Guidelines for Authors

Contributions are welcome from all qualified sources, including student authors. YJBM is dedicated to serving the interests of both authors and readers. No submission, publication, or page fees are levied. Manuscripts should be sent through Scholastica (see below), uploaded as Microsoft Word documents and figures, illustrations, and images in separate, high-resolution TIFF or JPEG format. Please contact the journal by e-mail at yjbm@yale.edu for questions not answered by the guidelines. For more detailed submission guidelines, please refer to the separate manuscript submission guidelines.

YJBM publishes the following types of articles:

• Original Research
  • Brief Communication
• Case Reports/Case Series
  
• Reviews
  • Mini-Reviews
• Perspectives
  • Brief/Opinion
• Analyses
• Symposia Pieces
• Book Reviews
• Profiles
• Interviews
• Other Submissions
• Focus Topic Articles
• Educational Scholarship Articles

For all submissions, once the article is submitted to YJBM, it is sent for pre-review to the editorial board and review committee. The article is discussed at the monthly YJBM board meeting, and the decision is made to accept the article for further review or reject it. If the article is accepted for further review, then depending on the type and content of the article, it may be sent to peer-reviewers who, along with the student reviewer, make the ultimate decision whether the article is suitable for YJBM. The author is offered the option of anonymous peer-review or double-anonymous peer-review. Three outcomes can occur at this point: rejection, conditional acceptance upon revision, and acceptance. Please note that if the article is conditionally accepted upon revision, it may undergo several rounds of revision until it meets YJBM publication standards. All revisions must be submitted using track changes in Microsoft Word.

For solicited submissions, the review and editorial process is handled by the Deputy Editor. The Deputy Editor coordinates reviews by peer-reviewers. Authors will also have the opportunity to suggest peer-reviewers to contact (up to 5) and peer-reviewers to avoid (up to 5). The author is also offered the option of anonymous peer-review or double-anonymous peer-review. The Deputy Editor will correspond with the author regarding the publication decision and suggested edits. The goal of this interaction is to develop the article into a well-rounded manuscript. If it does not meet YJBM standards by the required deadline for the issue for which it has been solicited, the article may not be published. Once the article is accepted for publication, it will be sent to the Editorial Coordinator for copy editing, formatting, and copyright requests. The article will be published either with the Focus Topic (solicited submissions) or in the next issue of YJBM (unsolicited submissions). Issues are published in March, June, September, and December.

YJBM manages all invited manuscripts through the online peer review platform Scholastica, a link to which is provided by the editors of the focus issue.

Once the article is submitted to YJBM, it is reviewed by the assigned editor(s) for quality and relevance. All submitted manuscripts are checked for plagiarism. Articles are discussed at the monthly YJBM board meeting and assessed by editors, who make the initial decision to send the article for peer review or reject it. If a manuscript is sent out for review, then based on the peer reviewers’ comments, the editors will discuss and make a decision about the manuscript. Three outcomes can occur: rejection, conditional acceptance upon revision, and acceptance. Please note that if the article is conditionally accepted upon revision, it may undergo several rounds of revision until it meets YJBM publication standards.

The Deputy Editors will correspond with the author regarding the publication decision and suggested edits. The goal of this interaction is to develop the article into a well-rounded manuscript. If it does not meet YJBM standards by the required deadline for the issue for which it has been solicited, the article may not be published.

Once the article is accepted for publication, it will be sent to the Editorial Coordinator for copy editing, formatting, and copyright requests. Issues are published in March, June, September, and December and all articles will be made available freely online at the time of publication.

A typical timeline from submission to publication is 1 week for initial editorial assessment, 4-8 weeks for peer review, 2-8 weeks for author revisions (depending on the scale of revisions requested).

If you would like to submit an unsolicited manuscript to the YJBM for evaluation, please send a 100-word abstract of your manuscript to yjbm@yale.edu with the subject line: Unsolicited MS_Last name_abstract.

YJBM encourages the submission of well-written and well-reasoned articles. Articles are evaluated based on various criteria, including importance to researchers and clinicians in the field, broad interest to the community of researchers in biology and medicine, evidence-based conclusions, originality of work, and educational value of the manuscript. Articles are not required to meet all the above criteria and the ultimate decision of acceptance is dependent on the Editorial Board. Articles can be submitted by medical and graduate students writing with a mentor or on their own (with support and guidance from YJBM Editors), as well as M.D.s and Ph.D.s at various stages of their careers and other experts in the field.

As students, researchers, and future professionals, the YJBM Editorial Board believes that scientific research should be carried out in accordance with the highest standards of ethics and professional conduct. To uphold our values, YJBM requires that all of our authors follow their institution’s guidelines for responsible conduct of research. In addition, YJBM requires that all authors certify that they meet the criteria for authorship, as described by the ICMJE Recommendations. YJBM publishes only original work and all YJBM submissions are checked for plagiarism. If any of YJBM’s core values are not honored by potential authors, YJBM may reject manuscripts for not meeting these expectations. For more details on our ethical requirements and our policies on plagiarism, please see our Authors Guidelines.