Instructions for Authors
Last updated June 2008
Purpose of the Bulletin | Submitting manuscripts | Presenting your manuscript | General references | Language and style | Authors' names and affiliations | Word length | Abstracts | Spelling | Capitalisation | Measurement units, symbols and abbreviations | Abbreviations | Footnotes | Preferred terminology | NSW Department of Health | Figures and tables | Figures | Figure presentation: | Tables | Acknowledgments | Citation and references | Websites | Peer review
Purpose of the Bulletin
The Bulletin aims to provide its readers with population health data and information to support public health action. Readers include public health professionals within the NSW Department of Health, health services throughout NSW, as well as other interested readers in Australia and overseas.
The NSW Public Health Bulletin is published by CSIRO Publishing and is available at: http://www.publish.csiro.au/
Submitting manuscripts
Send your manuscript as an email attachment to:
PHBULLETIN@doh.health.nsw.gov.au
Submissions should be accompanied by a covering letter and the Author Contact Details Form with the names, institutional affiliations, addresses and contact numbers of all authors. Authors should obtain the appropriate clearances for the material contained in their paper from their directors or supervisors before submission, and sign the Licence to Publish Form.
Presenting your manuscript
Please remove all track changes and mark-up alterations, style codes, EndNote codes and automatic footnoting. Superscript numbers for references should be manually inserted and checked against the numbering of the reference list at the end.
Authors using Endnote or other referencing programs must finalise and remove field codes before submitting the paper. This ensures that references are visible and can be edited in documents across different Word programs.
To remove field codes in EndNote:
- Open the Word document
- From the Tools menu, go to EndNote X submenu
- Select 'Remove Field Codes'
- A copy of the document without field codes appears in new document window
- Save this document with a new file name. use this new document for electronic submission to the Bulletin.
The General Information for Authors can be found at http://www.publish.csiro.au/nid/233.htm
General references
Follow the advice of the Commonwealth of Australia Style manual for authors, editor and printers (6th edition, John Wiley & Sons Australia, 2002).
Use the first spelling given in The Australian Oxford Dictionary or The Macquarie Dictionary (3rd edition).
Use Vancouver Style referencing as described in:
International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals: Writing and Editing for Biomedical Publication, http://www.icmje.org
Appropriate use of terminology for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples follows the advice of Communicating positively: a guide to appropriate Aboriginal terminology (NSW Health, 2004).
For guidelines on presenting graphs, see Better health graphs (NSW Health, 2006), http://www.health.nsw.gov.au/pubs/2006/better_graphs1.html
Use the International System of Units as given in: The International System of Units (SI), Organisation Intergouvemementale de la Convention du Mètre, 8th Edition, 2006. http://www.bipm.org/en/si/si_brochure/ (updated February 2006).
In reference lists use journal abbreviations from the List of Journals Indexed for MEDLINE, National Library of Medicine, http://www.nlm.nih.gov/tsd/serials/terms_cond.html (updated January 2007).
Language and style
The Bulletin follows the guidelines of the Style manual for authors, editor and printers (6th edition, John Wiley & Sons Australia, 2002).
The text of the Bulletin should be accessible to its broad readership. Therefore the language should be clear, and jargon avoided. A style guide for authors is included in this document.
Authors' names and affiliations
List authors' names with first name, middle initial and last name (Thomas D. Smith).
List professional affiliations (Planning and Urban Development Program, Faculty of the Built Environment, University of New South Wales; Communicable Diseases Branch, NSW Department of Health)
Corresponding author's email should be included.
Word length
| Manuscript Type | Word limit |
| Standard paper | 1500-2000 |
| Short report | 600 |
| Bug Breakfast | 600 |
| Fact Sheet | 600-1000 |
Abstracts
A standard scientific abstract should precede the introductory section of all papers. Abstracts should be as complete, accurate and simply expressed as possible:
- 100 words
- do not include: acronyms, trade names, abbreviations
- abbreviate Australian states and territories (NSW, WA)
- do not include references.
The format of an abstract is determined by the type of paper presented.
For review papers:
- summarise the issues addressed and their relevance
- an unstructured abstract is appropriate.
For epidemiological or scientific studies (refer to International Committee of Medical Journal Editors http://www.icmje.org):
- use a structured abstract with the headings: Aims; Method; Results; Conclusion
Spelling
In general, spelling follows The Australian Oxford Dictionary, with 'ise' spelling. Capitalisation, hyphenation, punctuation and abbreviations should be uniform throughout.
Capitalisation
- use lower case whenever possible.
- use lower case for general statements e.g. all states and territories
- use a capital letter for specific titles
- use lower case for occupations e.g. the director, the health promotion officer, the cleaner, editor, doctor and professor
- use a capital letter for the title of a named individual and for legal office e.g. the Attorney-General, the Chief Health Officer, Dr Smith, Professor Berry
Measurement units, symbols and abbreviations
Use the International System of Units (SI) unless there is a particular problem associated with its adoption. If SI units are not used, indicate the relationship between the units given and the official units.
Abbreviations
Use as little as possible.
Abbreviations of capital letters never take full stops
e.g. WHO, ABC, UNAIDS
Footnotes
Avoid footnotes in papers. Instead, put the material at the end of the paragraph or in brackets, or cut it altogether.
Footnotes can be used in tables:
use lower case superscript letters: a,b,c
to draw attention to p values in tables, use the sequence: *, **, ***
Preferred terminology
Use language that does not depersonalise the subject:
- do not refer to people as 'cases'
- use 'men and women' not 'males and females', unless referring to animals or children as well as adults
- use 'elderly people' and 'young people' not 'the elderly', or 'the young'
- people described in a category should first be referred to as people, before the category being discussed is identified
e.g. people with a disability not disabled people
people with diabetes not diabetics
people with HIV infection not people infected with HIV or HIV sufferers
people with HCV infection not people infected with hepatitis C - NSW Department of Health: Head office in North Sydney, Gladesville and Foveaux Street
- NSW Health: Generic term for NSW Department of Health, area health services, public health units, NSW Ambulance service, New Children's Hospital and others
- acknowledge data sources below the figure
- provide a descriptive figure title and a legend
- label both axes of graphs horizontally (do not use vertical text)
- do not use three dimensional boxes or shading
- use pattern rather than colour/shading to distinguish between columns
- do not use grid line across graphs
- do not place figures in boxes
- use footnotes to explain acronyms (lower case superscript letters: a,b,c)
NSW Department of Health
Use the terms as follows:
Figures and tables
Graphs from Excel or statistical analysis programs should not be embedded in the Word document but presented at the end of the manuscript following references; include the data file in a separate file as well as the graph itself. Indicate in the text where each figure and table should appear.
Other illustrations should be high-resolution files; pictures cut and pasted from the internet are not acceptable.
Refer to all figures and tables in the text, and number figures and tables consecutively in the order that they are cited within the paper. If there is only one figure or one table, it is Figure 1 or Table 1.
Figures
Figures should be simple, with every element relevant to the message of the graph. Figures should be complete in themselves, without reference to the accompanying text.
Figure presentation:
Tables
Tables should be simple without any distracting elements. Tables should be complete in themselves, without reference to the accompanying tex.
Refer to: Better Health Graphs (NSW Health 2006) available at http://www.health.nsw.gov.au/pubs/2006/better_graphs1.html
Acknowledgments
Acknowledgments should appear immediately before the reference list. The names, initials and, where necessary, official positions of those mentioned should be included. Do not mention everyone who has been marginally involved in the work. As the Bulletin is a NSW Health publication, expressions of appreciation to political figures should not appear.
Citation and references
Authors are responsible for checking the authenticity and accuracy of references. Special care should be taken to see that every reference in the text is included in the list of references and vice versa, and that there is consistency in the spelling of authors' names and the citation of dates throughout the paper.
The numbered Vancouver style is used for reference lists. Refer to the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/bsd/uniform_requirements.html
Avoid citing abstracts or a personal communication unless it provides essential information not available from a public source. In this case, the name of the person and date of communication should be cited in parentheses in the text. For scientific papers, authors should obtain written permission and confirmation of accuracy from the source of a personal communication.
Abbreviate journal titles according to Index Medicus style, from the National Library of Medicine: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/tsd/serials/terms_cond.html
Where the journal is not listed in Index Medicus, abbreviate its constituent words according to the same conventions. If in doubt leave title in full.
Websites
Whenever URLs are cited (in the text or in the reference list), the access date should be given (cited 12 August 2002), as websites are subject to change without notice.
For print publications downloaded from the internet, give the full print citation (author, title, publication, year, volume, pages), and then add 'Available from' and the URL:
Abood S. Quality improvement initiative in nursing homes: the ANA acts in an advisory role. Am J Nurs [serial on the Internet]. 2002 (cited 12 August 2002);102(6)(about 3 p.0). Available from: http://www.nursingworld.org/default.aspx
Peer review
The Bulletin is indexed by Medline and Index Medicus and uses peer review to maintain standards and ensure relevance. Submitted and invited papers are reviewed by at least two experts in the subject area. Some papers require further review, not because the first reviewer's evaluation or comments are inadequate, but because questions are raised on the first assessment. If submitted manuscripts are judged useful for the readership, authors are given anonymous peer reviewer comments to help in the revision of papers.
