Manuscript Submission Guidelines
The editorial policy of ARP Rheumatology follows the Editorial Policy Statements published by the Council of Science Editors.
Articles should be written in English. The accuracy of the manuscript contents, as well as written opinions, are the exclusive responsibility of the author(s).
Papers submitted to ARP Rheumatology must be original and cannot be previously published elsewhere. Published articles will remain the property of the journal and cannot be reproduced, as a whole or as a part, without the authorization of the Editor.
The journal is indexed on PubMed/Medline, and all the articles are available online with open and free access.
ARP Rheumatology follows the authorship criteria of the ICMJE, which are based on the following four criteria:
1. Having had a substantial contribution to the conception or design of the work, acquisition of data, analysis and interpretation of results;
2. Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content;
3. Final approval of the version to be published;
4. Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.
All those designated as authors should meet all these four criteria for authorship, and all who meet the four criteria should be identified as authors. Everyone who has contributed to the manuscript but does not meet the authorship criteria should be referred to in the acknowledgements.
To avoid delays during the revision process, read the instructions carefully and ensure that your manuscript length and format conform to ARP Rheumatology requirements before submitting.
The submission is divided into two main steps, described below.
First Step includes:
- Cover Letter to the Editor: This letter is mandatory.
- Corresponding author information: name; mailing address; phone number and email address.
- Manuscript identification: The title should briefly describe the paper's content. Avoid abbreviations in the title. A short running title should also be provided. Select the type of manuscript.
- Authors and affiliations: The author´s names and affiliations are mandatory. Up to three affiliations per author are possible.
- Suggested reviewers: you can provide up to three suggestions for reviewers, explaining why. The editor may or may not follow your suggestions.
Second Step includes:
- Abstract: A structured abstract with no more than 350 words summarizing the aims, methods, results and conclusions should be included. The word limit is 180 words for Case Reports.
- Keywords: A minimum of five keywords from the Journal’s list should be selected. These keywords are not the ones being published in the article (if accepted) but serve solely to support Editors to identify reviewers within the Journal’s database.
- Title Page: As the Journal functions in a double-blind format, this file should include the title, the authors and their affiliations, ORCID, the information of the corresponding author, as well as the acknowledgements or other information suitable to identify the authors.
- File Manuscript: The manuscript should be uploaded (Word format: .doc or .docx), with the title, abstract and all sections of the manuscript. Please list the Tables and Figures at the end, after the references.
- Supplementary material: As a complement to the manuscript and in order to be available online, authors may submit supplementary material which should be essential to the integrity of the paper. The material is subject to the same editorial standards and peer-review procedures as the print publication and should be submitted in the Tables/Figures section as a .docx or PDF file. If the editorial board doesn’t consider it essential to the paper, publisher reserves the right to decline the publication of supplementary material. You can upload supplementary material for review only, i.e. not to be published (e.g. databases). These files will be collated in a single PDF.
- Informed Consent (for publication of identifiable material): please use this template (EN or PT) to collect the signatures, which should be uploaded when required.
- Figures/Captions: In addition to the inclusion of the figures in the main file of the manuscript, you should provide the original files of the pictures in order to allow the editorial team to publish them with the best resolution possible.
- Conflict of Interest Disclosure Form. This file is required only after manuscript acceptance but is mandatory before it can be released “online first”.
- Editorials will be requested by the Editor and will be based on particularly relevant issues or on comments to articles published in that issue of ARP. Editorials should not exceed 1200 words, with a maximum of 15 references and one Table or Figure;
- Review articles will be also commissioned by the Editor. However, authors interested in presenting a review article are welcome to contact the Editor. Review articles should not exceed 4,000 words, 6 Tables or Figures and 100 references;
- Original articles: the text of original articles should be submitted with the following sections: Introduction, Material (or Patients) and Methods, Results, Discussion and Conclusions. Original articles should not exceed 4,000 words, 6 Tables or Figures and 60 references;
- Clinical Practice: the text should be submitted with the following sections: Introduction, Material and Methods, Results, Discussion and Conclusions. It should not exceed 4,000 words, 6 Tables or Figures and 60 references;
- Case Based Reviews: ARP will preferentially accept case based reviews. The text should be submitted with the following sections: Introduction, Case report and Discussion. Case reports should present illustrative figures (6 max.) and should not exceed 2,000 words and 25 references;
- Images in Rheumatology: images depicting rare clinical manifestations or of particular interest for clinical practice can be submitted. This type of publication should contain a maximum of 4 figures and the accompanying text should not exceed 500 words, with a maximum of 5 references;
- Letter: Letters to the Editor should be a comment on a previous ARP article or a short clinical study or case report. The text should not exceed 600 words, a maximum of 10 references and one Table/Figure.
Correspondence & Reply: Correspondence on articles published in ARP Rheumatology is welcomed. These should be submitted within 6 months of the “online first” publication and using the ARP Rheumatology submission system. Correspondences will be reviewed by the editor who decides if it merits publication. If accepted, the correspondence will be shown to the authors of the original article, who will be offered the chance to reply. Correspondence and replies are moderated but not peer-reviewed. Correspondence articles will be indexed. A reference to the original article must be included in the correspondence (the first reference). Replies should cite the correspondence (first reference), as well as the original article (second reference). The title of the correspondence should be: “Correspondence on: TITLE OF ORIGINAL PAPER”. Replies to correspondences should be given the title “Correspondence on: TITLE OF ORIGINAL PAPER - reply”. Both correspondences and replies should start with “Dear Editor,”. The text should not exceed 1000 words, a maximum of 10 references and one Table/Figure. Supplementary material is not allowed. Correspondence & Reply articles do not include an abstract.
- Tables should be cited in the text with Roman numerals. Each Table should have a title and contain no vertical lines. Horizontal lines should be used only as separators between titles and subtitles. All abbreviations should be explained at the bottom of the Table. Tables should be placed at the end of the manuscript, after the references.
- Figures should be cited in consecutive order, using Arabic numerals. All figures must have legends. Each Figure should be uploaded separately in high quality JPEG or TIFF. The publisher reserves the right to regroup figures and change their size to use pages efficiently. Figures can be placed at the end of the manuscript, as well.
References should be cited by a superscript numerical system and should be listed in the order cited in the text. Journal titles must be abbreviated in accordance with Index Medicus style. When 6 or less authors contributed to a cited article, all authors must be listed. If the number of authors is more than 7, list only the first 3 followed by et al. Page numbers should not be abbreviated (i.e. 565-569 instead of 565-9). The Journal number and month of publication should not be presented. References of unpublished work, presentations or personal observations should be inserted in the text (in parenthesis) and not as a reference. Authors are responsible for references accuracy.
Examples:
- Journal article
Name(s) and initials of author(s). Article title. Journal name Year; Volume: Pages(s).
Ex: Hill J, Bird HA, Hopkins R, Lawton C, Wright C. Survey of satisfaction with care in a rheumatology outpatient clinic. Ann Rheum Dis 1992; 51: 195-197.
- Article published online (insert DOI)
Name(s) and initials of author(s). Article title. Journal name Published Online First: date. doi.
Ex: Merkel PA, Curthbertson D, Hellmich B et al. Comparison of disease activity measures for ANCA-associated vasculitis. Ann Rheum Dis Published Online First: 29 July 2008. doi:10.1136/ard.2008.097758.
- Chapter in book
Name(s) and initials of author(s) of chapter. Chapter title. In: Name(s) and initial(s) of editor(s). Book title. City: Name of publisher, year of publication: page(s).
Ex: Stewart AF. Hypercalcemia resulting from medications. In: Favus MD, ed Primer on the Metabolic Bone Diseases and Disorders of Mineral Metabolism. New York: Raven Press, 1991:177-178.
- Book
Name(s) and initials of author(s). Book title. City: Name of publisher, year of publication: page(s).
Ex: Lorig K. Patient Education. A practical approach. St Louis: Mosby-Year Book, 1992: 51.
- Online document
Document title. http://address. Accessed date.
Ex: Programa Nacional de Luta Contra a Tuberculose. Sistema de Vigilância (SVIG-TB). Direcção-Geral da Saúde – Divisão de Doenças Transmissíveis, Março de 2005. http://www.dgsaude.pt/upload/membro.id/ficheiros/i006875.pdf. Accessed in January 25th 2008.
Include in this section acknowledgements to people that have contributed to the work but are not qualified as authors. Institutions and sources of financial support may also be included in this section. This information should be placed in the “Title page” only.
After submission and technical approval, the articles are sent for peer-review by experts in the field. Upon conclusion of the review, the authors are notified and receive the reviewers’ comments. Based on this review the authors should update the manuscript and resubmit a new version. In the resubmission process, a letter of reply to the reviews must be included as well as a tack changed version of the manuscript. In these documents, the identification of the authors and affiliations should not be visible.
The authors have a maximum period of 1 month to submit the reply to the reviewers. After this period ARP Editorial team reserves the right to remove the manuscript from the reviewing process.
The criteria for acceptance of a manuscript for publication take into account the quality and originality of the research, excellence in writing and organization of the manuscript and the potential impact on medical literature. Manuscripts accepted for publication will be stored and presented as “online-first articles” until the editors select them to be part of a specific journal number.
Corresponding authors of accepted manuscripts will receive digital page proofs for approval. Proofs must be reviewed within 72 hours of receipt. Authors are responsible for the detailed review of the text, figures, tables, legends and references, and should contact the Editors if any changes need to be made. Only minor changes and typographical corrections are allowed at the proof stage.
Upon acceptance for publication, authors transfer the copyrights interests of the manuscript to ARP Rheumatology.
(Last update: 28 Sept 2023)