Preparation of Manuscripts

Manuscripts should be sent via email as an email attachment to the Editor-in-Chief. Email: johce_fhcs@esn.ac.lk

Your article must be within the scope of the journal and be of sufficient quality. If not, it will not be reviewed. Please read the journal’s Scope to see if your article is appropriate.

The manuscript must be your original work, you must have the rights to the work, and you must have obtained and be able to supply all necessary permissions for the reproduction of any copyright works not owned by you, including figures, illustrations, tables, lengthy quotations, or other material previously published elsewhere.

 

Journal of HealthCare Education publishes the following article types:

Click the relevant link to find style and formatting information for the article type you want to submit.

General guidelines for the authors

Manuscript should be prepared in word processing format and should be well written in English without spelling and grammatical errors. The body text should be in Times New Roman font in size 12pt and numbers should be in Arabic numerals typed in double line-space with a margin of 1 inch on all sides. Footnotes should be avoided. Word limit for the manuscript should be no more than 5000 excluding the references.

Title page

This page should include title of the manuscript, author/s’ name and their affiliations, corresponding author’s contact information, and declarations.

Title: should be short, specific and informative. Include the study design if appropriate.

Author/s’ name and affiliations: Surname and initials of each author should be followed by their institution and country. In case of multiple authors, one of the authors should be designated as the corresponding author. The email address and telephone number of the corresponding author should be clearly stated.

Declarations:

All manuscripts must contain the following sections under the heading 'Declarations':

Please see below for details on the information to be included in these sections.

If any of the sections are not relevant to your manuscript, please include the heading and write 'Not applicable' for that section.

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Manuscripts reporting studies involving human participants, human data, human tissue or animals must:

If your manuscript does not report on or involve the use of any animal or human data or tissue, please state “Not applicable” in this section.

Consent for publication

If your manuscript contains any individual person’s data in any form (including individual details, images or videos), consent to publish must be obtained from that person, or in the case of children, their parent or legal guardian. All presentations of case reports must have consent to publish.

If your manuscript does not contain data from any individual person, please state “Not applicable” in this section.

Competing interests

All financial and non-financial competing interests must be declared in this section. Any competing interests related to the manuscript should be clearly stated. If the author has no conflict of interest, state “No potential competing interests related to this article was identified”

Funding

If the author has received any funds for conducting this study, it should be stated including the name and country of the funding agency. The role of the funding body in the design of the study and collection, analysis, and interpretation of data and in writing the manuscript should be declared.

Authors’ contribution

If more than one author has contributed to the manuscript, the author’s responsibilities, and contributions should be stated.

Acknowledgment

Please acknowledge anyone who contributed towards the article who does not meet the criteria for authorship including anyone who provided professional writing services or materials.

Please note: Journal of HealthCare Education operates double-blind peer review. The above information should not be included in the main manuscript file, but should instead be uploaded as part of the Title page.

Abstract:should be a single paragraph not exceeding 300-word limit. It may be structured as introduction, objectives, methods, results, and conclusion if appropriate. Please minimize the use of abbreviations and do not cite references in the abstract.

Keywords: should not be more than five words. Keywords should be in Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) terminology and should be arranged in alphabetical order at the end of the abstract. Separate each keyword with a comma.

Main text

Tables and figures should be self-explanatory and include a brief descriptive title and should be numbered consecutively. Title should be placed above for the table and below for the figures. Tables and figures should be in line with text. Number of tables and figures together should not exceed 4.

Photographs should be of sufficiently high quality with respect to detail, contrast and fineness of grain. Photographs should be submitted in the desired final size so that the reduction can be avoided.

Reference

Authors should follow the American Psychological Association (APA) reference style 7th edition for in-text citation and reference list.

Please keep the reference list as up to date as possible and avoid referring extensively to your own published work.

Submission of Manuscript

All manuscripts should be submitted to the Editor-in-Chief by email in word processing format as an email attachment.

All correspondences related to the manuscript before/after submission should be sent to the Editor-in-Chief by email.

Email: johce_fhcs@esn.ac.lk

Original research article

Criteria

Research articles should report on original primary research.

Preparing your manuscript

Title page

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of Title page, abstract and key words.

Follow the general instructions for preparation of the Main text which includes:

Background

The Background section should explain the background to the study, its aims, a summary of the existing literature and why this study was necessary.

Methods

The methods section should include:

Results

This should include the findings of the study including, if appropriate, results of statistical analysis which must be included either in the text or as tables and figures.

Discussion

For research articles, this section should discuss the implications of the findings in context of existing research and highlight limitations of the study. For study protocols and methodology manuscripts this section should include a discussion of any practical or operational issues involved in performing the study and any issues not covered in other sections.

Conclusions

This should state clearly the main conclusions and provide an explanation of the importance and relevance of the study to the field.

References

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of references .

Review

Criteria

Reviews provide comprehensive and authoritative coverage of a topic area.

Key aims of reviews are to provide systematic and substantial coverage of mature subjects, evaluations of progress in specified areas, and/or critical assessments of emerging technologies/trends.

Preparing your manuscript

Title page

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of Title page, abstract and key words.

Main text

This should contain the body of the article, and may also be broken into subsections with short, informative headings.

Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses should follow the standard reporting format (PRISMA)

Conclusions

This should state clearly the main conclusions and provide an explanation of the importance and relevance of the case, data, opinion, database, technology or software reported.

References

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of references.

Commentary

Criteria

Commentaries are short, narrowly focused articles of contemporary interest.

It is a discussion of an article or trial that was recently published, and that is interesting enough to warrant further comment or explanation. This type of commentary discusses specific issues within a subject area rather than the whole field, explains the implications of the article and puts it in context. Opinions are welcome as long as they are factually based.

Preparing your manuscript

Title page page

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of Title page, abstract and key words.

Main text

This should contain the body of the article, and may also be broken into subsections with short, informative headings.

Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses should follow the standard reporting format (PRISMA)

Conclusions

This should state clearly the main conclusions and provide an explanation of the importance and relevance of the case, data, opinion, database, technology or software reported.

References

Main text

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of references.

Commentary

Criteria

Commentaries are short, narrowly focused articles of contemporary interest.

It is a discussion of an article or trial that was recently published, and that is interesting enough to warrant further comment or explanation. This type of commentary discusses specific issues within a subject area rather than the whole field, explains the implications of the article and puts it in context. Opinions are welcome as long as they are factually based.

Preparing your manuscript

Title page page

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of Title page, abstract and key words.

Background

The Background section should explain the background to the article, its aims, a summary of a search of the existing literature and the issue under discussion.

Main text

This should contain the body of the article, and may also be broken into subsections with short, informative headings.

Conclusions

This should state clearly the main conclusions and include an explanation of their relevance or importance to the field.

References

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of references. A maximum of ten articles may be included in the references.

Editorial

Criteria

Editorials are short, narrowly focused articles of contemporary interest that covers an aspect of an issue that is relevant to the journal's scope.

Preparing your manuscript

Title page

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of Title page, abstract and key words.

Background

The Background section should explain the background to the article, its aims, a summary of a search of the existing literature and the issue under discussion.

Main text

This should contain the body of the article, and may also be broken into subsections with short, informative headings.

Conclusions

This should state clearly the main conclusions and include an explanation of their relevance or importance to the field.

References

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of references. A maximum of ten articles may be included in the references.

Mini Review

Criteria

Mini Reviews are concise articles aiming to provide an insight into timely and relevant topics. The aim of these is to act as a 'state-of-the-art' overview of key areas for the journal's readers.

These should cover three aspects - the basis of the subject, the research undertaken so far, and what crucial next steps need to be taken.

Mini Reviews should consist of a maximum of 1500 words (excluding references, but including a short summary abstract), and one figure illustrating an important aspect of the topic in question.

Preparing your manuscript

Title page

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of Title page, abstract and key words.

Main text

This should contain the body of the article, and may also be broken into subsections with short, informative headings.

Brief Historical Perspective

Provide readers with an overview of the most significant developments in the field, illustrated by classical experiments and published papers. It provides a basis for readers to understand the past, interpret the present, and project the future of research in that field.

Summary of the established principles

Provide a short summary of the scientific concepts/ principles that have been well established and documented. These principles and mechanisms are the foundations of research and are essential for the understanding of complex mechanisms and data.

Current state of the art

Provide an overview of the current state of each research area, including a critical appraisal of the most recent findings and technological developments, how these might drive the field forward, and how novel data expands our understanding.

Highlight of future directions

In the light of current developments, this aspect provides future directions to be explored, how to best integrate knowledge from different fields, and how a ground-breaking, multidisciplinary approach to each field of research could shed light on unanswered questions.

Conclusions

This should state clearly the main conclusions and provide an explanation of the importance and relevance of the case, data, opinion, database, technology or software reported.

References

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of references. A maximum of fifteen articles may be included in the references.

Case report

Criteria

These are reports focusing on educational methodologies, interventions, initiatives, policies, application of adult learning theory, and the like in health professions education. These reports are not to be confused with clinical case reports that are meant to be educational.

Title page

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of Title page, abstract and key words.

Main text

The report should start with evidence of the need and gap based on review of the literature. Next, the educational intervention may be outlined; Study data are then presented along with a narrative of what happened during the study, from start to finish. This text should include how the intervention ran, observation of learning processes, barriers, modifications, and changes that were required and the reaction to them, educational outcomes, and final impact and scalability. Additionally, inclusion of student perspectives should be considered.

Lessons learned along the way, propositions about how and why the outcomes came to be, and questions raised with novel perspectives should be proposed and critically argued in the conclusion.

Mentioning limitations and the potential existence of multiple explanations, unsettled ambiguities, and researcher bias is also important.

References

Follow the general instructions given for the preparation of references. A maximum of fifteen articles may be included in the references.