Instructions to Authors

About the Journal

European Journal of Preventive Cardiology (EJPC) is a peer-reviewed journal that publishes 18 issues per year.

Please read these instructions carefully and follow them closely to ensure that the review and publication of your paper is as efficient as possible. The Editors reserve the right to return manuscripts that are not in accordance with these instructions. Please note that initial submissions are largely “format free,” whereas manuscripts submitted after revision must adhere to specific formatting requirements outlined below.

Scope of the Journal

European Journal of Preventive Cardiology embraces all the scientific, clinical and public health disciplines that address the causes and risk factors of cardiovascular diseases, as well as cardiovascular prevention, rehabilitation, exercise physiology and sport cardiology.

EJPC is the official Journal of the European Association of Preventive Cardiology but it also serves the interests of complementary Councils, working groups in the European Society of Cardiology and other European professional societies, such as hypertension, atherosclerosis, metabolic disorders, internal medicine, behavioural medicine and general practice. It provides an avenue for reports of organizations involved in the prevention of cardiovascular diseases.

The Journal publishes reviews and editorials in order to improve the understanding, prevention, investigation and treatment of cardiovascular diseases. Pathology, physiology, pharmacology, as well as the clinical, social and population sciences all form part of the discipline that is cardiac prevention. Accordingly, submission of manuscripts on clinical and population sciences is invited. Original contributions on nursing, care of the elderly, primary care, health economics and other specialist fields related to prevention are also welcome. Papers can include translational investigations on animals, and remarks on genetics and/or biomarkers—however, the results must have obvious clinical relevance in the fields of cardiovascular prevention, rehabilitation or exercise/sports medicine.

Contents

About

• About the Journal
• Scope of the Journal

Editorial Policies

• Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement
• Authorship
• Co-Authorship Verification
• Contributors
• Plagiarism and Redundant Publication
• Peer Review
• Appealing a decision
• Research ethics and patient consent
• Clinical trials
• Reporting guidelines
• Availability of Data and Materials
• Data Availability Statement
• Data Citation
• Preprints and self-archiving
• Conflict of Interest
• Post-publication corrections
• Author’s toll-free link
• Retractions

Submission

• Submission
• How to Submit
• Article Types
• Title page
• Abstract
• Graphical abstracts
• Keywords
• Third-Party Permissions
• Manuscript transfer within the ESC Journal Family
• Manuscript Preparation: Format, Structure, and Style
• Presubmission Language Editing
• Style
• Abbreviations
• Tables
• References
• Acknowledgments and Funding
• LaTeX
• Figures
• Supplementary Material
• Licence to Publish and Open Access Options
• Author’s accepted manuscript
• Proofs
• Publication Embargoes
• Press Releases

Contact Us

Editorial Policies

For full details of Oxford University Press’s editorial policies, please see the Publication Ethics page.

Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement

European Journal of Preventive Cardiology and Oxford University Press are members of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and follow the guidance provided in the COPE Core Practices. The Journal also subscribes to the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICJME) Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly work in Medical Journals. It is expected that all parties involved in the publication of content in the Journal (the publisher, editors, authors, and reviewers) follow these guidelines on best practice and publication ethics. The Journal is committed to investigating cases of alleged editor, author, and reviewer misconduct arising from its activities, and will follow COPE Guidelines in all cases.

The Editors are further supported by the ESC Publication Ethics Committee.

Authorship

All individuals listed as authors should qualify for authorship and should have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for appropriate portions of the content. Each author included in the manuscript must meet ALL of the following conditions, as specified in the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICJME). To qualify as an author, the individual must have

1. made substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
2. drafted the work or reviewed it critically for important intellectual content; AND
3. given final approval of the version to be published; AND
4. agreed 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 individuals who meet the authorship criteria listed above should be listed as authors. Individuals who do not meet the above authorship criteria should not be listed as authors. The Journal considers all forms of ghost authorship, in which an individual contributes in the role of an author (according to the criteria above) but is not listed as an author on the manuscript, and all forms of guest or gift authorship, in which individuals are included though they do not meet the above criteria, as unethical and unacceptable.

For more information about authorship, including changes in authorship, see the relevant section of OUP Publication Ethics page, and also the ICJME guidelines.

Artificial Intelligence

Natural language processing tools driven by artificial intelligence (AI) do not qualify as authors, and the Journal will screen for them in author lists. The use of AI (for example, to help generate content or images, write code, process data, or for translation) should be disclosed in a cover letter at the point of submission and explained in full in a Methods or Acknowledgements section in the manuscript. Please see the COPE position statement on Authorship and AI for more details.

CRediT

The Journal uses the contributor roles taxonomy (CRediT), which allows authors to describe the contributor roles in a standardized, transparent, and accurate way. Authors should choose from the contributor roles outlined on the CRediT website and supply this information upon submission. You may choose multiple contributor roles per author. Any other individuals who do not meet authorship criteria and made less substantive contributions should be listed in your manuscript as non-author contributors with their contributions clearly described.

Co-Authorship Verification

The corresponding author is responsible for providing the full list of co-authors on the manuscript. The co-authors will receive an email asking them to verify their contribution to the manuscript. The corresponding author is responsible for ensuring that this step is completed.

Contributors

Any other individual contributor or group of contributors to the work who do not qualify for authorship but who meet some of the four ICMJE criteria listed above should be listed in the article in a section under the heading “Acknowledgements”. As per the ICJME guidelines, the contribution of each individual or group must be specified. For more information, refer to section 3 of the ICJME guidelines.

Plagiarism and Redundant Publication

COPE defines plagiarism as ‘when somebody presents the work of others (data, words or theories) as if they were his/her own and without proper acknowledgement’.

COPE defines redundant publication as ‘when a published work (or substantial sections from a published work) is/are published more than once (in the same or another language) without adequate acknowledgment of the source/cross-referencing/justification or when the same (or substantially overlapping) data is presented in more than one publication without adequate cross-referencing/justification, particularly when this is done in such a way that reviewers/readers are unlikely to realise that most or all the findings have been published before”.

Manuscripts submitted to the Journal may be screened with iThenticate anti-plagiarism software to detect and prevent plagiarism and redundant publication. Any manuscript may be screened, especially if there is reason to suppose that part or all the of the manuscript has been previously published. Prior to final acceptance any manuscript that has not already been screened may be screened with iThenticate. More information about iThenticate.

Peer Review

All manuscripts submitted to the Journal will be assessed by the Editorial Board. Some manuscripts will be returned to authors at this stage if they are deemed more appropriate for another journal, if the paper fails to meet submission requirements, or if they are deemed to have insufficient priority for further consideration.

This journal uses single-anonymised peer review. Single-anonymised peer review means that the identity of the authors is known to the reviewers, but the identities of the reviewers are not known to the authors. All peer review reports are confidential.

For full details about the peer review process, see the Publication Ethics page.

European Journal of Preventive Cardiology’s policy is to obtain at least two independent reviews of each article. Referees will be encouraged to provide substantive, constructive reviews that provide suggestions for improving the work and distinguish between mandatory and non-mandatory recommendations. Following the receipt of the reviewer comments, the Editor will make a decision as rapidly as possible.

As part of the submission process you will be asked to provide the names of three peers who could be called upon to review your manuscript. Recommended reviewers should be experts in their fields and should be able to provide an objective assessment of the manuscript. Please be aware of any conflicts of interest when recommending reviewers. Examples of conflicts of interest include (but are not limited to) the below:

• The reviewer should have no prior knowledge of your submission
• The reviewer should not have recently collaborated with any of the authors
• Reviewer nominees from the same institution as any of the authors are not permitted

Please note that the Editor is not obliged to invite/reject any recommended/opposed reviewers to assess your manuscript.

European Journal of Preventive Cardiology has partnered with ORCID Reviewer Deposit. This is a third-party service that seeks to track, verify, and give credit for peer review. Reviewers for European Journal of Preventive Cardiology can opt in to claim their reviews or have them automatically verified and added to their reviewer profile. Reviewers claiming credit for their review will be associated with the relevant journal, but the article name, reviewer’s decision, and the content of their review is not published on the site. For more information visit the ORCID website.

To ensure that manuscripts receive unbiased evaluation, it is the Journal’s policy that papers in which an Editor at the Journal is an author or contributor will be assigned to another Editor (one who is not at the same institute). This Editor will oversee the peer review and decision-making process. This policy also applies to papers where an Editor has declared any other conflict of interest.

Any manuscript in which the Editor-in-Chief is an author or contributor will be assigned to an Executive Editor. Papers that are handled by an Executive Editor will include a statement in the article.

The corresponding author should indicate in the cover letter if an Editor from the Journal is a co-author or contributor to the manuscript.

Individuals that have any conflicts of interest relating to the peer review and decision-making process are excluded from the process.

Appealing a Decision

If the authors have reason to believe that the review process or final decision has not been fair or well-informed, the authors may submit an appeal to the Journal. Appeals can be submitted within one month of the final decision on the manuscript. Appeals received after this date will not be considered. Only one appeal per manuscript will be considered. The appeal will be considered carefully by the Editor-in-Chief and the Editorial Board.

The authors should provide the appeal in a word document and attach it to an email to [email protected]. The appeal should include:

• Names of all authors submitting the appeal
• Email addresses and contact details of the authors, or the corresponding author
• Full manuscript title
• Manuscript ID from Editorial Manager
• An explanation outlining why the final decision was unfair or not merited
• Specific comments in relation to the peer review reports

Research ethics and patient consent

Medical research involving human subjects must be conducted according to World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki.

Submitted manuscripts should conform to the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, and all papers reporting animal and/or human studies must state in the methods section that the relevant Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board provided (or waived) approval. Please ensure that you have provided the full name and institution of the review committee, in addition to the approval number.

For research articles, authors are also required to state in the methods section confirming that participants (or parents/guardians) provided written consent.

Information on informed consent to report individual cases or case series should be included in the manuscript text. A statement is required regarding whether written informed consent for patient information and images to be published was provided by the patient(s) or a legally authorized representative.

Authors should observe high standards with respect to publication ethics as set out by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) recommendations for reporting about patients. Patients have a right to privacy that should not be infringed without prior informed consent.

The Editorial Board reserves the right to reject papers for which the ethical aspects are, in the opinion of the Editorial Board, open to doubt. Authors can contact the Editorial Office with any queries regarding consent.

Please also refer to the ICMJE Recommendations for the Protection of Research Participants.

Clinical trials 

European Journal of Preventive Cardiology conforms to the ICMJE requirement that clinical trials are registered in a WHO-approved public trials registry at or before the time of first patient enrolment as a condition of consideration for publication. The trial registry name and URL, and registration number must be included at the end of the abstract.

Authors should refer to the ICMJE guidelines on trial registration

Reporting guidelines

The relevant EQUATOR Network reporting guidelines should be followed depending on the type of study. For example, all randomized controlled trials submitted for publication should include a completed CONSORT flow chart as a cited figure and the completed CONSORT checklist should be uploaded with your submission as a supplementary file. Systematic reviews and meta-analyses should include the completed PRISMA flow chart as a cited figure and the completed PRISMA checklist should be uploaded with your submission as a supplementary file. The EQUATOR wizard can help you identify the appropriate guideline.

Other resources can be found at NLM’s Research Reporting Guidelines and Initiatives.

Reporting Demographic Information for Study Participants

The Journal adopts the definitions of sex and gender proposed by the Institute of Medicine Report, the United States National Institutes of Health and the Canadian Institutes of Heart Research.

De-identified information on demographics (e.g. age, sex, race/ethnicity, and/or socioeconomic indicators) should be described where available. This information should be included in the methods and/or results section of the article. Authors are required to explain demographic variables that have been collected but which are not included in the manuscript.

Terms and recommendations:

Sex and gender stratified data should be uniformly provided (in the work when relevant, in the Appendix when not). Authors should refer to the Sex and Gender Equity in Research (SAGER) guidelines.

Lack of compliance will not prevent the publication of the manuscript, but it will be disclosed in the same way as conflict of interest disclosures.

Statistics 

The application of adequate statistical methods is required for publication in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology. The Journal advises authors to ‘be as simple as possible, but as sophisticated as needed’. For example, clinical trials with their formalized framework must meet more specific statistical standards than pathophysiological studies. Authors are advised to include absolute risk as well as relative risk where possible. For studies with a sophisticated design, the collaboration of a professional statistician is recommended. Prior to acceptance, the manuscripts will be assessed by Statistical Editors if necessary.

Availability of Data and Materials

Where ethically feasible, the Journal strongly encourages authors to make all data and software code on which the conclusions of the paper rely available to readers. Authors are required to include a Data Availability Statement in their article.

We suggest that data be presented in the main manuscript or additional supporting files, or deposited in a public repository whenever possible. Information on general repositories for all data types, and a list of recommended repositories by subject area, is available on the Research Data Policy page.

Authors may be asked to make available the underlying deidentified data on which their research relies to the Journal for inspection and verification during the peer review process.

Data Availability Statement

The inclusion of a Data Availability Statement is a requirement for original research papers and research letters published in the Journal. Data Availability Statements provide a standardized format for readers to understand the availability of data underlying the research results described in the article. The statement may refer to original data generated in the course of the study or to third-party data analysed in the article. The statement should describe and provide means of access, where possible, by linking to the data or providing the required unique identifier. If no data is presented or discussed in your paper, you should indicate this as follows (or similar): “No new data were generated or analysed in support of this research”. Please include your data availability statement at the end of the main text in your manuscript.

More information and example Data Availability statements.

Data Citation

The Journal supports the Force 11 Data Citation Principles and requires that all publicly available datasets be fully referenced in the reference list with an accession number or unique identifier such as a digital object identifier (DOI). Data citations should include the minimum information recommended by DataCite:

• [dataset]* Authors, Year, Title, Publisher (repository or archive name), Identifier

*The inclusion of the [dataset] tag at the beginning of the citation helps us to correctly identify and tag the citation. This tag will be removed from the citation published in the reference list.

Preprints and self-archiving

Authors retain the right to make an Author’s Original Version (preprint) available through various channels and this does not prevent submission to the Journal. At initial submission, authors should indicate if any preprint is available in a server or repository. If accepted, the authors are required to update the status of any preprint, including adding the published paper’s DOI. For full details on allowed channels and updating your preprint, please see our Author self-archiving policy.

Authors of all article types, excluding ESC Guidelines, may enter their Accepted Manuscript (the final draft after peer review but before copyediting, typesetting and proof correction, also called the “post-print”) in PubMed Central, other subject repositories, or institutional repositories providing that the public availability of the manuscript is delayed by 12 months after the first online publication.

More information about this policy.

Conflict of Interest

All authors must declare any conflicts of interest (COI). It is the responsibility of each co-author to declare any conflicts of interests on submission and it is the responsibility of the corresponding author to ensure that the Journal receives all declarations from each co-author. Any potential conflict of interest that might constitute an embarrassment to any of the authors if it were not to be declared and were to emerge after publication should be declared. A detailed definition of conflicts of interests can be found on OUP's Publication Ethics page.

Instructions for the author/s:

• The corresponding author submits their conflicts of interest declaration by answering the mandatory COI questions in the submission system at the time of submission.
• Any co-authors listed will be contacted by email to confirm their co-authorship and to submit their COI declaration by answering a series of mandatory questions in the submission system.
• Authors are still required to provide a response to the COI questions even if there are no conflicts of interest to declare (state “none declared”).
• The corresponding author must, at revision stage (at the latest), submit a concise and accurate summary of any conflicts of interest declared under a “Disclosures” header in the manuscript. If there are no conflicts of interest, state “Conflict of interest: none declared”. The text under “Disclosures” will be included at the end of the article when published.
• Authors that hold a position on the Editorial Board of EJPC in any capacity are required to declare their role in their conflict of interest statement.

Post-Publication Corrections

The Publisher will only make changes to published papers if the publication record is seriously affected by the academic accuracy of the published information.

Changes to published papers are accompanied by a formal correction notice. This applies to papers on Advance articles and those published within an issue. This means that any change carried out to a paper already published online will have a corresponding correction published with its own DOI. The notice will be published online at the earliest opportunity (on the Journal’s Advance articles page if possible, otherwise in the earliest available issue), and will link to the paper being corrected. A link will also appear on the paper being corrected, notifying readers that a correction has been published.

Changes cannot be made to papers that have been published online for more than 12 months. In such instances a correction will be published explaining the error, but the paper will not be updated. The correction will be published online with links to the original paper as described above.

To submit a correction the corresponding author should email [email protected].

OUP’s full corrections policy.

Author’s Toll-Free Link

All corresponding authors will be provided with a free access link to their article upon publication.  The link will be sent via email to the article’s corresponding author who is free to share the link with any co-authors.  Please see OUP’s Author Self-Archiving policy for more information regarding how this link may be publicly shared depending on the type of license under which the article has published.  

Retractions

The Journal subscribes to the COPE Retraction Guidelines, which outlines appropriate use cases for retractions. The Journal also has the option of consulting the ESC Publications Ethics Committee.

Submission

Submission

We will consider your manuscript as long as

• it is your own original work and does not duplicate any previously published work, including your own;
• it is not under consideration, in peer review, or accepted for publication in any journal other than European Journal of Preventive Cardiology;
• it has not been published in any other journal; and
• it contains nothing abusive, defamatory, libelous, obscene, fraudulent, or illegal.

Authors should observe high ethical standards and obey publication best practices. The following are all unacceptable (see ‘Editorial Policies’ above for more detail):

• data falsification or fabrication
• plagiarism, including duplicate publication of your own work without proper citation
• misappropriation of work

We treat any case of ethical or publication malpractice very seriously. We will address them in accordance with the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines.

The Journal expects all authors to have read and understood the Editorial Policies of the Journal (above) prior to submission.

Authors submitting to the journal will be asked to select a category which best describes the focus of their paper. The paper, if accepted, will be identified by that category name in the contents list of the issue it is published. For a list of categories published in the Journal, please see our About page.

How to Submit

You must submit your paper via our web-based submission system. If you have not published with European Journal of Preventive Cardiology before, you will need to create an account. For more information, please see the Author Help page. Questions about submitting can be sent to the editorial office at [email protected]. Please add [email protected] to your safe senders list to avoid key emails about the publication of your article potentially going into your spam folder.

Authors are required to add their ORCiDs to their Editorial Manager accounts and include their ORCIDs as part of the submission process. If you do not already have one you can create one on the Register for an ORCID iD page.

Article Types

The following are the various article types which the journal publishes. Authors must adhere to the page/word counts given there. 

Full Research Articles

These are expected to be around 5,000 words in the main body of text (excluding the title, author names/affiliations, abstract, keywords, figures/tables and references). They may include up to a maximum of 6 figures and/or tables and up to 40 references. Supplementary materials (including tables, figures) may be submitted and published on-line as web-addenda (see below). Research articles should be divided into the following sections: (1) Title page, (2) Abstract*, lay summary** and up to six Keywords, (3) Introduction, (4) Methods, (5) Results, (6) Discussion, (7) Acknowledgements, (8) Funding, (9) Conflict of interest, (10) Authors’ Contributions, (11) References, (12) Figure legends, (13) Appendices, (14) Tables, (15) Figures, including a graphical abstract.

*The Abstract should be divided into the following sections ‘Aims’, ‘Methods’, ‘Results’ and ‘Conclusion’; it should not exceed 250 words.

** Lay summaries provide an overview of the paper for patients and/or the public. The lay summary should consist of a one sentence summary of the paper and two bullet points listing key findings. The lay summary should not exceed 250 words.

Clinical Practice/Education

Reviews and Issues for Debate articles, which focus on education in the clinical practice environment, are welcomed. These are expected to be around 5,000 words (excluding references, tables and figures). They may include up to a maximum of 6 figures and/or tables and up to 40 references. A formal structured division is not required, but an Abstract (less than 250 words length) is necessary. Graphical abstract is warranted. 

Reviews

European Journal of Preventive Cardiology publishes a limited number of scholarly, comprehensive Review papers that summarise and critically evaluate research in the field and discuss future implications. These papers may be invited or not. Systematic reviews and Meta-analyses, on the other hand, should follow the format of full research articles and should be submitted as a Full Research article during the submission process. Length: up to 8,700 words (each table or figure reducing the word count by 250), with an abstract of not more than 250 words which may be structured or unstructured (no headings), a graphical abstract, and up to 50 references.

Papers should be registered on the PROSPERO platform. Authors should follow the PRISMA recommendations and MOOSE reporting guidelines.

Consensus Documents / Position Papers 

Position Papers are prepared by a single scientific body, Consensus Documents by more than one: a formal endorsement letter from the Scientific Association(s) is required, and the Authors should acknowledge that they are writing on behalf of it. Before submitting an ESC official document, the Authors should first contact the ESC Clinical Practice Guidelines (CPG) Committee with their proposal, in order to receive its approval. The approval of the ESC CPG committee should be stated in the cover letter. These papers are expected to be around 10 journal pages long (i.e. around 8,700 words, with each table or figure reducing that word count by 250), with an unstructured abstract (no headings) which should not exceed 250 words, a graphical abstract, and up to 50 references.

Editorials

All editorials should be limited to 1,300 words (excluding references), with no more than 10 references. They do not require an abstract and may include no more than one table or figure. In particular, the addition of one figure would be welcome and could add to the understanding and attractiveness of the article. The following different categories of editorials may be considered:

• Invited Editorial. Written upon invitation by the Editor, it is a comment to a research article and should discuss its results, compare them with the current literature and give a personal interpretation of the study. The number of authors for invited editorials should not exceed 3.
• Viewpoint. This is a commentary on a topical item, unrelated to a specific publication but rather a specific topic. It may be invited or not. When we receive more Viewpoints regarding a similar topic they may be gathered under the category of “Controversies” in the index page. However, their labelling will remain “Viewpoint” in the title page so that they may be considered alone. The number of authors for Viewpoints should not exceed 6.

Rapid Communications 

Rapid Communications (formerly Research Letters) based on original research findings are also allowed, they are not structured, and with no Abstract. This type of article may include up to 1000 words, including around 10 references, and one figure or Table. While there should be no sub-headings, however, a short description of methods, results and conclusions is required. Rapid Communications should present only evidence-based research reports, based on solid scientific research.

Letters to the Editor

Letters to the Editor may regard comments to an article published in our journal in a previous issue. These letters should have a maximum of 3 authors, should not exceed 700 words and have a maximum of 5 references, including one reference to the article that they are about. We may ask for a reply from the authors of the original article and the letter and its reply will be published together. Letters should present only evidence-based research reports, based on solid scientific research.

All word counts are exclusive of references, figure legends, and text in tables. 

Title page

• The title page should carry the full title of the paper, consisting of no more than 20 words (only common abbreviations should be used if absolutely necessary); titles should be clear and brief, conveying the main message of the paper.
• All authors’ names: the full first name, middle name/initial (optional) and last name of each author should appear; if the work is to be attributed to a department or institution, its full name and location should be included. Persons listed as authors should be those who substantially contributed to the study's conception, design, and performance as per the guidance in section above.
• The affiliations of all the authors; when authors are affiliated to more than one institution, their names should be connected using a,b,c. These letters should follow the surname but precede the address; they should be used only for the second and subsequent addresses.
• a short running head of 50 characters or less.
• Information about previous presentations of the whole or part of the work presented in the article.
• The sources of any support, for all authors, for the work in the form of grants, equipment, drugs, or any combination of these.
• Disclaimers, if any.
• The name and address of the author responsible for correspondence concerning the manuscript.
• The peer review process as well as publication will be delayed if you do not provide an up to date email address.
• Word count (excluding references).

Abstract

Abstracts are required for Full Research Papers (structured), Reviews (can be either structured or unstructured), Clinical Practice/Education papers (unstructured) and Consensus Documents/Position Papers (unstructured) - they are not required for Research Letters, Editorials, or Commentaries. Abstracts should not exceed 250 words. If structured, the abstract should include sections on Aim, Methods, Results and Conclusions. Please list the abstract word count at the end of the abstract.

Graphical abstracts

Authors are requested to submit a graphical abstract as part of the article, in addition to the text abstract. Graphical abstracts help communicate the key messages in your paper to readers in a clear and immediate way. They are well-suited to sharing on social media, which helps disseminate research more widely and allows readers to easily identify papers that are of interest to them. The graphical abstract must be clear and eye-catching as it will help to attract readers to your publication. It can include one or more of the key images/figures/graphs of the article. The graphical abstract must be referenced in the text as any other figure. It should be submitted for peer review as a separate file, selecting the appropriate file-type designation in the journal’s online submission system. The file should be clearly named, e.g. graphical_abstract.tiff.

If your paper is accepted, and per the decision of the Editor, a leading medical illustration company may be engaged to redraw your graphics and the ESC will bear the cost of this service. Please adhere to the following guidelines when preparing your graphical abstract:

• Size: 12.5 cm x 18.0 cm (height x width)
• Minimum resolution: 300 dpi (the dpi of an image can usually be found by right-clicking on an image file and selecting ‘Properties’)
• Font: use a sans serif font. Gill Sans is preferred but Myriad Pro, Arial, or Helvetica are acceptable.
• Font size: text should be 10-12 points, but no smaller than 8 points
• A figure legend should be included for the graphic element, which should define any abbreviations. This should be given in the ‘Legends’ section of the manuscript

Guidance on how to create an effective graphical abstract.

See Preparing and submitting your manuscript for guidance on appropriate file format and resolution for graphics and videos.

Keywords

The abstract should be followed by a list of 3-10 keywords which will assist the cross-indexing of the article and will be published. The terms used should be from the Medical Subject Headings list of the Index Medicus.

Third-Party Permissions

If you wish to reproduce any material for which you do not own the copyright—including quotations, tables, or images—you must obtain permission from the copyright holder. The permissions agreement must include the following documents:

• nonexclusive rights to reproduce the material in your article in European Journal of Preventive Cardiology
• both print and electronic rights, preferably for use in any form or medium
• lifetime rights to use the material
• worldwide English-language rights.

Further information on obtaining permissions is available.

Manuscript transfer within the ESC Journal Family

Oxford University Press (OUP) and the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) have introduced a means for transfer of manuscripts among the ESC Journal Family. Authors submitting to a journal within the family will be given the opportunity to indicate whether or not their manuscript could be considered for transfer to another journal within the ESC Journal Family if the initial journal is unable to consider their manuscript further.

If authors agree during the upload process to have their manuscript transferred, and the manuscript is henceforth approved for transfer, there will be no need for re-submission and any reviewer comments will be transferred, resulting in a reduced time to a decision. Please see Manuscript sharing for more information.

Manuscript Preparation: Format, Structure, and Style

Presubmission Language Editing

If you are not confident in the quality of your English, you may wish to use a language-editing service to ensure that editors and reviewers understand your paper. Language editing is optional and does not guarantee that your manuscript will be accepted. Edited manuscripts will still undergo peer review by the journal.

Oxford University Press partners with Enago, a leading provider of author services. Prospective EJPC authors are entitled to a discount of 30% for editing services at Enago, via the Specialist English Editing Services for Oxford University Press Authors page. 

Style

Oxford English spelling should be used throughout, except in quotations and in references. Section headings should be unnumbered and SI units of measurement should be used.

Abbreviations

Please define nonstandard abbreviations at the first occurrence.

Tables

You must number all tables (e.g., Table 1, Table 2, Table 3) and reference them in the text. You must place all tables at the end of the main text. Tables should be in an editable format, and not embedded as an image file.

References

You may format references in any readable style at submission, but will be asked to format your manuscript according to journal requirements prior to acceptance. You are responsible for the accuracy of reference information. Style files for reference managers can be found here:

• Endnote—use the ‘European Heart Journal’ output style
• Zotero/Mendeley—use the Oxford University Press SCIMED (numeric)’ output style.

In following journal style, references should be identified in the text by Arabic numerals and numbered in the order cited. All references should be compiled at the end of the article in the Vancouver style (i.e. author-number system). Complete information should be given for each reference, including title of article, abbreviated journal title, and inclusive page numbers. The first six authors should be listed. If there are more than six authors, the first six authors should be listed followed by ‘et al.’.

Article citation example:

1. Schroeder S, Baumbach A, Mahrholdt H. The impact of untreated coronary dissections on the acute and long-term outcome after intravascular ultrasound guided PTCA. Eur Heart J 2000;21:137-145.

Book citation example:

2. Nichols WW, Rourke MF. Aging, High Blood Pressure and Disease in Human. 3rd ed. London/Melbourne: Lea and Febiger; 1990.

Chapter citation example:

3. Nichols WW, O'Rourke MF. Aging, high blood pressure and disease in humans. In: Arnold E, ed. McDonald's Blood Flow in Arteries: Theoretical, Experimental and Clinical Principles. 3rd ed. London/Melbourne/Auckland: Lea and Febiger; 1990. p398-420.

Webpage citation example:

4. Panteghini M. Recommendations on use of biochemical markers in acute coronary syndrome: IFCC proposals. eJIFCC 14. http://www.ifcc.org/ejifcc/vol14no2/1402062003014n.htm (28 May 2004)

where the date in parenthesis refers to the access date.

Acknowledgments and Funding

Acknowledgments and funding information should be included at the end of your manuscript. Please fully cite any relevant funding information, including specific grant numbers.

LaTeX

Information on LaTeX files and formatting can be found on the Preparing and submitting your manuscript page.

Figures

You must include figure titles and legends within the manuscript file—they should not be included in the image file.

You must submit each figure as an individual image file. Submit all panels of a multipanel figure on a single page as one file. For example, if the figure has 3 panels, the figure should be submitted as one file. Each panel should be labelled as a letter (A, B, C, D, etc.) in the upper-left corner of each panel.

Images of photographs or paintings can be provided as raster images. Common examples of raster images are .tif/.tiff, .raw, .gif, and .bmp file types. The resolution of raster files is measured by the number of dots or pixels in a given area, referred to as “dpi” or “ppi.”

• minimum resolution required for images or pictures: 350dpi
• minimum resolution for line art: 600dpi (complex or finely drawn line art should be 1200dpi)
• minimum resolution for electronic images (i.e., for on-screen viewing): 72dpi

Images of maps, charts, graphs, and diagrams are best rendered digitally as geometric forms called vector graphics. Common file types are .eps, .ai, and .pdf. Vector images use mathematical relationships between points and the lines connecting them to describe an image. These file types do not use pixels; therefore, resolution does not apply to vector images.

Figures prepared as .doc/.docx or .jpeg/.jpg files may not be accepted.

Figure accessibility and alt text

Incorporating alt text (alternative text) when submitting your paper helps to foster inclusivity and accessibility. Good alt text ensures that individuals with visual impairments or those using screen readers can comprehend the content and context of your figures. The aim of alt text is to provide concise and informative descriptions of your figure so that all readers have access to the same level of information and understanding, and that all can engage with and benefit from the visual elements integral to scholarly content. Including alt text demonstrates a commitment to accessibility and enhances the overall impact and reach of your work.  

Alt text is applicable to all images, figures, illustrations, and photographs. 

Alt text is only accessible via e-reader and so it won’t appear as part of the typeset article. 

Detailed guidance on how to draft and submit alt text. 

Supplementary Material

If you wish to publish supplementary data or supplementary material these must be submitted at the same time as the main manuscript.

• Supplementary material must be cited in the text of the main manuscript.
• Supplementary material will be available online and will not be copyedited or typeset.
• Style and formatting of supplementary material should be consistent with that of the manuscript.
• Supplementary material should be formatted to function on any internet browser.
• Supplementary material files should be no larger than 15MB each.

Licence to Publish and Open Access Options

European Journal of Preventive Cardiology offers the option of publishing under either a standard licence or an open access licence. Please note that some funders require open access publication as a condition of funding. If you are unsure whether you are required to publish open access, please do clarify any such requirements with your funder or institution.

In signing a standard licence to publish, the corresponding author (on behalf of all authors) grants an exclusive licence to the European Society of Cardiology to publish their paper in European Journal of Preventive Cardiology. There is no charge to publish under a standard licence.

Should you wish to publish your article open access, you should select your choice of open access licence in our online system after your article has been accepted for publication. You will need to pay an open access charge to publish under an open access licence.

Please note that if you have been invited to submit to the Journal, and you select an open access licence, you will still be required to pay.

Details of the open access licences and open access charges.

OUP has a growing number of Read and Publish agreements with institutions and consortia which provide funding for open access publishing. This means authors from participating institutions can publish open access, and the institution may pay the charge. Find out if your institution is participating and whether your paper is eligible.

To be eligible for one of OUP’s Read and Publish agreements, the corresponding author must provide their qualifying institution as their primary affiliation when they submit their manuscript. After submission, changing the corresponding author in order to access Read and Publish funding is not permissible.

Author’s accepted manuscript

EJPC aims to publish authors’ accepted manuscripts on the Advance Access page within 2 weeks of receipt at OUP, as long as a license to publish is signed as soon as possible (a link will be sent in the initial email when a paper is sent to OUP). The accepted manuscript will be published in PDF format.

Manuscripts are then copyedited, typeset, proofed out, and corrected. Once the manuscripts are finalized, the uncorrected manuscripts are replaced with the final corrected articles in HTML and PDF format.

Proofs

Page proofs will be submitted to the corresponding author electronically. These should be checked thoroughly for any changes or typographic errors.

It is the Publisher’s intent to review and correct the proofs and publish the accepted work as soon as possible. To achieve this, all corrections must be returned to the Publisher within 3 days.

Publication Embargoes

The Journal will coordinate embargoes if this is required by the authors. Authors should email the Editorial Office ([email protected]) as soon as possible if an embargo is required, stating the exact date and time that the paper can be published. Authors should also include a note to production when returning proofs.

Press Releases

If a press release will be prepared and issued by the institution or funder of one or more of the authors, the authors should reach out to the EJPC Editorial Office ([email protected]) as soon as possible and before the final decision is made on the article. The Journal publishes the accepted manuscript version of the paper shortly after acceptance, and this process cannot be interrupted. No version of a paper may be temporarily withdrawn once published.

If the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) or OUP on behalf of the Journal opt to take forward a press release, the authors will be contacted by [email protected].

Contact Us

For any questions or feedback please contact the Editorial Office: [email protected]