Guide for Authors

Tutorial Videos 

 Author Guide Video

 Reviewer Guide Video

 Editor Guide Video 

 

Introduction:

The Egyptian Journal of Community Medicine (EJCM) is a peer-reviewed open access journal. The journal covers a wide spectrum of research topics addressing current public health issues and challenges in Egypt and other Middle Eastern and African countries that share similar public health challenges. EJCM particularly welcomes research that address local and regional public health concerns and those recommending appropriate public health solutions/programs/policies tailored to under-resource setting. Manuscripts are judged on the interest and importance of the topic, intellectual and scientific strength, clarity of presentation and relevance to Journal readers. Among the other factors considered is the strength of the paper compared with that of other papers under review.

Aims and Scope:

EJCM welcomes research in the following topic:  

  • Community-based studies
  • Epidemiology and prevention of chronic diseases
  • Prevention and control of infectious disease
  • Prevention and control of healthcare-associated infections
  • Morbidity, mortality, and financial impacts of diseases
  • Surveillance and monitoring of diseases
  • Evaluation of public health services, interventions, and programs
  • Disparities in health, public health services, and healthcare services
  • Administration and quality of public health and healthcare services
  • Epidemiology and prevention of injury and violence
  • Reproductive health, maternal and child health, and mental health
  • Environmental health, and food Safety
  • Nutrition epidemiology and health promotion
  • Health communication and information technology
  • Health policy making
  • Public health governance, audit and quality

 

Submission Process

All manuscripts must be submitted on-line through the website https://ejcm.journals.ekb.eg/. First time users will have to register at this site. Registration is free but mandatory. Registered authors can keep track of their articles after logging into the site using their username and password.  

During primary submission, the corresponding author, on behave of other co-authors, should sign the conflict of interest form and declarations and copyright form.

Review Process 

A manuscript will be reviewed for possible publication with the understanding that it is being submitted exclusively to EJCM and has not been published, simultaneously submitted, or accepted for publication elsewhere. 

Editor will screen all submitted manuscripts initially for suitability for formal review. Manuscripts with insufficient originality, serious scientific or technical flaws, irrelevant to the journal readers or lack of a significant message will be rejected at this stage. 

Manuscripts that are found suitable for publication will be sent to at least two peer reviewers. During submission, the author is requested to provide names of two qualified reviewers who have had experience in the subject of the submitted manuscript. In case two independent reviewers cannot be secured, one reviewer and one editor will be required before acceptance/rejection. The reviewers should not be affiliated with the same institutes of the authors. 

The journal follows a double-blind review process; both reviewers and authors are unaware of each other’s identity. Every manuscript is also assigned to a member of the editorial team, who based on the comments from the reviewers takes a final decision on the manuscript. The comments and suggestions (acceptance/ rejection/ amendments in manuscript) received from reviewers are conveyed to the corresponding author. 

The author is requested to provide a point by point response to reviewers’ comments and submit a revised version of the manuscript. In addition, they are expected to mark the changes as yellow highlighted in the article. This process is repeated till reviewers and editors are satisfied with the manuscript. The revised version of the manuscript should be submitted online in a manner similar to that used for submission of the manuscript for the first time. However, there is no need to submit the “Title page/covering letter” file while submitting a revised version. 

The Editor is responsible for the final decision regarding acceptance or rejection of articles. The Editor's decision is final. Editors are not involved in decisions about papers which they have written themselves or have been written by family members or colleagues or which relate to products or services in which the editor has an interest. Any such submission is subject to all of the journal's usual procedures, with peer review handled independently of the relevant editor and their research groups 

Publication process 

Copy editing (making sure a text is clear, readable, and error free) of English language, grammar, punctuation, and format is the sole responsibility of authors of accepted manuscripts. The corresponding author should provide official documents of copy editing after acceptance and before manuscript proof. 

Manuscript proof will be sent (by production editor) to the corresponding author for final revision and correction. The main focus will be confirming the author names and affiliations, ensuring that additional minor copyediting (by production editor) did not change the author message, confirming final places of tables and figures, and ensuring complete references as per journal style. The correct proof should be returned to the journal with 72 hours. The whole process of submission of the manuscript to final decision and sending and receiving proofs will be completed online. 

Processing and publication charges 

Article processing charge: 

Egyptian authors: As an open access journal, the EJCM charges a fee after acceptance. The manuscript publication processing fee is 2500 Egyptian pounds for the first ten pages of the article (in its final format) and 200 Egyptian pounds per extra page added.  

Non-Egyptians from authors outside Egypt the fee is 250 US Dollars. Publication fees are paid by bank transfer to: 

Bank name: National Bank of Egypt – Al-Azhar University Branch 

Beneficiary: Egyptian Association of Community Medicine 

Account number: 1433071102888402025

IBAN: EG660003014330711028884020250

 Note: Publication fees are waived in case of invited editorials or reviews 

Types of Manuscript 

Original articles should not exceed 3500 words in length. The word count is from the introduction through to the end of the conclusion/discussion and does not include abstract, tables, figures, acknowledgements or reference list. Abstract should be structured and not exceeding 250 words. Up to 4 tables/figures are allowed. There should be no more than 30 references

Reviews on topics of importance to readers of diverse interest areas. These should be comprehensive, fully referenced and up to date. The word count should not exceed 4000 words in length for the main part of the manuscript from introduction to conclusion/discussion. Abstract should be structured and not exceeding 250 words. Up to 4 tables/figures are allowed. There should be no more than 50 references. If you planning to write a review, it may be wise to send a pre-submission enquiry letter to the journal editor to propose your Review manuscript before you spend time writing it 

Short Communications brief reports of unusual or preliminary findings. Maximum length 800 words, two tables or figures and a maximum of 10 references. 

Correspondence/Letter to the Editor relating to papers recently published in the Journal, or containing brief reports of unusual or preliminary findings. Maximum length 400 words, one table or figure and a maximum of 10 references.

Case Reports must be carefully documented and must be of importance because they illustrate or describe unusual features or have important therapeutic implications. Maximum length 1200 words and a maximum of 1 table or figure. Case reports require an abstract (100 words), but this does not need to be a structured abstract and should include no more than 15 references. 

Invited editorial or review: This type of manuscript is reserved for experts in the field who have made important contributions to a specific topic in recent years. Author will be invited by Editor-in-Chief to write an invited editorial or review for the EJCM. It will follow the instructions for reviews and short communications described above. Individuals may however send a proposal (one-page maximum) for an invited editorial or review to the Editor-in-Chief for consideration. 

Parts of manuscript:

The submitted manuscripts that are not as per the “Instructions to Authors” would be returned to the authors for technical correction, before they undergo editorial/ peer-review. Generally, the manuscript should be submitted in the form of separate files: 

1-    Title Page and covering letter 

A copy of the standard Title Page and covering letter can be downloaded. It is one file that should include: 

The type of manuscript: original article, review article, Letter to editor, etc. 

Title: Concise and informative. Titles are often used in information-retrieval systems. Avoid abbreviations and formulae where possible. 

Author names and affiliations: Please clearly indicate the first name(s) and family/last name(s) of each author, with highest academic degrees. Present the authors' affiliation addresses (where the actual work was done and credited) below the names. Indicate all affiliations with a lower-case superscript letter immediately after the author's name. All information which can reveal authors identity should be here. Use word doc files. Do not zip the files. 

Statistics: The total word counts separately for abstract and for the text (excluding the abstract, tables, figures, and references). Number of tables, figures, references. 

Corresponding author: The name, address, e-mail, and telephone number of the corresponding author, who is responsible for communicating with the other authors about revisions and final approval of the proofs. Ensure that the e-mail address and contact details are kept up to date. 

Ethical approval: The name of institution providing ethical approval and its number 

Funding source: List funding source(s) if any. Add grant number if applicable. If no funding is received, state “The authors received no financial support related to this research” 

Registration number: Only in case of a clinical trial (name of the registry and its URL) 

Conflict of interest: You should add one of these 2 statements (1) All authors have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper or (2) One or more of the authors have the following financial interests/personal relationships, which may be considered as potential competing interests. The form should be uploaded separately 

Acknowledgement (optional): One or more statements should specify 1) contributions that need acknowledging but do not justify authorship, such as general support by a departmental chair; 2) technical help (e.g., providing language help, writing assistance or proofreading the article, etc.); and 3) financial and material support, which should specify the nature of the support. This should be included in the title page of the manuscript and not in the main article file. 

Previous meeting publication:  Only if the abstract of the manuscript was presented at a meeting or published in the meeting proceeding, name the meeting name, place, and date. If not presented before, state “Not applicable” 

Covering letter (mandatory): The corresponding author on behalf of all other authors should declare agreement with publication ethics stated on the EJCM web site. All authors have made substantial contributions to the submitted work. All authors have read and approved the current submitted version. The work is original and it has been neither published elsewhere nor submitted for publication simultaneously. If requested by the editors, we will provide the data on which the manuscript was based. The form should be uploaded separately. 

Highlights (optional): They help increase the discoverability of your article via search engines. They consist of a short collection of bullet points that capture the novel results of your research as well as new methods that were used during the study (if any). They should be 3 to 5 bullet points (maximum 85 characters, including spaces, per bullet point). They will be shown on the top of the HTML version but not the PDF version 

Suggested reviewers:

Authors should provide a list of 3 potential reviewers (name, e-mail and affiliation) who are knowledgeable in the subject matter, have no conflict of interest, and are likely to agree to review the manuscript. All suggested reviewers should be from outside your institution. 

Non-Preferred Reviewers:
It is optional. The author can give up to 3 reviewers who are considered as non-preferred reviewers, due to conflict of interest or personal conflicts 

2-    Text file: 

Criteria: 

  • The manuscript must not contain any mention of the authors' names or initials or the institution at which the study was done or acknowledgements.
  • Page headers/running title can include the title but not the authors' names.
  • Manuscripts not in compliance with the Journal's blinding policy will be returned to the corresponding author.
  • The main text of the article, beginning from Abstract till References (including tables) should be in this file.
  • Use word doc files. Do not zip the files.
  • The pages and lines should be numbered consecutively, beginning with the first page of the blinded article file.
  • Manuscript should be double space with font times new Romans size 12.  

Content: 

Abstract: A structured abstract no more than 250 words must be provided as part of each manuscript, except Letter to the editor. Short communication and case report can have an unstructured abstract of up to 100 words. The structured abstract should consist of four paragraphs, with the following headings: Background (ending with objectives), methods, results, conclusions. The abstract should not refer to footnotes or references.

Keywords: Immediately after the abstract, provide a maximum of six keywords, avoiding general and plural terms and multiple concepts (avoid, for example, 'and', 'of'). Be sparing with abbreviations: only abbreviations firmly established in the field may be used. 

Sections: This include introduction (one page), methods (2 pages), results (2 pages), and discussion (2-3 pages ending with conclusions). The maximum word count should not exceed 3500 in original articles, 4000 in review articles, 800 in short communications, 400 in correspondence/letter to the editor, and 1200 in case reports. Typical topics of the methods include study design, setting, population and eligibility, sample size calculation, sampling technique, data collection tool and validation, definition of exposure and outcomes, and statistical analysis. When data are summarized in the results section, give numeric results not only as derivatives (for example, percentages) but also as the absolute numbers from which the derivatives were calculated, and specify the statistical methods used to analyze them. 

References: There should be no more than 30 references in original articles, 50 in review articles, 10 in short communications, 10 in correspondence/letter to the editor, and 15 in case reports. References should be numbered consecutively in the order in which they are first mentioned in the text (not in alphabetic order). Identify references in text, tables, and legends by Arabic numerals in superscript after the punctuation marks. Please ensure that every reference cited in the text is also present in the reference list (and vice versa). References cited only in tables or figure legends should be numbered in accordance with the sequence established by the first identification in the text of the particular table or figure. Unpublished results and personal communications are not recommended in the reference list, but may be mentioned in the text. 

Reference styles: 

Journal article with up to six authors: List all authors 

Afifi IK, Labah EA and Ayad KM. Surgical site infections after elective general surgery Tanta university hospital: rate, risk factors and microbiological profile Egyptian. J. Med. Microbiol. 2009;18:61-72 

Journal article with more than six authors: List the first six authors followed by et al. 

Nozari Y, Hashemlu A, Hatmi ZN, Sheikhvatan M, Iravani A, Bazdar A, et al. Outcome of coronary artery bypass grafting in patients without major risk factors and patients with atleast one major risk factor for coronary artery disease. Indian J Med Sci 2007;61:547-54
Books with personal author(s): 

Ringsven MK, Bond D. Gerontology and leadership skills for nurses. 2nd ed. Albany (NY): Delmar Publishers; 1996. 

Books with Editor(s), compiler(s) as author: 

Norman IJ, Redfern SJ, editors. Mental health care for elderly people. New York: Churchill Livingstone; 1996. 

Book chapter: 

Phillips SJ, Whisnant JP. Hypertension and stroke. In: Laragh JH, Brenner BM, editors. Hypertension: pathophysiology, diagnosis, and management. 2nd ed. NewYork: Raven Press; 1995. pp. 465-78. Electronic Sources as reference 

Web site 

European Committee on Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing (EUCAST). Breakpoint tables for interpretation of MICs and zone diameters. Available at: https:// 

Reference to a dataset: 

Dataset 

[dataset] Oguro M, Imahiro S, Saito S, Nakashizuka T. Mortality data for Japanese oak wilt disease and surrounding forest compositions, Mendeley Data, v1; 2015. https://doi.org/10.17632/xwj98nb39r.1.eucast.org/clinical_breakpoints/. Accessed May 22, 2021 

Tables: Each table must be presented at the end of the manuscript on a separate page and numbered in order of appearance in the text. Tables should be self-explanatory and should not duplicate textual material. The title of the table must appear after the number. Each table must include appropriate headings. Units of measurement must be clearly indicated.  Footnotes, when necessary, must be identified by letters. Explain in footnotes all non-standard abbreviations that are used in each table.For footnotes use the following symbols, in this sequence: *, †, ‡, §, ||,¶ , **, ††, ‡‡. A table can include references if appropriate. Restrict tables to those needed to explain the argument of the paper and to assess its support. Use graphs as an alternative to tables with many entries; do not duplicate data in graphs and tables. Tables are placed in the text file after references.Place explanatory matter in footnotes, not in the heading.

Figure legends: Ensure that each figure/image has a legend that is not attached to the figure/image. A legend should comprise a brief title (not on the figure itself) and a description or note. Keep text in the figures/images themselves to a minimum. When symbols, arrows, numbers, or letters are used to identify parts of the figure/image, identify and explain each one in the legend. Legends for the figures/images should be included at the very end of the article file (after references and tables) 

3-    Figures/Images: 

Submit good quality color figures/images. Keep up to 1800 x 1200 pixels or 5-6 inches). Images can be submitted as JPEG or TIFF files. Do not zip the files. Submit each figure/image as a separate file. The file size should not exceed 4 MB in size while uploading. Legends for the figures/images should be included at the very end of the article file (after references and tables). Figures should be numbered consecutively according to the order in which they have been first cited in the text. Labels, numbers, and symbols should be clear and of uniform size. The lettering for figures should be large enough to be legible after reduction to fit the width of a printed column. 

4-    Conflict of interest form 

All authors must disclose any financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that could inappropriately influence (bias) their work. Examples of potential conflicts of interest include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. The corresponding author, on behave of other co-authors, should sign the conflict of interest form and upload to the submission system.  If there are no interests to declare, please choose the first option in the template. 

5-    Declarations and copyright form 

The corresponding author, on behave of other co-authors, should declare agreement with publication ethics stated on the EJCM website, including but not limited to ethics related to human or animal studies, obtaining informed consent if applicable, declaring any conflict of interest, declaring funding source (s), authorship criteria, rules of changes to authorship, retraction/withdrawal of a manuscript, and registration and reporting of clinical trials if applicable. The article is not under consideration for publication with any other journal. Neither this manuscript nor one with substantially similar content under our authorship has been published. If requested by the editors, we will provide the data or will cooperate fully in obtaining and providing the data on which the manuscript was based. For the copyright, authors will be allowed to retain ownership of the copyright for their articles, but they permit anyone unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited under EJCM. The corresponding author, on behave of other co-authors, should sign the declarations and copyright form and upload to the submission system. 

Please review other topics of the Publication Ethics for more information about the ethics related to human or animal studies, obtaining informed consent if applicable, declaring any conflict of interest, declaring funding source (s), authorship criteria, rules of changes to authorship, retraction/withdrawal of a manuscript, and registration and reporting of clinical trials if applicable 

6-    Supplementary materials 

It can be placed in a separate file where it will be accessible but will not interrupt the flow of the text. It will be only published in the electronic version of the journal. 

7-    Graphical abstract

Although a graphical abstract is optional, its use is encouraged as it draws more attention to the online article. The graphical abstract should summarize the contents of the article in a concise, pictorial form designed to capture the attention of a wide readership. Graphical abstracts should be submitted as a separate file in the online submission system. It has the same criteria as figure/image shown above.