Submissions

Author Guidelines

INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS

Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ) is a scientific, open-access, online-only periodical published in accordance with independent, unbiased, and double-blinded peer-review principles. The journal is published quarterly in January, April, July, and October. The publication language of the journal is American English. 

The journal aims to bridge the gap between basic and clinical application by publishing high-quality research in the medical field. The journal's scope includes but is not limited to clinical practice, translational medicine, medical and health advances, public health, global health, policy, and general topics of interest to the biomedical and sociomedical professional communities. Somalia Türkiye Medical Journal accepts research articles, reviews, brief reports, editorials, letters to editors, and case reports. The journal's target audience includes specialists, residents, and scientists in medicine and related disciplines.

EDITORIAL AND PUBLICATION PROCESS

The editorial and publication processes of the journal are shaped in accordance with the guidelines of the International Council of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), the Council of Science Editors (CSE), the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the European Association of Science Editors (EASE), and National Information Standards Organization (NISO). The journal conforms to the Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing (doaj.org/bestpractice).

Originality, high scientific quality, and citation potential are the most important criteria for a manuscript to be accepted for publication. Manuscripts submitted for evaluation should not have been previously presented or already published in an electronic or printed medium. The journal should be informed of manuscripts that have been submitted to another journal for evaluation and rejected for publication. Manuscripts that have been presented in a conference meeting should be submitted with detailed information on the organization, including the name, date, and location of the conference.

PEER REVIEW PROCESS

Manuscripts submitted to Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ) will go through a double-blind peer-review process. Each submission will be reviewed by at least two external, independent peer reviewers who are experts in their fields in order to ensure an unbiased evaluation process. The Editor-in-Chief is the final authority in the decision-making process for all submissions.

ETHICAL GUIDELINES

An approval of research protocols by the Ethics Review Board in accordance with international agreements (The World Medical Association’s Declaration of Helsinki “Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects amended in October 2013, www.wma.net) is required for experimental, clinical, and drug studies. If required, Ethics Review Board reports, or an equivalent official document will be requested from the authors. Submissions which do not have ethical approval will be reviewed according to the COPE’s Research, Audit and Service Evaluations guidelines. Such manuscripts can be rejected after editorial review due to the lack of ethics committee approval.

For manuscripts concerning experimental research on humans, a statement should be included that written informed consent of patients and volunteers was obtained following a detailed explanation of the procedures that they may undergo. It is the authors’ responsibility to protect the patients’ anonymity carefully. For photographs that may reveal the identity of the patients, signed releases of the patient or their legal representative should be enclosed, and the use for academic publication approval must be provided.

For studies carried out on animals, an approval research protocols by the Ethics Review Board in accordance with international agreements (Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals, 8th edition, 2011" and/or International Guiding Principles for Biomedical Research Involving Animals, 2012) is required. Also, the measures taken to prevent pain and suffering of the animals should be stated clearly in such studies.

Information on patient consent, the name of the Ethics Review Board, and the Ethics Review Board approval number and date should also be stated in the Methods section of the manuscript.

The author should make sure that this information is also displayed in the main text of the manuscript under the heading of "Ethical Approval" before the reference list.

AUTHORSHIP

Each researcher listed as an author should fulfill the authorship criteria recommended by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE - www.icmje.org). The ICMJE recommends that authorship is based on the following four criteria:

1. Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work;
2. Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content;
3. Final approval of the version to be published;
4. Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work, including data, are appropriately searched.

In addition to being accountable for the parts of the work a corresponding author has done, he/she should be able to identify which co-authors are responsible for specific other parts of the work. Also, the corresponding author should have confidence in the integrity of the contributions of their co-authors. All those designated as authors should meet all four criteria for authorship, and all who meet the four criteria should be identified as authors.

CHANGE OF AUTHORSHIP

Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ) reviews the authorship according to the author’s declaration on the Title Page. Thus it is the corresponding author's responsibility to send the final order of the complete author names. Requests in the change of authorship (e.g. removal/addition of the authors, change in the order, etc.) after submission are subject to editorial approval. Change of authorship requests should be submitted to the Editorial Office with an official letter stating the reasons for the change. The letter must be signed by all authors and include their approval of the change in authorship. If the request is approved by the Editorial Office, authors need to submit a new Copyright Agreement Form according to the final order list.

Declaration of Interest

Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ) requires and encourages the authors to disclose any existing or potential conflicts of interest, including financial, consultant, and institutional, that might lead to potential bias or a conflict of interest. Any financial grants or other support received for a submitted study from individuals or institutions should be disclosed to the Editorial Office. To disclose a potential conflict of interest, the ICMJE Potential Conflict of Interest Disclosure Form should be filled in and submitted by the contributing author. The journal’s Editorial Board resolves cases of a potential conflict of interest of the authors within the scope of COPE and ICMJE guidelines.

If there are no conflicts of interest, the authors should make sure that they write the statement "The authors declare no conflicts of interest" under the heading of "Conflicts of Interest" before the references and the "Ethical Approval" and "Funding" subtitles.

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ) requires each submission to be accompanied by a Copyright Agreement and Acknowledgement of Authorship form. By signing this form, authors retain the copyright of their work and agree that the article, if accepted for publication by the Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ), will be licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) 4.0 International License, which permits third parties to share and adapt the content for non-commercial purposes by giving the appropriate credit to the original work. When using previously published content, including figures, tables, or any other material in both print and electronic formats, authors must obtain permission from the copyright holder. Legal and financial liabilities in this regard belong to the author(s).

The copyright form can be downloaded using this link  Download

Disclaimer

Statements or opinions expressed in the manuscripts published in the Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ) reflect the views of the researchers/ authors and not the opinions of the editors, the editorial board, or the publisher; the editors, the editorial board, and the publisher disclaim any responsibility or liability for such materials. The final responsibility regarding the published content rests with the authors.

Manuscript Preparation

The manuscripts should be prepared in accordance with ICMJE-Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals (Updated May 2022 - https://www.icmje.org/recommendations/). Authors are required to prepare manuscripts in accordance with the CONSORT guidelines for randomized research studies, STROBE guidelines for observational original research studies, STARD guidelines for studies on diagnostic accuracy, PRISMA guidelines for systematic reviews and meta-analysis, ARRIVE guidelines for experimental animal studies, and TREND guidelines for non-randomized public behavior. The style of the manuscripts should be prepared according to the National Library of Medicine (NLM) style.

Manuscripts can only be submitted through the journal’s online manuscript submission and evaluation system, available at https://www.stmedj.com/index.php/STMJ/about/submissions. Manuscripts submitted via any other medium and submissions by anyone other than one of the authors will not be evaluated. Manuscripts submitted to the journal will first go through a technical evaluation process where the editorial office staff will ensure that the manuscript has been prepared and submitted in accordance with the journal’s guidelines. Submissions that do not conform to the journal’s guidelines will be returned to the submitting author for technical revision.

The authors can review the last issue of the journal and select an appropriate manuscript to use as a template. This approach will decrease the risk of return of the manuscript to the author simply due to violance of the journal's instructions regarding manuscript preparation. 

Authors should never start a sentence with a number. In the case that they have to start the sentence with a number, they should write the number verbally: Thirty-eight patients underwent cholecystectomy.

Authors should use italic  format while writing the sub-subtitles such as "Statistical analysis".

Use of English grammer checking softwares such as Grammarly are strongly encouraged. 

The corresponding author is responsible for the correctness of the references and copyright issues. Please avoid copying visual material from previously published material such as articles, case reports or medical books without written consent from the author/publisher. 

The order of subtitles of the main manuscript should be as follows:

Abstract, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Conclusion, Conflicts of Interest*, Funding*, Ethical Approval*, References.

*For the case reports these three subtitles should be replaced by the subtitle "Informed consent". Also, there should be the subtitle "Case presentation" instead of the "materials and methods" and the "results" subtitles.

Language

The publication language of the Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ) is English. Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ) encourages authors to have their manuscripts gone through a thorough language proofing/editing process before submission for faster evaluation.

Authors also are required to submit the following:

Copyright Agreement and Acknowledgement of Authorship Form.

Preparation of the Manuscript Title Page

A separate title page should be submitted with all submissions. This page should include:

• The full title of the manuscript as well as a short title (running head) of no more than 50 characters,
• Name(s), affiliations, and ORCIDs of the author(s),
• Grant information and detailed information on the other sources of funding,
• Name, address, and email address of the corresponding author,
• Acknowledgment of the individuals who contributed to the preparation of the manuscript but who did not fulfill the authorship

Abstract

An abstract should be submitted with all submissions except for Letters to the Editor. The abstract of Research Articles should be structured with subheadings (Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, and Conclusion). The abstract should not be less than 250 words and should not exceed 400 words.

The abstract should be written as a compact structured paragraph, so do not skip to the following line while passing from one subtitle to the another.

Keywords

Each submission must be accompanied by a minimum of four to a maximum of six keywords for subject indexing. The keywords should be listed in full without abbreviations. There should be a semicolon (;) between all keywords and all keywords should start with a capital (upper case) letter. The keywords can be selected from the National Library of Medicine, Medical Subject Headings database (https://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/MBrowser.html).

• Manuscript Types

Primary Data Research Papers

This is the most important type of manuscript since it provides new information based on original primary data research. Acceptance of primary data manuscripts will be based on the originality and importance of the study. The main text of original articles should be structured with an Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion.

Reporting Statistical Analysis

Statistical analyses to support results and conclusions are necessary. Statistical analyses must be conducted in accordance with international statistical reporting standards (Altman DG, Gore SM, Gardner MJ, Pocock SJ. Statistical guidelines for contributors to medical journals. Br Med J (Clin Res Ed). 1983 May 7;286(6376):1489-93. doi: 10.1136/bmj.286.6376.1489). Information on statistical analyses should be provided with a separate subheading under the Methods section, and the statistical software that was used during the process must be specified. Values for reporting statistical data, such as correlation coefficients, Chronbach’s alphas, and p values, should be presented and rounded appropriately. P values should be expressed to 2 digits to the right of the decimal point unless the first 2 digits are zeros, in which case 3 digits to the right of the decimal place should be provided (e.g., instead of p<0.01, report as p=0.002). However, values close to 0.05 may be reported to 3 decimal places (e.g., p=0.053). P values less than 0.001 should be designated as p<0.001 rather than exact values (e.g., p=0.000006).

Units mentioned in primary data research articles should be reported in accordance with the International System of Units (SI).

Both at the results section of the manuscript and tables and figures, there should be no space between the number and the "%" sign: 56%

There should be one space between the number and brackets: 87 (43%)

There should be no space between the "p" sign and the "<" or ">" signs: p<0.05 or p>0.05

All abbreviations used in the tables or figures should be explained in the legend even if they have been used and explained in the text before their use in the table or the figure.

The text should not fully duplicate the content of the tables; instead it should emphasize the important points. 

Editorial Papers

Invited brief editorials on selected articles are published in the Somalia Turkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ). Editorials should not be longer than 1000 words excluding references. Editorials aim to provide brief critical updates by experts with high reputations. Authors can be selected and invited by the journal to provide such papers. Abstract, Keywords, Tables, and Figures are not included.

Brief Reports

Brief reports should consist of focused (or highly innovative preliminary) reports of research in a clinical field. They may also be suitable for presenting research that extends previously published research, including reporting additional data and confirmatory results in other settings, as well as negative results. Brief Reports should be no more than 1500 words, up to two tables, and 20 references. These articles should contain a structured abstract with no more than 250 words.

Review Papers

Reviews prepared by researchers who have extensive publications in their field are welcomed. Reviews should describe, discuss, and evaluate the current level of knowledge and unmet needs of a topic in research and clinical practice and should include implications for future studies. Review papers should include an “Introduction” and a “Conclusion” section.

Letter to the Editor

Letters to the Editors discuss important parts, overlooked aspects, or lacking parts of a previously published article. Articles on subjects within the scope of the journal that might attract the attention of the readers, particularly crucial and seminal topics, may be submitted in this form. Abstract, Keywords, Tables, and Figures are not included.

Case Reports 

Reports on rare cases or conditions that constitute challenges in diagnosis and treatment, those offering new therapies or revealing knowledge not included in the current literature, and adverse events are accepted for publication. The text should include Introduction, Case Presentation, and Discussion with an unstructured abstract. Please check Table 1 for the limitations of Case Reports.

Tables

Tables should be included in the main document, and presented after the reference list, and they should be numbered consecutively in the order they are referred to within the main text. A descriptive title must be placed above the tables. Abbreviations used in the tables should be defined below the tables by footnotes (even if they are defined within the main text). Data presented in the tables should not be a repetition of the data presented within the main text.

Sample table title:

Table 2. Demographic features of the study participants

Figures and Figure legends

Figures, graphics, and photographs should be submitted as separate files (in TIFF, PNG, or JPEG format) through the submission system. The files should not be embedded in an MS Word document or the main document. Do not write separate legends for the parts of a compound figure. In both legends and text, spell out the full word "Figure" like Figure 1 or Figure 2 instead. Use upper case or lower case labels for figure citations. Like the rest of the submission, the figures should also be blind. Any information within the images that may indicate an individual or institution should be blinded. The minimum resolution of each submitted figure should be 300 DPI, roughly 1000 pixels. Figure legends should be listed at the end of the main text.

All abbreviations used in the manuscript should be defined at first use, both in the abstract and in the main text. The abbreviation should be provided in parentheses following the definition. When a drug, product, hardware, or software program is mentioned within the main text, product information, including the name of the product, the producer of the product, and the city and country of the company, should be provided in parentheses in the following format: "Philips MRI scanners (Philips Medical Systems, Amsterdam, Netherlands)". All references, tables, and figures should be referred to within the main text, and they should be numbered consecutively in the order they are referred to within the main text. Limitations and shortcomings of original research papers should be mentioned in the Discussion section before the conclusion paragraph.

Sample figure legend:

Figure 1. The histopathological micrograph demonstrating renal amyloidosis A. x10 magnification B. x100 magnification

References

Both citations in the text and the references must be prepared according to the National Library of Medicine (NLM) style. While citing publications, preference should be given to the latest, most up-to-date publications. Authors are responsible for the accuracy of references. In case of an ahead-of-print publication is cited, the DOI number should be provided. Journal titles should be abbreviated in accordance with the journal abbreviations in Index Medicus/MEDLINE/PubMed. The names of the six authors should be provided. If there are seven or more authors, the first three authors should be listed followed by "et al." In the main text of the manuscript, references should be cited in superscript after punctuation.

References are numbered consecutively in the order in which they are first mentioned in the text. Identify references in text, tables, and captions by bracketed numbers (1), and provide a list of references at the end of the article in numerical order starting from 1. Reuse the original number assigned to the reference each time a reference is repeated in the text. Insert the citation numbers at the relevant place in the text, inside any adjacent punctuation mark.

Examples:

Myopathy typically occurs in fewer than one in 10,000 patients on standard doses (1).

For this purpose, the NNs were widely used in structural inverse problems, damage identification, or parameter estimation, among many applications (14, 24-26).

Journal titles are abbreviated according to ISO 4. See http://www.issn.org/services/online-services/access-to-the-ltwa/. Journal title abbreviations should not include full points, except at the end of the title; see examples below. Do not abbreviate journal titles consisting of a single word.

References cited only in tables or figure captions should be numbered in accordance with the sequence established by the first identification in the text of the particular table or figure.

Reference Examples

Journal Article

Meneton P, Jeunemaitre X, de Wardener HE, et al. Links between dietary salt intake, renal salt handling, blood pressure, and cardiovascular diseases. Physiol Rev 2005;85:701–715.

Important notes: The authors should make sure that the journal name is given in the abbreviated and italic format, there is no dot between the journal name and the year of publication, only volume number is given (i.e., no issue number), and the page numbers are displayed in the extended format.

Books with a Single Author

Brown AF. Accident and emergency: diagnosis and management. 4th ed. New York (NY): Arnold; 2002.

Book Chapter

Sumner P, Mollon JD. Did primate trichromacy evolve for frugivory or folivory? In: Mollon JD, Pokorny J, Knoblauch K, editors. Normal and defective color vision. New York (NY): Oxford University Press; 2003.p. 21–30.

Conference Proceedings

Satoh K, Suzuki S, Matsunaga M, editors. Advances in brain research: cerebrovascular disorders and neurodegeneration. Proceedings of the 6th Hirosaki International Forum of Medical Science; 2002 Oct 15–16; Hirosaki, Japan. Amsterdam (Netherlands): Elsevier; 2003. (Excerpta Medica international congress series; 1251).

Thesis

Zhao C. Development of nanoelectrospray and application to protein research and drug discovery [dissertation]. Buffalo (NY): State University of New York at Buffalo; 2005.

Online

Grady D. Jump in doctor visits and deaths in flu season. New York Times [Internet]. 2008 Apr 18 [cited 2008 Dec 19]; Research:[about 4 screens]. Available from: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/18/health/research/18flu.html?scp=7&sq=f lu%20season&st=cse

Websites

StatePublicHealth.org [Internet]. Washington (DC): ASTHO; [cited 2007 Feb 23]. Available from: http://statepublichealth.org/

Web Pages

AMA: helping doctors help patients [Internet]. Chicago (IL): American Medical Association; c1995–2007. AMA launches exclusive partnership for medical professionals; 2007 Mar 26 [cited 2007 Mar 28]; [about 2 screens]. Available from: http://www.ama- assn.org/ama/pub/category/17469.html.

Revisions

When submitting a revised version of a paper, the author must submit a detailed “Response to the reviewers” that states point by point how each criticism raised by the reviewers has been covered and where it can be found (each reviewer’s comment, followed by the author’s reply and line numbers where the revisions have been made) as well as an annotated copy of the main document.

Revised manuscripts must be submitted within 21 days from the date of the decision letter. If the revised version of the manuscript is not submitted within the allocated time, the revision option may be canceled. If the submitting author(s) believe that additional time is required, they should request this extension before the initial 21-day period is over.

Accepted manuscripts are revised for grammar, typos, and format by the STMedJ Language Editor. Once the publication process of a manuscript is completed, a PDF proof of the accepted manuscript is sent to the corresponding author, and their publication approval is requested within 2 days of their receipt of the proof.

Publication Fee Policy

STMedJ does not charge any submission or article processing fees.

Open Access Statement

Somalia Türkiye Medical Journal (STMedJ) is an open-access publication, and the journal’s publication model is based on Budapest Access Initiative (BOAI) declaration. All published content is available online, free of charge, at http://www.stmedj.com. The journal’s content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) 4.0 International License, which permits third parties to share and adapt the content for non-commercial purposes by giving the appropriate credit to the original work.

Editor In Chief:

Asir Ereslan, MD

Address: Digfeer Street, Hodan District, Mogadishu, Somalia

Mobile: +252613357841

E-mail address: editor@stmedj.com

Webpage: www.stmedj.com