Instructions for Authors

The Journal of Pain & Palliative Care Pharmacotherapy is a peer reviewed, interdisciplinary, quarterly journal focusing on efficacy, safety, cost-effectiveness, availability, delivery systems, ethics, policy, philosophy and other issues relevant to pharmacotherapy in the management of acute, chronic and end-of-life pain and related symptoms. Orig­inal articles, reviews, reports, case reports, commentaries, and letters are invited. Acceptability of submitted papers will be determined by the editor fol­lowing review by external referees. Publica­tion decisions normally are com­municated to the corresponding author within 60 days of receipt of the manuscript. Most manuscripts are published six to nine months following formal acceptance. Submissions that include original data from human experimentation should include written assurance that the study was approved by the applicable institu­tional review board(s) or ethics committee(s).

Manuscript Submission

Manuscripts or letters for publication consideration may be submitted as e-mail attachments sent directly to the editor at the e-mail address listed above. Each manuscript must be accompa­nied by a completed Publication Agreement and Copyright Transfer form that is available from the editor, appears in each issue of the Journal, and is available on the Journal web page. Original signed copies of the form that are then scanned and submitted as e-mail attachments are acceptable. 

If e-mail submission of a manuscript is impractical, authors may mail a computer disk or three hard copies of the final manuscript to: Dr. Arthur G. Lipman, Editor, Journal of Pain & Palliative Care Pharmacotherapy, 30 S 2000 E Room 258, University of Utah Health Sciences Center, Salt Lake City, UT 84112-5820 USA.. 

Books, monographs, audio and videotapes, software and other relevant media may be submitted to the editor for review. Formal Book and Media Reviews are published in each issue.

Format and Style

Manuscripts should be computer printed or typewritten on 8.5 inch by 11 inch paper, double spaced throughout, with 1 inch margins on all sides. The preferred font is Times New Roman, 12 pitch. Please do not change fonts or font size in the manuscript.

Only persons who contributed materially to the preparation of the manuscript should be listed as authors. Other individuals may be recognized in authors' acknowledgments that should be listed at the end of the manuscript. The title page should include the name(s), degree(s), and affiliation(s) of all authors as they wish them to appear in the published manuscript. If applicable, list the meeting at which the paper was presented. This should be followed by an abstract which summarizes the paper in 150-200 words and a list of key words for indexing. Authors' names and affiliations should appear only on the title page. Articles are normally 20 to 30 pages in length exclusive of references, figures, and tables and reports are normally 10 to 20 pages long. Longer manuscripts may be considered by the editor and may be divided into sections for publication in successive Journal issues.

Tables, Figures, and Illustrations

Tables, figures and illustrations should be of good quality for reproduction. Figures may be scanned into the manuscript electronic computer file or submitted as laser printed images or unmounted glossy photographs. In the latter case, legends should be printed/typewritten on separate sheets. The number of each figure should be included in the legend and written lightly in pencil on the back of the illustration or pho-tograph. Illustrations may be cropped to fit available space. Each table should be numbered, captioned, and computer printed or typewritten on a separate page following the references in the manuscript. Figures and tables should be sequentially numbered as two separate series in the order in which they are cited in the manuscript. All figures and tables must be cited in the text.  Please place each figure and table on a separate page following the references in the manuscript.

Statistics

When statistics are presented, the name of the test used, statistic, and probability (p) value as appropriate. Specify whether standard deviations or standard errors of the mean are used and  indicate the number of observations involved.

References

The reference format is that used by the Journal of the American Medical Association. References should be sequentially numbered with superscript numbers in the order in which they appear in the text and listed at the end of the article in numerical sequence. Please use simple superscripts for references; do not change font face or pitch for the superscript numbers. Do not underline or italicize any parts of the reference list. List all authors' names up to a total of six. If there are more than six, list the first three followed by “et al”. The number of references normally should be limited to 50. Higher numbers of references for extensive review articles may be included at the editor's discretion. Abbreviations of journal names should be the same as those used in Index Medicus. When in doubt of the proper abbreviation, list the full journal name. The style for references is as follows:

Journal Reference

1.   Ferrell BR, Novy D, Sullivan MD et al. Ethical dilemmas in pain management. J Pain. 2001;2(3):171-80.

Textbook Chapter Reference

2. Miyoshi HR, Leckbsand SG. Systemic opioid analgesics. In Loeser JD, editor, Bonica's Management of Pain, 3rd edition. Philadelphia, Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2001.

Monograph Reference

3. American Pain Society. Principles of Analgesic Use in the Treatment of Acute Pain and Chronic Cancer Pain. 5^th ed., Glenview IL, American Pain Society, 2003.

World Wide Web (Internet) Reference

4. American Pain Foundation. Pain action guide, updated May 2004.Available at http://www.painfoundation.org. Accessed May 25, 2004.

Copy Editing

Submissions may be accepted contingent upon revisions requested by the reviewers (referees). Authors are responsible for making any such revisions and resubmitting the final manuscript. Galley proofs are not provided. All submissions must be accompanied by a completed Publication Agreement and Copyright Transfer form. The original form signed by all authors must be faxed, e-mailed or mailed to the editor before the paper can be accepted for publication. Failure to return the copyright form in a timely fashion will result in delay in publication. Informa Healthcare does not retain copyright for any submission not accepted for publication.

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