POLICIES
1. General Policy
"Kobe Journal of Medical Sciences"(Hereafter KJMS) is an online
journal. We online-publish original works in medical/biomedical sciences
and case reports written in English, after editorial review.
Contributors are responsible for the payment of all charges, including
processing fee and page charges.
Articles accepted for online-publication are posted on this web site ("CONTENTS" section) in PDF format.
Accepted articles are also indexed in "PubMed", where they provide links to the PDF documents as "free full-text" articles. Our publications can thus be viewed from anywhere in the world.
2. Manuscript submission guidelines
Please make sure that your manuscript follows the guidelines below:
(1) It is written in clear, concise and grammatical English.
Authors are strongly advised to have the manuscript proofread by a native
English speaker or a person who is well-experienced in writing English
manuscripts.
(2) The submission must be original, unpublished work that is not under
consideration for publication elsewhere.
(3) All authors must agree to submission of the manuscript and transferal of their respective copyright to KJMS.
(4) Submissions
must not contain any instances of plagiarism or fabrication. When using a
plagiarism checking software, it is necessary to submit proof of same. KJMS
does not assume responsibility of any instances of plagiarism or fabrication.
(5) When reporting on experiments on human subjects or animals, authors should
indicate in the manuscript whether the procedures followed were in accordance
with the ethical standards of the institutional and national guidelines.
(6) Off-label use of drugs, biologics or medical devices on human subjects
must be approved by the institutional review boards of all participating
institutions and be so stated in the manuscripts.
(7) Authors are expected to disclose any potential conflicts of interest.
(8) Authors are fully responsible for the contents of their submissions
and KJMS assumes no responsibility for said content.
(9) Submit articles in accordance with the regulations stated in "Format" section, in PDF format up to 2 MB as an e-mail attachment.
(10) Posting
of preprints to a preprint server, such as medRxiv and bioRxiv, is acceptable
provided that the following conditions are met:
@a. The preprint server is a not-for-profit service, and the server does not
hold the copyright of the article.
@b. Upon submission, use of the preprint server must be disclosed in a
cover letter. Be sure to include the digital object identifier (DOI).
@c. KJMS does not allow posting of either revised manuscripts responding
to peer-review comments, or the accepted final version to a preprint server.
(11) Using contents created via a generative AI as-is may be considered
"plagiarism" if a part or the entirety of a manuscript closely
resembles an existing work.
(12) Authors should suggest at least two and no more than five potential
reviewers.
(13) Even if the manuscript is initially rejected, the chief editor may,
at their discretion, invite the authors to resubmit, provided that all
reviewers' comments have been satisfactorily addressed. However, if the
revised manuscript is rejected again, further resubmissions will not be
accepted.
(14) Protocol papers are eligible for publication only for studies registered
on public clinical trial registries (e.g., ClinicalTrials.gov, jRCT, ISRCTN).
The Methods section must clearly state the clinical trial registration
number and the name of the registry. Additionally, a copy of the ethics
committee's approval certificate must be attached at the time of submission.
3. Copyright Transfer
The authors must submit a "Copyright Transfer Form" along with their manuscripts. Submission of the form to the Publisher
implies that the authors agree to the following conditions:
(1) If accepted for publication by KJMS, the same article cannot be contributed elsewhere without express written permission for
reproduction issued by the Editor-in-Chief of KJMS.
(2) The articles published in KJMS after July 1, 2024 are marked by the Creative
Commons (CC) License; the CC BY 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Under this term KJMS also retains copyright for all articles. Any user may reuse, share, or build upon the work in any medium, even
commercially, as long as the original source is properly credited, and
any changes are indicated.
4. Checklist
The authors must submit a "Checklist" which states whether the manuscript follows our guidelines. Please read "Notes on filling out the checklist".
5. Expenses
All accepted manuscripts will incur a processing fee of 35,000 yen in addition
to the page charges (10,000 yen per page). Please make the payment by bank
transfer only. Other means of payment such as credit card, personal check,
bank draft, or money order, etc. are not available.
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HOW TO SUBMIT MANUSCRIPTS
Please format your manuscripts BEFORE THE FIRST SUBMISSION, in accordance
with the following instructions. Manuscripts that do not conform to these guidelines are treated as "SPAM"
and ignored.
1. Format
Input text using Microsoft Word:
Manuscripts should be typed using Microsoft Word (hereafter "Word")
in the following format and made into PDF document. (Download sample document
>> [ Word ], [ PDF ] , or template >> [ for Word ] ).
Article size should be set to A4 (21.0 x 29.7cm) with 2.5cm margins on
all sides.
Use only "Times New Roman" font, except for "Symbol"
font for Greek characters.
Generally, articles should contain the following sections:
| Title, Authors' Names, Affiliations, and Keywords On the first page, state the title of the article, names of authors, name and address of the laboratory where the work was performed. Also, list 4-6 keywords. Indicate the corresponding author by an asterisk, and input their contact information (phone number, fax number [if applicable] and e-mail address) to the footer.Title page is not required. |
| Abstract Summarize the argument, preferably in less than 250 words, in bold letters on the first page. Avoid excessive abbreviations and references. Do not include diagrams. |
| Headers Input first author's name in the header section of every even-numbered page. Input running title to the paper's header for the 3rd and every subsequent odd page. The header section should contain up to 50 letters including spaces. |
| Introduction |
| Materials and Methods |
| Results (Clinical Case[s]) |
| Discussion |
| Acknowledgements |
| References References should be numbered consecutively in the order they are first mentioned in the text. Some examples are shown below: (1) Standard journal article List the first six authors. If there are more than six authors, list the
first six authors, followed by et al.: (2) Organization as author Diabetes Prevention Program Research Group. Hypertension,
insulin, and proinsulin in participants with impaired glucose tolerance.
Hypertension. 2002;40(5):679-86. (3) Chapter in a book Meltzer PS, Kallioniemi A, Trent JM. Chromosome alterations
in human solid tumors. In: Vogelstein B, Kinzler KW, editors. The genetic basis
of human cancer. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2002. p. 93-113. (4) Homepage/ Web site (Source: U.S. National Library of Medicine) Please refer to NLMfs gSamples of
Formatted References for Authors of Journal Articlesh page for further
information: |
| Figures and Tables Embed them into appropriate places instead of gathering them at the end. Entitle each, and add legends so that readers can understand their general meanings without referring to the text. |
Proofreading:
The final typescript will be posted as is.
We strongly advise having the manuscript proofread by a native English
speaker or a person who is well-experienced in writing English manuscripts.
Please take care of the following points as well:
| Title: Capitalize first letters of every word, except for articles (a, the) and prepositions. | ||||||||
| Author: Capitalize all letters. | ||||||||
| Affiliations: Capitalize appropriate place and institution names. | ||||||||
| Fonts: Use "Symbol" for Greek characters, superscript "o" and capital "C" for degree Celsius mark, and "special characters" pallet for plus, minus or other mathematical characters. | ||||||||
Headers and Footers: should be input as follows:
|
Make PDF document:
Make the Word document into a PDF document, using "Adobe Acrobat"
(See http://adobe.com/products/main.html ).
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2. Submit by e-mail
Authors are required to send the following documents as e-mail attachments.
Please virus-scan all the files immediately before sending. Submissions without any of these documents will not be
processed further.
e-mail address: journal@med.kobe-u.ac.jp
a. Cover Letter (Word document or PDF document)
State the following information about the manuscript and author(s):
* Title of the article
* Field of study (Epidemiology, Genetics etc.)
* Brief summary of the manuscript
* Contact information for the corresponding author
(complete mailing address [including street address, etc.], e-mail address, telephone number, and fax number [if applicable]).
If a cover letter lacks any of the above-mentioned information, we may
ask for re-submission before forwarding the manuscript to referees.
Contact information will be used only for necessary correspondence between
authors and the Publisher.
b. Manuscript (PDF document)
Make the entire manuscript into one PDF file. File size should preferably
be within 1 MB, and should not exceed 2 MB. Authors have the responsibility
to keep their original file.
If you have any questions, feel free to contact us at journal@med.kobe-u.ac.jp
c. Copyright Transfer Form (Word, PDF, JPEG, or other printable formats).
Please download the format "HERE". Detailed information is stated in POLICIES section
d. Checklist
Please download the format "HERE". Detailed information is stated in POLICIES section
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RECEPTION AND SUBSEQUENT PROCESSING
1. Reception
When the Publisher receives a manuscript, a reception notice is sent within
a week by e-mail to the corresponding author. It is the responsibility
of the corresponding author to inform the co-authors of the manuscript's
status throughout the submission and review process.
2. Review
We have adopted a 2-step review system, employing associate editors in
December, 2013.
The chief editor elects one associate editor depending on his/her expertise
and the associate editor selects two reviewers for the first step review.
In some cases the associate editor can seek opinions from additional specialists
in appropriate areas, and then will give some suggestions to the chief
editor on the suitability of a manuscript for publication recommending
that we accept, reject, or require modification. For the second step
review, the chief editor decides whether the manuscript requires a second
round review or not. The chief editor will make the final decision
on the manuscript.
All manuscripts are considered confidential, and reviewers will remain
unknown to the authors.
3. Modification
Reviewers' comments are sent to the corresponding author by e-mail.
When modification is requested, the authors have to either submit a modified
version or withdraw the manuscript. Submission of the 2nd and following
versions should consist of a PDF document of the modified manuscript, and
a letter listing point-by-point response to the reviewers' comments.
4. Acceptance
Acceptance will be notified by e-mail. For the final typescript, please
send a Word document of the final version to the Publisher.
Please note that any major changes after acceptance are subject to further
review and may delay publication.
5. Page-Charge Statement
All accepted manuscripts will incur a processing fee of 35,000 yen in addition
to the page charges (10,000 yen per page). (Due to the recent rise in publication
costs, the publication fee will be revised to 12,000 yen per page, along
with a processing fee of 40,000 yen per munuscript for submissions on or
after October 1, 2025. We apologize any inconvenience this change may cause.)
We accept payment in Japanese Yen (JPY) via bank transfer only.
Please note that other means of payment such as credit card, personal check,
bank draft, or money order, etc. are not available.
6. Online Publication
After the Publisher confirms the payment of the processing fee and page
charge, volume number, issue number and page numbers are added to the final
typescript, and it will appear on this web site in CONTENTS section.
Shortly after online publication, the contents appear in "PubMed"
as an "issue" of Kobe J. Med. Sci. and from "PubMed"
a link is provided to the free full-text-PDFs of all articles at our website.
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