsevier after receipt of your accepted article.

Proofs
Page proofs in PDF format will be sent by e-mail to the corresponding author to be checked for typesetting/editing. No changes in, or additions to, the accepted (and subsequently edited) manuscripts will be allowed at this stage. Proofreading is solely your responsibility.



Updated April 2012