Submission guidelines
Contents
Instructions for Authors
General
Manuscripts should be submitted in English via the Editorial Manager Website.
Please direct all questions to:
Candace Moore
Editorial Coordinator
The New York Academy of Medicine
1216 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10029
phone: 212-419-3671
fax: (212) 996-7826
cmoore@nyam.org
www.nyam.org
Focus of the Journal
In concert with the mission of its parent organization, The New York Academy of Medicine, the Journal serves as a vehicle for publishing articles relevant to urban health including the broader determinants of health and health inequities. Clinical, health services research, and policy papers are welcome.
Manuscripts
1. Original Article
This is the most common type of journal manuscript used to publish full reports of data from research. The Original Research format is suitable for many different fields and different types of studies. It includes full Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion sections. The Journal of Urban Health publishes reports of original research comprising laboratory, field, clinical, or mathematical modeling studies of conditions that impact urban health and health equity, as well as studies of statistical or methodological issues. We encourage authors of methodological papers to make them as comprehensible as possible by using examples based on urban population health studies and by relegating highly technical material to appendices.
- Original articles should be no longer than 4,000 words and preferably less than 3,500 words not including abstract, tables/figures, and references.
- An unstructured abstract should not exceed 250 words. While up to 7 Tables and Figures are permitted, four is the optimum number to consider for the print edition.
- Maximum number of references: 35
2. Review
In-depth reviews and analyses on both substantive subject areas and methodologic aspects of urban health. This may include systematic, scoping, narrative and realist reviews.
- Maximum word length: 5,000 words not including abstract, tables/figures, and references.
3. Editorial
Editorials are written by the Editor in Chief or a guest editor and is either an opinion piece or to introduce a special issue.
- Maximum word length: 750 words, not including references
- No abstract for editorials
- Maximum number of references: 15
4. Commentary
Commentaries take a “position” and then bring forth arguments or evidence to support that position. Structured with content-appropriate headings and a conclusion section. The text summary (abstract) gives the reader an idea what the commentary is about.
- Maximum word length: 750 words, not including abstract, tables/figures, and references
- Text abstract: 150 words
- Maximum number of references: 15
- Commentaries may have 2 tables and figures.
5. Brief Report
Brief Reports are used for articles that convey an important, novel message and present interesting data that, however, are limited in scope and size. These papers communicate brief reports of data from original research that editors believe will be interesting to many researchers, and that will likely stimulate further research in the field. This format is useful for scientists with results that are time sensitive (for example, those in highly competitive or quickly-changing disciplines).
- Maximum word length: 1500 words, not including abstract, tables/figures, references
- Text abstract: 150 words
- Maximum number of references: 25
- 1 table/figure
6. Book Review: The Journal no longer publishes book review.
7. Format: All abstracts are unstructured, and we use the following style citations (numbered in order of appearance within brackets), footnotes, and references (JAMA/PUBMED style). Research or project support should be included in acknowledgement section at the end of the paper. Authors should note any affiliations, financial agreement, or other involvement with any company whose product figures in the manuscript. Structure this in the original submission.
Generally, manuscripts will be reviewed by two outside consultants or members of the Editorial Board.
Copyright
Upon acceptance of a manuscript, the authors will receive a standard Copyright Agreement, which must be signed by all authors and returned to the Editor. All accepted manuscripts become the property of The New York Academy of Medicine and may not be published elsewhere in whole or in part without written permission of NYAM.
Artwork and Illustrations Guidelines
Electronic Figure Submission
• Supply all figures electronically.
• Indicate what graphics program was used to create the artwork.
• For vector graphics, the preferred format is EPS; for halftones, please use TIFF format. MSOffice files are also acceptable.
• Vector graphics containing fonts must have the fonts embedded in the files.
• Name your figure files with "Fig" and the figure number, e.g., Fig1.eps.
Line Art
• Definition: Black and white graphic with no shading.
• Do not use faint lines and/or lettering and check that all lines and lettering within the figures are legible at final size.
• All lines should be at least 0.1 mm (0.3 pt) wide.
• Scanned line drawings and line drawings in bitmap format should have a minimum resolution of 1200 dpi.
• Vector graphics containing fonts must have the fonts embedded in the files.
Halftone Art
• Definition: Photographs, drawings, or paintings with fine shading, etc.
• If any magnification is used in the photographs, indicate this by using scale bars within the figures themselves.
• Halftones should have a minimum resolution of 300 dpi.
Combination Art
• Definition: a combination of halftone and line art, e.g., halftones containing line drawing, extensive lettering, color diagrams, etc.
• Combination artwork should have a minimum resolution of 600 dpi.
Color Art
• Color art is free of charge for online publication.
• If black and white will be shown in the print version, make sure that the main information will still be visible. Many colors are not distinguishable from one another when converted to black and white. A simple way to check this is to make a xerographic copy to see if the necessary distinctions between the different colors are still apparent.
• If the figures will be printed in black and white, do not refer to color in the captions.
• Color illustrations should be submitted as RGB (8 bits per channel).
Figure Lettering
• To add lettering, it is best to use Helvetica or Arial (sans serif fonts).
• Keep lettering consistently sized throughout your final-sized artwork, usually about 2–3 mm (8–12 pt).
• Variance of type size within an illustration should be minimal, e.g., do not use 8-pt type on an axis and 20-pt type for the axis label.
• Avoid effects such as shading, outline letters, etc.
• Do not include titles or captions within your illustrations.
Figure Numbering
• All figures are to be numbered using Arabic numerals.
• Figures should always be cited in text in consecutive numerical order.
• Figure parts should be denoted by lowercase letters (a, b, c, etc.).
• If an appendix appears in your article and it contains one or more figures, continue the consecutive numbering of the main text. Do not number the appendix figures,
"A1, A2, A3, etc." Figures in online appendices (Electronic Supplementary Material) should, however, be numbered separately.
Figure Captions
• Each figure should have a concise caption describing accurately what the figure depicts. Include the captions in the text file of the manuscript, not in the figure file.
• Figure captions begin with the term Fig. in bold type, followed by the figure number, also in bold type.
• No punctuation is to be included after the number, nor is any punctuation to be placed at the end of the caption.
• Identify all elements found in the figure in the figure caption; and use boxes, circles, etc., as coordinate points in graphs.
• Identify previously published material by giving the original source in the form of a reference citation at the end of the figure caption.
Figure Placement and Size
• When preparing your figures, size figures to fit in the column width.
• For most journals the figures should be 39 mm, 84 mm, 129 mm, or 174 mm wide and not higher than 234 mm.
• For books and book-sized journals, the figures should be 80 mm or 122 mm wide and not higher than 198 mm.
Permissions
If you include figures that have already been published elsewhere, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner(s) for both the print and online format. Please be aware that some publishers do not grant electronic rights for free and that Springer will not be able to refund any costs that may have occurred to receive these permissions. In such cases, material from other sources should be used.
Accessibility
In order to give people of all abilities and disabilities access to the content of your figures, please make sure that
• All figures have descriptive captions (blind users could then use a text-to-speech software or a text-to-Braille hardware)
• Patterns are used instead of or in addition to colors for conveying information (colorblind users would then be able to distinguish the visual elements)
• Any figure lettering has a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1
Permissions
Manuscripts reporting experiments with human subjects must specify in the text the provisions of the consent form signed by the subjects and must be accompanied by a letter indicating that an institutional review committee has authorized the research.
If any tables or illustrations have been published previously, permission in writing from the author and the publisher or holder of the copyright must accompany the letter of transmittal. Legends for illustrations or tables should contain a full reference to the original source.
Tables are to be typed double-spaced, each on separate, unnumbered pages, with the consecutive table number in upper case Roman numbers followed by the title at the top of each page.
Research Data Policy
This journal operates a type 1 research data policy. The journal encourages authors, where possible and applicable, to deposit data that support the findings of their research in a public repository. Authors and editors who do not have a preferred repository should consult Springer Nature’s list of repositories and research data policy.
General repositories - for all types of research data - such as figshare and Dryad may also be used.
Datasets that are assigned digital object identifiers (DOIs) by a data repository may be cited in the reference list. Data citations should include the minimum information recommended by DataCite: authors, title, publisher (repository name), identifier.
If the journal that you’re submitting to uses double-blind peer review and you are providing reviewers with access to your data (for example via a repository link, supplementary information or data on request), it is strongly suggested that the authorship in the data is also blinded. There are data repositories that can assist with this and/or will create a link to mask the authorship of your data.
Authors who need help understanding our data sharing policies, help finding a suitable data repository, or help organising and sharing research data can access our Author Support portal for additional guidance.
Editing Services
English
How can you help improve your manuscript for publication?
Presenting your work in a well-structured manuscript and in well-written English gives it its best chance for editors and reviewers to understand it and evaluate it fairly. Many researchers find that getting some independent support helps them present their results in the best possible light. The experts at Springer Nature Author Services can help you with manuscript preparation—including English language editing, developmental comments, manuscript formatting, figure preparation, translation, and more.
You can also use our free Grammar Check tool for an evaluation of your work.
Please note that using these tools, or any other service, is not a requirement for publication, nor does it imply or guarantee that editors will accept the article, or even select it for peer review.
Chinese (中文)
您怎么做才有助于改进您的稿件以便顺利发表?
如果在结构精巧的稿件中用精心组织的英语展示您的作品,就能最大限度地让编辑和审稿人理解并公正评估您的作品。许多研究人员发现,获得一些独立支持有助于他们以尽可能美好的方式展示他们的成果。Springer Nature Author Services 的专家可帮助您准备稿件,具体包括润色英语表述、添加有见地的注释、为稿件排版、设计图表、翻译等。
您还可以使用我们的免费语法检查工具来评估您的作品。
请注意,使用这些工具或任何其他服务不是发表前必须满足的要求,也不暗示或保证相关文章定会被编辑接受(甚至未必会被选送同行评审)。
Japanese (日本語)
発表に備えて、論文を改善するにはどうすればよいでしょうか?
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これらのツールや他のサービスをご利用いただくことは、論文を掲載するための要件ではありません。また、編集者が論文を受理したり、査読に選定したりすることを示唆または保証するものではないことにご注意ください。
Korean (한국어)
게재를 위해 원고를 개선하려면 어떻게 해야 할까요?
여러분의 작품을 체계적인 원고로 발표하는 것은 편집자와 심사자가 여러분의 연구를 이해하고 공정하게 평가할 수 있는 최선의 기회를 제공합니다. 많은 연구자들은 어느 정도 독립적인 지원을 받는 것이 가능한 한 최선의 방법으로 자신의 결과를 발표하는 데 도움이 된다고 합니다. Springer Nature Author Services 전문가들은 영어 편집, 발전적인 논평, 원고 서식 지정, 그림 준비, 번역 등과 같은 원고 준비를 도와드릴 수 있습니다.
또한 당사의 무료 문법 검사도구를 사용하여 여러분의 연구를 평가할 수 있습니다.
이러한 도구 또는 기타 서비스를 사용하는 것은 게재를 위한 필수 요구사항이 아니며, 편집자가 해당 논문을 수락하거나 피어 리뷰에 해당 논문을 선택한다는 것을 암시하거나 보장하지는 않습니다.
No Page Charges
The journal makes no page charges. Reprints are available to authors, and order forms with the current price schedule are sent with proofs.
Open access publishing
To find out more about publishing your work Open Access in Journal of Urban Health, including information on fees, funding and licences, visit our Open access publishing page.