Japan Journal of Nursing Science

Official English language journal of the Japan Academy of Nursing Science

Edited by:
William L. Holzemer

Print ISSN: 1742-7932
Online ISSN: 1742-7924
Frequency: Bi-annual
Current Volume: 7 / 2010

TopAuthor Guidelines

The Japan Journal of Nursing Science is the official English language journal of the Japan Academy of Nursing Science. The purpose of the Journal is to provide a mechanism to share knowledge related to improving health care and promoting the development of nursing.

Author Membership Requirement
The introduction of the Author Membership Requirement is designed to provide an avenue for members of the Japan Academy of Nursing Science to publish articles in English, thus making their scholarly work available to the international community. It also provides a mechanism for non-members to disseminate their work within Japan and internationally. All Japanese authors wishing to contribute to the Journal must be members of the Japan Academy of Nursing Science. Authors preparing manuscripts abroad are exempt from this qualification requirement. Please visit http://jans.umin.ac.jp for further information about this and to obtain an application form to become a member.

The Journal seeks original manuscripts reporting scholarly work on the art and science of nursing. Original articles may be empirical and qualitative studies, review articles, methodological articles, brief reports, case studies and letters to the Editor.

1. Original Article
Definition: Original research, consisting of introduction, method, results, discussion. Original work must provide 10 references and an explanation about research findings.
Size: Should be approximately 5000 words (not counting the abstract, references, tables and/or figures).

2. Review Article
Definition: Critical evaluations of material about current research that has already been published by organizing, integrating, and evaluating previously published material. Re-analyses as meta-analysis and systemic reviews are encouraged.
Size: Should not exceed 4000 words.

3. Methodological Article
Definition: New methodological approaches, modifications of existing methods, and discussions of quantitative and data analytic approaches, new qualitative methods/approaches.
Size: Should not exceed 4000 words.

4. Others
Definition: Brief reports, case studies, comments, Letters to the Editor, and replies on previously published articles will be considered.
Size: Should not exceed 2000 words.

EDITORIAL REVIEW AND ACCEPTANCE

The acceptance criteria for all papers are the quality and originality of the research and its significance to our readership. Except where otherwise stated, manuscripts are double-blind peer reviewed by two anonymous reviewers and the Editor. Final acceptance or rejection rests with the Editorial Board, who reserves the right to refuse any material for publication.
Authors are encouraged to indicate in the submission form that names of potential reviewers as well as those whom they wish not to review the paper, but the editors will make the final choice.
Manuscripts should be written so that they are intelligible to the professional reader who is not a specialist in the particular field. They should be written in a clear, concise, direct style. Where contributions are judged as acceptable for publication on the basis of content, the Editor or the Publisher reserve the right to modify typescripts to eliminate ambiguity and repetition and improve communication between author and reader. If extensive alterations are required, the manuscript will be returned to the author for revision.

ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDITING SERVICE

Authors are responsible for the linguistic accuracy of their manuscripts. Authors not fully conversant with the English language should seek advice from subject specialists with a sound knowledge of English. The cost will be bourne by the author, and a copy of the certificate issued by the service should be attached to the cover letter. More information is available from the Editorial Office.

SUBMISSION OF MANUSCRIPTS

Manuscripts should be submitted online at http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/JJNS. Authors must supply an email address as all correspondence will be by email. Two files should be supplied: the covering letter and the manuscript (in Word or rich text format (.rtf)). The covering letter should be uploaded as a file not for review.
All articles submitted to the Journal must comply with these instructions. Failure to do so will result in return of the manuscript and possible delay in publication.
Will authors please note that Word 2007 is not yet compatible with journal production systems. Unfortunately, the journal cannot accept Microsoft Word 2007 documents until such time as a stable production version is released. Please use Word's 'Save As' option therefore to save your document as an older (.doc) file type.
• Submissions should be double-spaced.
• All margins should be at least 30 mm.
• All pages should be numbered consecutively in the top right-hand corner, beginning with the title page.
• Do not use Enter at the end of lines within a paragraph.
• Turn the hyphenation option off; include only those hyphens that are essential to the meaning.
• Specify any special characters used to represent non-keyboard characters.
• Take care not to use l (ell) for 1 (one), O (capital o) for 0 (zero) or ß (German esszett) for (Greek beta).
• Use a tab, not spaces, to separate data points in tables. If you use a table editor function, ensure that each data point is contained within a unique cell (i.e. do not use carriage returns within cells).
Each figure should be supplied as a separate file, with the figure number incorporated in the file name. For submission, low-resolution figures saved as .jpg or .bmp files should be uploaded, for ease of transmission during the review process. Upon acceptance of the article, high-resolution figures (at least 300 d.p.i.) saved as .eps or .tif files should be uploaded. Digital images supplied only as low-resolution files cannot be used.

ONLINE　SUBMISSION
To submit a manuscript, please follow the instructions below.

Getting Started
1. Launch your web browser (supported browsers include Internet Explorer 5.5 or higher, Firefox 1.0.4 or higher or Safari 1.2.4) and go to the Japan Journal of Nursing Science Manuscript Central homepage (http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/jjns).
2. Log-in or click the "Create Account" option if you are a first-time user of Manuscript Central.
3. If you are creating a new account.
• After clicking on "Create Account", enter your name and e-mail information and click "Next". Your e-mail information is very important.
• Enter your institution and address information as appropriate, and then click "Next."
• Enter a user ID and password of your choice (we recommend using your e-mail address as your user ID), and then select your area of expertise. Click "Finish".
4. If you have an account but have forgotten your log in details, go to "Password Help" on the Manuscript Central homepage and enter your email address. The system will send you details on how to log in.
5. Log-in and select "Author Center."

Submitting Your Manuscript
6. After you have logged in, click the "Submit a New Manuscript" link in the menu bar.
7. Enter data and answer questions as appropriate.
8. Click the "Save and Continue" button on each screen to save your work and advance to the next screen.
9. You are required to upload your files.
• Click on the "Browse" button and locate the file on your computer.
• Select the designation of each file in the drop down next to the Browse button.
• When you have selected all files you wish to upload, click the "Upload Files" button.
10. Review your submission (in both PDF and HTML formats) before sending to the Journal. Click the "Submit" button when you are finished reviewing.

After submission, you will receive a confirmation e-mail. You can also access Manuscript Central any time to check the status of your manuscript. The Journal will inform you by e-mail once a decision has been made.

Cover letter
Papers are accepted for publication in the journal on the understanding that the content has not been published or submitted for publication elsewhere. This must be stated in the cover letter.
The cover letter must also contain an acknowledgement that all authors have contributed significantly, and that all authors are in agreement with the content of the manuscript.
Authors must declare any financial support or relationships that may pose conflict of interest.
If tables or figures have been reproduced from another source, a letter from the copyright holder (usually the Publisher), stating authorization to reproduce the material, must be attached to the cover letter.
The cover letter of the paper should contain (i) the title; (ii) the full names of the authors; (iii) membership numbers of authors in the Japan Academy of Nursing Science; (iv) the addresses of the institutions at which the work was carried out together with (v) the full postal and email address, plus facsimile and telephone numbers, of the author to whom correspondence about the manuscript should be sent. The present address of any author, if different from that where the work was carried out, should be supplied in a footnote.
As articles are double-blind reviewed, material that might identify authorship of the paper should be placed on a cover sheet.

ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS

Authors must follow the ethical standards for human experimentation established in the Declaration of Helsinki in 1995 (as revised in Seoul 2008), available at http://www.wma.net/e/policy/b3.htm

The authors reporting studies involving human subjects must have obtained approval from appropriate institutional ethics board before any data collection to be reported in the study results was started. Upon request from the Journal editors, the author(s) must provide copies of the appropriate documentation. Local institutional approval must be indicated in the Materials and Methods section of the submitted manuscript.

If the study is exempt from Institutional Review Board approval, or if your institution has no mechanism to approve protection of human subjects, an explanation documentation signed by an appropriate institutional personnel must be submitted along with the manuscript and mentioned under the Materials and Methods section of the manuscript.

All investigations on human subjects must include a statement that the subject gave informed consent. Patient anonymity should be preserved. Photographs need to be cropped sufficiently to prevent human subjects being recognized (or an eye bar should be used). In general, submission of a case report should be accompanied by the written consent of the subject (or parent/ guardian) before publication; this is particularly important where photographs are to be used or in cases where the unique nature of the incident reported makes it possible for the patient to be identified. While the Editorial Board recognizes that it might not always be possible or appropriate to seek such consent, the onus will be on the authors to demonstrate that this exception applies in their case. Any experiments involving animals must be demonstrated to be ethically acceptable and where relevant conform to national guidelines for animal usage in research. The Japan Journal of Nursing Science requires that the clinical trials submitted for its consideration are registered in a publicly accessible database. Authors should include the name of the trial register and their clinical trial registration number at the end of their abstract. If you wish the editor to consider an unregistered trial please explain briefly why the trial has not been registered. For author reference, examples of public clinical trial registries include: http://www.clinicaltrials.gov; http://clinicaltrials-dev.ifpma.org/; http://isrctn.org/; http://www.umin.ac.jp/ctr/index.htm.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST STATEMENT

It is the responsibility of the authors to disclose to the Editor any significant financial or personal interests they may have in products, technology or methodology mentioned in their manuscript. This information will be deemed confidential and will only be disclosed to manuscript reviewers if, in the opinion of the Editor, the information is directly pertinent for an informed review.

STATEMENT OF INFORMED CONSENT

All authors are required to obtain informed consent from the participants and that evidence of such consent will be provided upon request. All authors are required to obtain informed consent as listed in the journal's instructions for authors. Authors of case reports are required to provide the written consent of the patient before publication will be considered.

COPYRIGHT

Authors publishing the Journal will be asked to sign a Exclusive Licence Form. In signing the form it is assumed that authors have obtained permission to use any copyrighted or previously published material. All authors must read and agree to the conditions outlined in form, and must sign the form or agree that the corresponding author can sign on their behalf. Articles cannot be published until a signed form has been received.

STYLE OF THE MANUSCRIPT

Manuscripts should follow the style of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 5th edition (2001) and the Vancouver agreement detailed in the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors' revised 'Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals: Writing and Editing for Biomedical Publication', as presented at http://www.ICMJE.org/.
Spelling. The journal uses US spelling and authors should therefore follow the latest edition of the Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.

Units
All measurements must be given in Système International (SI) units.

Abbreviations
Abbreviations should be used sparingly - only where they ease the reader's task by reducing repetition of long, technical terms. Initially use the word in full, followed by the abbreviation in parentheses. Thereafter use the abbreviation only.

Trade names
Chemical substances should be referred to by the generic name only. Trade names should not be used. Drugs should be referred to by their generic names. If proprietary drugs have been used in the study, refer to these by their generic name, mentioning the proprietary name, and the name and location of the manufacturer, in parentheses.

Genetic nomenclature
Standard genetic nomenclature should be used. For further information, including relevant websites, authors should refer to the genetic nomenclature guide in Trends in Genetics (Elsevier Science, 1998).
Nucleotide sequence data can be submitted in electronic form to any of the three major collaborative databases: DDBJ, EMBL or GenBank. It is only necessary to submit to one database as data are exchanged between DDBJ, EMBL and GenBank on a daily basis. The suggested wording for referring to accession-number information is: 'These sequence data have been submitted to the DDBJ/EMBL/GenBank databases under accession number U12345.' Addresses are as follows:
DNA Data Bank of Japan (DDBJ) http://www.ddbj.nig.ac.jp
EMBL Nucleotide Sequence Submissions www.ebi.ac.uk
GenBank www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

PARTS OF THE MANUSCRIPT

The length of any article type (including references, tables and appendices) should not exceed 24 manuscript pages.
Manuscripts should be presented in the following order: (i) title page, (ii) abstract and keywords, (iii) text, (iv) acknowledgements, (v) references, (vi) appendices, (vii) figure legends, (viii) tables (each table complete with title and footnotes) and (ix) figures. Footnotes to the text are not allowed and any such material should be incorporated into the text as parenthetical matter.

Title
The title should be short, informative and contain the major key words. Do not use abbreviations in the title. A short running title (less than 40 characters) should also be provided.

Abstract and key words
All articles (except Comments, Replies and Monographs) must have a structured abstract that states in 250 words or fewer the purpose, basic procedures, main findings and principal conclusions of the study. Divide the abstract with the headings: Aim, Methods, Results, Conclusions. The abstract should not contain abbreviations or references.
Five key words, for the purposes of indexing, should be supplied below the abstract, in alphabetical order, and should be taken from those recommended by the US National Library of Medicine's Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) browser list.

Text
Authors should use the following subheadings to divide the sections of their manuscript: Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion.

Acknowledgements
The source of financial grants and other funding must be acknowledged, including a frank declaration of the authors' industrial links and affiliations. The contribution of colleagues or institutions should also be acknowledged. Personal thanks and thanks to anonymous reviewers are not appropriate.

References
The author-date system of referencing as shown in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association is used (examples are given below). In the text give the author's name followed by the year in parentheses: Smith (2000). If there are two authors use 'and': Smith and Jones (2001); but if cited within parentheses use '&': (Smith & Jones, 2001). When reference is made to a work by three to five authors, cite all authors the first time it occurs; subsequently, list the first author followed by et al. If there are six or more authors, cite only the first author and then use et al. For references to multiple sources, please list these in alphabetical order. In the reference list, references should be listed in alphabetical order.
In the reference list, cite the names of all authors when there are six or fewer; when seven or more, list the first six followed by et al. Do not use ibid. or op cit. Reference to unpublished data and personal communications should not appear in the list but should be cited in the text only (e.g. Smith A, 2000, unpublished data). All citations mentioned in the text, tables or figures must be listed in the reference list.
Full publication title should be provided.
Authors are responsible for the accuracy of the references.

Journals
Vega K. J., Pina I., Krevsky B. (1996). Heart transplantation is associated with an increased risk for pancreatobiliary disease. Annals of Internal Medicine, 124, 980-983.

Online article not yet published in an issue

An online article that has not yet been published in an issue (therefore has no volume, issue or page numbers) can be cited by its Digital Object Identifier (DOI). The DOI will remain valid and allow an article to be tracked even after its allocation to an issue.

Satoh, A., Kitamiya, C., Kudoh, H., Watanabe, M., Menzawa, K., Sasaki, H. (2009). Factors associated with late post-partum depression in Japan. Japan Journal of Nursing Science doi: : 10.1111/j.1742-7924.2009.00121.x

Books
Ringsven M. K. & Bond D. (1996). Gerontology and leadership skills for nurses, 2nd ed. Albany, NY: Delmar Publishers.

Chapter in a book
Phillips S. J. & Whisnant J. P. (1995). Hypertension and stroke. In: J. H. Laragh & B. M. Brenner (Eds), Hypertension: pathophysiology, diagnosis, and management (2nd ed., pp. 465-478). New York: Raven Press.

Non-English journal article, title translated into English
Kondoh Y. (2001). Gokuteishussei-taijuji niokeru kikan-nai kyuin-go no kyokai-tsuki-fukugai-kukkyokushisei no kouka [Effects of flexed posture with boundaries following endotracheal suction in very low birth weight infants]. Journal of Japan Academy of Nursing Science, 21(3), 11-20.

Electronic Material
Japan Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare. (2003a). Byouin Houkoku: Heisei 15nen 4gatsuban Gaisuu [Estimates of Hospital REport in April 2003]. Retrieved January 4, 2004, from http://www.mhlw.go.jp/toukei/saikin/hw/byouin/m03/by0304.html

References in Articles
We recommend the use of a tool such as EndNote or Reference Manager for reference management and formatting.
EndNote reference styles can be searched for here:
http://www.endnote.com/support/enstyles.asp

Reference Manager reference styles can be searched for here:
http://www.refman.com/support/rmstyles.asp

Tables
Tables should be self-contained and complement, but not duplicate, information contained in the text. Number tables consecutively in the text in Arabic numerals. Type tables on a separate sheet with the legend above. Legends should be concise but comprehensive - the table, legend and footnotes must be understandable without reference to the text. Vertical lines should not be used to separate columns. Column headings should be brief, with units of measurement in parentheses; all abbreviations must be defined in footnotes. Footnote symbols: †, ‡, §, , should be used (in that order) and *, **, *** should be reserved for P-values. Statistical measures such as SD or SEM should be identified in the headings.

PROOFS
It is essential that corresponding authors supply an email address to which correspondence can be emailed while their article is in production.

Word files of edited articles will be sent for checking via email, and should be returned to the Publisher within 3 days of receipt. It is essential that these files are checked carefully, as the cost of changes made at a later stage may be charged to the author. Full instructions on how to correct and return the file will be attached to the email.

Notification of the URL from where to download a Portable Document Format (PDF) typeset proof page, associated forms and further instructions will be sent by email to the corresponding author. The purpose of the PDF proof is a final check of the layout, and of tables and figures. Alterations other than the essential correction of errors are unacceptable at PDF proof stage. The proof should be checked, and approval to publish the article should be emailed to the Publisher by the date indicated, otherwise, it may be signed off on by the Editor or held over to the next issue.

OFFPRINTS

A minimum of 50 offprints will be provided upon request, at the author's expense. These paper offprints may be ordered online. Please visit http://offprint.cosprinters.com/, fill in the necessary details and ensure that you type information in all of the required fields.

If you have queries about offprints please email offprint@cosprinters.com


PUBLICATION FEES
Color figure reproduction costs must be covered by the author. More detailed information is available at the Editorial Office.

ONLINE EARLY
The Japan Journal of Nursing Science is covered by Blackwell Publishing's OnlineEarly service. OnlineEarly articles are complete full-text articles published online in advance of their publication in a printed issue. Articles are therefore available as soon as they are ready, rather than having to wait for the next scheduled print issue. OnlineEarly articles are complete and final. They have been fully reviewed, revised and edited for publication, and the authors' final corrections have been incorporated. Because they are in final form, no changes can be made after online publication. The nature of OnlineEarly articles means that they do not yet have volume, issue or page numbers, so OnlineEarly articles cannot be cited in the traditional way. They are therefore given a Digital Object Identifier (DOI), which allows the article to be cited and tracked before it is allocated to an issue. After print publication, the DOI remains valid and can continue to be used to cite and access the article. More information about DOIs can be found at http://www.doi.org/faq.html.


BLACKWELL JOURNALS ONLINE
Visit the Japan Journal of Nursing Science home page for more information, and Blackwell Publishing's web pages for submission guidelines and digital graphics standards. Japan Journal of Nursing Science is also available online via Blackwell Synergy.