Author Guidelines

The Journal of Baghdad College of Dentistry is a research periodical, which publishes original clinical and basic studies in addition to review articles covering all specialties of dentistry and related sciences.

Ethical guidelines:

• Authorship and Acknowledgements

The manuscript submission to the journal must be approved by all authors. The Journal of Baghdad College of Dentistry adheres to the criteria of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE). According to the ICMJE authorship criteria should be based on:

• All authors must contribute substantially to the designing of the study, collection, analysis and interpretation of data
• Drafting and revision of the article
• Final approval of article version to be published

 Contributors who do not qualify as authors should be mentioned under Acknowledgements.

Acknowledgments: in this section, mention contributors to the article other than the authors accredited. Authors also disclose any affiliations, financial support, or any other information that constitutes a real or perceived conflict of interest.

• Ethical Approvals

All studies using human or animal subjects should include an explicit statement in the Material and Methods section identifying the review and ethics committee approval for each study, if applicable. The authorized letter must be obtained from people before publishing their photographs.  Editors reserve the right to reject papers if there is doubt as to whether appropriate procedures have been used.

• Permissions

If all or parts of previously published illustrations are used, permission must be obtained from the copyright holder concerned. It is the author's responsibility to obtain these in writing and provide copies to the Publishers.

Manuscript Files Accepted

Manuscripts should be submitted as Word (.doc/.docx). The text file must contain the entire manuscript including the title page, abstract, text, references, tables and figures.

Manuscript types accepted

Research Articles: must describe significant and original clinical or experimental observations and provide sufficient detail so that the observations can be critically evaluated and, if necessary, repeated.

Review Articles: are selected for their broad general interest; all are refereed by experts in the field. Reviews should take a broad view of the field rather than merely summarizing the authors´ own previous work, so extensive citation of the authors´ own publications is discouraged.

Letters to the editor: Letters should address any aspect of the profession, including education and training, new or advanced treatment approach, and concepts of dental pathologies and their management. Letters should be brief (<1,000 words), focused on one or a few specific points or concerns, and can be signed by no more than five individuals. Citations should be handled as standard references.

Point of view: based on invitation to national and international authors, covering a smaller area and may be written in a format not exceeding 2 pages.

General Format

Article structure:

Papers should be written in proper English. The house style of JBCD requires that articles should be arranged in the following order: Title, Author(s) full name(s) and affiliation with the correspond­ing author's e-mail address, Abstract, Introduction, Materials and Methods (specifying statistical procedures used), Results, Discussion, Conclusions, Acknowledgements (if any), Conflict of interest, References, Abstract in Arabic.

Corresponding author: Clearly indicate who will handle correspondence at all stages of refereeing and publication, also post-publication. This responsibility includes answering any future queries about Methodology and Materials. Ensure that the e-mail address is given and that contact details are kept up to date by the corresponding author.

The title should be short and precise. Abstracts should be both in English and Arabic (Arabic abstract at the end of the article). Abstracts should not exceed 300 words, and presented under the following subheadings: Objectives, Materials and Methods; Results; Conclusions (For Reviews: Objectives; Data; Sources; Study selection; Conclusions). Keywords: up to 5 keywords should be supplied.

Font type and size:

Font type: Palatino linotype.

Title: font size 18 (bold), centered, only the first word starts with a capital letter, avoid abbreviations.

Author(s) name(s): font size 10 (bold), centered.

Headings: font size 12 (bold, only the first word starts with a capital letter), e.g. Abstract, Introduction, etc.

Subheadings: font size 12 (bold, only the first word starts with a capital letter).

Abstract sections: font size 9.

Text of the manuscript: font size 10.

Table/figure title and caption: font size 10.

References list: font size 8.

References:

The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) has published the "Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals" (ICMJE Recommendations, formerly "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts"). http://www.icmje.org/urm_main.html

Only papers closely related to the author's work should be referred to (maximum of 40 references), exhaustive reference lists should be avoided. The alphabetical arrangement of references should be as in the JBCD paper template; namely surnames(s) and initial(s) of the author(s), title, abbreviated journal name, year of publication, volume, number opening and closing pages. Unpublished observations and personal communications should not be included as references. Authors numbering six or fewer should all be quoted; when more authors are present, the first six names will be quoted, followed by et al.

Within the text: references should be numbered consecutively in the order of appearance, being quoted between parentheses (rounded brackets) as a superscript in the text before the punctuation mark. The actual authors can be referred to, but the reference number(s) must always be given. Within the reference list: Number the references in the list in the order in which they appear in the text.

Examples:

Reference to a journal publication:

1. Ibrahim AI, Al-Hasani NR, Thompson VP, Deb S. In vitro bond strengths post thermal and fatigue load cycling of sapphire brackets bonded with self-etch primer and evaluation of enamel damage. J Clin Exp Dent. 2020; 12:22-30.

Reference to a book:

1. Strunk W, White EB, The Elements of Style, fourth ed., Longman, New York, 2000.

Reference to a chapter in an edited book:

1. Mettam GR, Adams LB, How to prepare an electronic version of your article, in: Jones BS, Smith RZ (Eds.), Introduction to the Electronic Age, E-Publishing Inc., New York, 2009, pp. 281–304.

Please also refer to the journal paper template as an example.

Tables and figures:

Tables should be presented as editable text (word doc.) and not as images. Figures are accepted as TIFF or JPEG files with a minimum resolution of 300 dpi. Number tables and figures consecutively following their appearance in the text.

 

Reporting clinical trials:

Randomized controlled trials should be presented according to the CONSORT guidelines. At manuscript submission, authors must provide the CONSORT checklist accompanied by a flow diagram that illustrates the progress of patients through the trial, including recruitment, enrollment, randomization, withdrawal and completion, and a detailed description of the randomization procedure. The CONSORT checklist and template flow diagram are available online.

 

Animal welfare statement:

The use of laboratory animals in any research must be according to the ethics relating to the use of these animals in scientific work.  Therefore, the authors should state and be responsible for the application of these ethics according to the guidelines of the National Committee for Research Ethics in Science and Technology (NENT). https://www.etikkom.no/en/ethical-guidelines-for-research/ethical-guidelines-for-the-use-of-animals-in-research/

 

Further considerations before submission:

• The manuscript has been 'spell checked' and 'grammar checked'.
• All references mentioned in the Reference List are cited in the text, and vice versa.
• The tables and figures used in the manuscript should be self-explanatory.
• The metric of measurement should be used. (S.I. Units).
• A conflict of interest statement is provided at the end of the manuscript (before the references), even if the authors have no competing interests to declare. All authors must disclose any financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that could inappropriately influence (bias) their work.

 

 

The appeal of decision:

The decision on a paper is final and cannot be appealed.