Instructions for Authors
- Pre-submission
- Submitting
- Pre-Submission Language Editing
- Authorship
- Previously published material
- Online Submission
- Manuscript format and style for all articles
- Manuscript Preparation
- Availability of Data and Materials
- Preprint policy
- Types of papers
- Disclosure of Potential Conflict of Interest
- Ethical Research
- Funding
- Change of Address
- Important Notes to Authors
- Proofs
- Permission to Reproduce Figures and Extracts
- Supplementary Data
- Publication Ethics
- CrossRef Funding Data Registr
- Post-submission and promotion
Pre-submission
Scope
Health Policy and Planning is an open access journal, publishing health policy and systems research focusing on low- and middle-income countries.
It provides an international forum for publishing original and high-quality research that addresses questions pertinent to policymakers, public health researchers and practitioners.
It aims to :
- Ensures wide geographical coverage of papers and attracts high quality research papers, reviews and debates on topics relevant to health policies in low- and middle-income countries;
- Encourage and support researchers from low- and middle-income countries to publish;
- Attract papers that reflect a broad range of disciplines, methodologies and topics;
- Publish papers that are clearly explained and accessible to readers from the range of disciplines used to analyse health policies; and
- Provide a fair, supportive and high-quality peer review process.
Health Policy and Planning provides video resources to guide authors on the best practices for submitting.
Open Access
Health Policy and Planning moved to fully Open Access on 1st of January 2024. Content published prior to that date is free to view, and all rights are reserved.
After your manuscript is accepted, you will be asked to sign a licence to publish through our licencing and payment portal, SciPris.. The corresponding author must arrange payment of an open access charge to publish in the Journal. This charge allows all published papers to be immediately and freely available to all readers immediately upon online publication. Editorial decisions occur prior to this step and are not influenced by payment or the ability to pay. If you select a CC BY license, you will grant OUP a non-exclusive license. Under the other licenses, you grant OUP an exclusive licence to publish and distribute the content. For all licenses you, the author, retain copyright for the content and have the reuse rights described therein.
Papers can be published under the following licences
- Creative Commons Attribution licence (CC BY)
- Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial licence (CC BY-NC)
- United States Government Licence
- Crown Copyright - Open Government Licence
See the OUP guidance on Licences, copyright, and re-use rights for more information regarding these publishing agreement options.
Open Government Licence
This is an open licencing model for content produced by employees of UK Crown bodies allowing users to copy, publish, distribute adapt and transmit the Information for commercial and non-commercial purposes. For additional information see here.
Complying with funder mandates
Some funders require open access publication as a condition of funding. If you are unsure whether you are required to publish open access, please clarify any requirements with your funder or institution before selecting your licence.
Further information on funder mandates and direct links to a range of funder policies.
Open access charges
Please see the details of open access licences and charges. As the Journal is fully open access, you must pay the open access charge or request to use an institutional agreement to pay the open access charge through our licencing and payment portal, SciPris.
Open access charges applicable to this journal:
- Original Research, Review Articles, How To Do...Or Not To Do and Methodological Musings - £2,423
- Commentaries - £1,212
- Members of Health Systems Global benefit from a 25% reduction on the full article processing charge (APC).
Editorials, 10 Best Resources, Innovation and Practice Reports and Corrections do not require an APC and can be published free of charge.
We do not want authors to be prevented from publishing because of financial barriers. There are two routes through which you may be able to secure support to help with the costs of publication through Health Policy and Planning.
Read and Publish agreements, these 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.
Waiver policies - if the corresponding author is based in one of the low income countries included in OUP’s Developing Countries Initiative, your article will receive a full waiver of the open access charge. This waiver will be automatically applied during the production process, but if you have any questions, or need help indicating your eligibility, please contact the Health Policy and Planning Editorial Office ([email protected]).
Health Policy and Planning may be able to offer a discretionary full or partial waiver to other authors if they do not have funding to pay the Article Processing Charge. Authors can request a waiver after their paper’s acceptance for publication by visiting the OUP APC Waiver Policy page and filling out a Waiver request form.
Before you submit please make sure you have followed all the relevant instructions. A checklist for authors is available on the HPP webpage.
Improving your chances of publication
As well as the high overall quality required for publication in an international journal, authors should take into consideration:
- The need to address Health Policy and Planning’s readership: national and international policy makers, practitioners, academics and general readers with a particular interest in health policy issues and debates.
- The fact that manuscripts that fail to set out the international debates to which the paper contributes, and to draw out policy lessons and conclusions, are more likely to be rejected, returned to the authors for redrafting prior to being reviewed, or undergo a slower acceptance process.
- Economists should note that papers accepted for publication in Health Planning and Policy will consider the broad policy implications of an economic analysis rather than focusing primarily on the methodological or theoretical aspects of the study.
- Public health specialists writing about a specific health problem or service should discuss the relevance of the analysis for the broader health system. Those submitting health policy analyses should draw on relevant bodies of theory in their analysis, or justify why they have not, rather than only presenting a narrative based on empirical data.
- That papers should primarily focus on one or more low- or middle-income countries.
The editors cannot enter into correspondence about papers considered unsuitable for publication and their decision is final. Neither the editors nor the publishers accept responsibility for the views of authors expressed in their contributions. The editors reserve the right to make amendments to the papers submitted although, whenever possible, they will seek the authors' consent to any significant changes made. The manuscript will not be returned to authors following submission unless specifically requested.
Should you require any assistance in submitting your article or have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact the editorial office at [email protected].
Submitting
Pre-Submission Language Editing
You may wish to use a language-editing service before submitting to ensure that editors and reviewers understand your manuscript. Our publisher, Oxford University Press, partners with Enago, a leading provider of author services. Through the OUP-Enago partner page, prospective authors are entitled to a discount for language editing, abstract and layperson summary writing, rejected manuscript editing, and creation of graphical abstracts, illustrations, and videos.
Enago is an independent service provider, which will handle all aspects of this service, including payment. As an author you are under no obligation to take up this offer. Language editing and other services from Enago are optional and do not guarantee that your manuscript will be accepted. Edited manuscripts will undergo the regular review process of the Journal. For more details and a list of additional resources, please see OUP’s page on language services.
Alternatively, you can contact AuthorAid, a free network which provides free mentoring and English-language editing for researchers in low-and middle-income countries.
Authorship
Requirements
Authorship is limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the design and execution of the work described. Any contributors whose participation does not meet the criteria for authorship should be acknowledged but not listed as an author. The Journal will contact all listed authors at the point of submission to confirm their role.
We are proud to publish research from low- and middle-income countries. We wish to advise our authors and readers that, as a general rule, for empirical research and research using secondary data, only papers that include at least one co-author based in one of the countries where the research was undertaken will be published in the journal. If authors have any questions, they should contact the journal prior to submission for advice at [email protected].
If all named authors are from high-income countries please clarify the reason for this on the Title Page under the heading "Authorship."
Ghost authorship
The Journal does not allow ghost authorship, where an unnamed author prepares the article with no credit, or guest/gift authorship, where an author who made little or no contribution is listed as an author. The Journal follows Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidance on investigating and resolving these cases. For more information, please see the OUP Publication Ethics page.
Use of AI
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 both in cover letters to editors and in the Methods or Acknowledgements section of manuscripts. Please see the COPE position statement on Authorship and AI for more details.
Authorship changes
After manuscript submission, no authorship changes (including the authorship list, author order, and who is designated as the corresponding author) should be made unless there is a substantive reason to do so. The editor and all co-authors must agree on the change(s), and neither the Journal nor the publisher mediates authorship disputes. If individuals cannot agree on the authorship of a submitted manuscript, contact the editorial office at [email protected]. The dispute must be resolved among the individuals and their institution(s) before the manuscript can be accepted for publication. If an authorship dispute or change arises after a paper is accepted, contact OUP’s Author Support team. COPE provides guidance for authors on resolving authorship disputes.
Author contribution statement
An "Author Contribution Statement" is required on the Title Page of all submissions
Please clarify how each author has contributed to the paper. You need to create a list assigning a person’s name against the following roles or tasks:
- Conception or design of the work
- Data collection
- Data analysis and interpretation
- Drafting the article
- Critical revision of the article
- Final approval of the version to be submitted - all named authors should approve the paper prior to submission.
Reflexivity statement
At Health Policy and Planning, we believe in reducing inequities in global health research. We invite you to reflect on the inclusivity within the authors’ group for this paper. You may want to consider inclusivity and balance in dimensions such as gender, seniority, regional location, etc when writing this statement.
Previously published material
Manuscripts containing original material are accepted for consideration with the understanding that neither the article nor any part of its essential substance, tables, or figures has been or will be published or submitted for publication elsewhere. This restriction does not apply to abstracts or short press reports published in connection with scientific meetings. Copies of any closely related manuscripts should be submitted along with the manuscript that is to be considered by the journal. The journal discourages the submission of more than one article dealing with related aspects of the same study. See our Prior Publication Policy for more information.
During the online submission procedure, authors are asked to provide:
- information on prior or duplicate publication or submission elsewhere of any part of the work;
- a statement of financial or other relationships that might lead to a conflict of interest or a statement that the authors do not have any conflict of interest;
- a statement that the manuscript has been read and approved by all authors (see also section on authorship);
- name, address, telephone and fax number of the corresponding author who is responsible for negotiations concerning the manuscript;
- copies of any permissions to reproduce already published material, or to use illustrations or report sensitive personal information about identifiable persons.
All papers submitted are checked by the editorial office for conformance to author and other instructions all specified below. Non-conforming manuscripts will be returned to authors.
If authors are unsure about the originality of their manuscript or any part of it, they should contact the editorial office at [email protected].
Online Submission
Prior to submission please carefully read instructions on each type of paper and closely follow instructions on word count, abstract, tables and figures and references. This will ensure that the review and publication of your paper is as efficient and quick as possible. The Editorial Office reserve the right to return manuscripts that are not in accordance with these instructions.
All material to be considered for publication in Health Policy and Planning should be submitted in electronic form via the journal's online submission system. Once you have prepared your manuscript according to the instructions below, instructions on how to submit your manuscript online can be found by clicking Manuscript Submission.
The OUP LaTeX template produces manuscripts matching the formatting requirements of the journals listed here. The template is available on Overleaf.com, at CTAN, and as a direct download.
Manuscript format and style for all articles
Only articles in English are considered for publication.
The journal follows Oxford SCIMED style. Please refer to these requirements when preparing your manuscript. More information on preparing your manuscript is available. Oxford English spelling style should be used consistently throughout your manuscript. (-ize/-ization), except in quotations and in references.
Prepare your manuscript, including tables, using a word processing program and save it as a .doc, .rtf or .ps file. Use a minimum font size of 11, double-spaced and paginated throughout including references and tables, with margins of at least 2.5 cm. The text should be left justified and not hyphenated.
Title Page
The Title Page should be uploaded as a separate file type "Title Page" and contain the following information:
- Title
- Corresponding authors name, address, country, e-mail address, ORCID details
- Each authors affiliation and qualification (BSc, MA, PhD...)
- Keywords
- Reflexivity Statement
- A word count of the full article: Word Limits do not include Abstract, References, Figure/Table legends.
- Ethical Approval
- if no ethical approval was required for the research, please note the reason:
- Example A: Ethical approval for this type of study is not required by our institute.
- Example B: Ethical approval for this research was waived by the authors institute/s IRB.
- Ethical Approval Received-Please note the institute/s which approved the research with reference number.
- if no ethical approval was required for the research, please note the reason:
Funding/Acknowledgements/Conflicts of interest/Ethical approval should be noted on the title page.
In the acknowledgements, all contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed. Sources of funding for research must be explicitly stated, including grant numbers if appropriate. Other financial and material support, specifying the nature of the support, should be acknowledged as well.
Figures
Figures should be designed using a well-known software package for standard personal computers. If a figure has been published earlier, acknowledge the original source and submit written permission from the copyright holder to reproduce the material.
The requirements for online submission and for reproduction in the journal are different: (i) for online submission and peer review, upload your figures separately as low-resolution images (.jpg, .tif, .gif or. eps); (ii) for reproduction in the journal, you will be required, after acceptance, to supply high-resolution .tif files. Minimum resolutions are 300 d.p.i. for colour images or 600 d.p.i for tone images, and 1200 d.p.i. for line drawings. We advise that you create your high-resolution images first as these can be easily converted into low-resolution images for online submission.
Figures will not be re-lettered by the publisher. The journal reserves the right to reduce the size of illustrative material. Any photomicrographs, electron micrographs or radiographs must be of high quality. Wherever possible, photographs should fit within the print area or within a column width. Photomicrographs should provide details of staining technique and a scale bar. Patients shown in photographs should have their identity concealed or should have given their written consent to publication. When creating figures, please make sure any embedded text is large enough to read. Many figures contain miniscule characters such as numbers on a chart or graph. If these characters are not easily readable, they will most likely be illegible in the final version.
Certain image formats such as .jpg and .gif do not have high resolutions, so you may need to save your figures and insert them as .tif instead.
For information on preparing your figures for publication, visit OUP's Preparing and submitting your manuscript page.
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.
Manuscript Preparation
Page 1: Title Page – as above.
Page 2: Abstract. To be prepared in one paragraph, no headings are required. It should describe the purpose, materials and methods, results, and conclusion in a single paragraph no longer than 300 words without line feeds.
Page 3: Key Messages. Include 3-4 key focusing on the main points in the paper, explaining the rationale for the research/paper, key finding(s), and implication(s) and lessons for health systems and health policy. Text should not be taken verbatim from the abstract. Please see this article as an example.
Page 4: Introduction. This should state the purpose of the investigation and give a short review of the pertinent literature and be followed by:
Methods. This section should follow the Introduction and provide full information about how the study was conducted, appropriate for the study design.
Results. This section should describe the critical findings of the study. Data should be presented as concisely as possible, if appropriate in the form of tables or figures, although very large tables should be avoided.
Discussion. This should be an interpretation of the results and their significance with reference to work by other authors.
Abbreviations. Non-standard abbreviations should be defined at the first occurrence and introduced only where multiple use is made. Authors should not use abbreviations in headings.
All measures should be reported in SI units, followed (where necessary) by the traditional units in parentheses. There are two exceptions: blood pressure should be expressed in mmHg and haemoglobin in g/dl. For general guidance on the International System of Units, and some useful conversion factors, see 'The SI for the Health Professions' (WHO 1977).
References. References must follow the Harvard system and must be cited as follows:
Baker and Watts (1993) found...
In an earlier study (Baker and Watts 1993), it...
Where works by more than two authors are cited, only the first author is named followed by 'et al.' and the year. The reference list must be typed double-spaced in alphabetical order and include the full title of both paper (or chapter) and journal (or book), thus:
Baker S, Watts P. 1993. Paper/chapter title in normal script. Journal/book title in italics Volume number in bold: page numbers.
Baker S, Watts P. 1993. Chapter title in normal script. In: Smith B (ed). Book title in italics. 2nd edn. Place of publication: Publisher's name, page numbers.
Tables All tables should be on separate pages and accompanied by a title - and footnotes where necessary. The tables should be numbered consecutively using Arabic numerals. Units in which results are expressed should be given in parentheses at the top of each column and not repeated in each line of the table. Ditto signs are not used. Avoid overcrowding the tables and the excessive use of words. The format of tables should be in keeping with that normally used by the journal; in particular, vertical lines, coloured text and shading should not be used. Please be certain that the data given in tables are correct. Tables should be provided as Word or Excel files.
Availability of Data and Materials
Where ethically feasible, Health Policy and Planning 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.
Data should be presented in the main manuscript or additional supporting files or deposited in a public repository whenever possible. For information on general repositories for all data types, and a list of recommended repositories by subject area, please see Choosing where to archive your data.
Data Availability Statement
The inclusion of a Data Availability Statement is a requirement for all articles published in Health Policy and Planning. Data Availability Statements provide a standardised 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.
The Data Availability Statement should be included in the end matter of your article under the heading ‘Data availability’.
More information and examples of Data Availability Statements.
Data and Software Citation
Health Policy and Planning supports the Force 11 Data Citation Principles and the recommendations of the FORCE11 Software Citation Implementation Group. When data and software underlying the research article are available in an online source, authors should include a full citation in their reference list.
For details of the minimum information to be included in data and software citations see the guidance on Citing research data and software.
Preprint policy
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. For further information see our Online Licensing, Copyright and Permissions policies. If accepted, the authors are required to update the status of any preprint, including your published paper’s DOI, as described on our Author Self-Archiving policy page.
Types of papers
Health Policy and Planning welcomes submissions of the following article types:
- Original research
- Review articles
- Methodological musings
- Innovation and practice reports
- Commentaries
- 'How to do (or not to do)...' [for example, see Hutton & Baltussen, HPP, 20(4): 252-9] and
- '10 best resources' [for example, see David & Haberlen, HPP, 20(4): 260-3].
Original Research
Manuscripts reporting quantitative or fixed design studies should be a maximum of 6,000 words, excluding tables and figures/diagrams and references.
Manuscripts reporting qualitative, mixed method or flexible design studies should be a maximum of 7,000 words, excluding tables and figures/diagrams and references.
The manuscript will generally follow through sections: Title page, Abstract (no more than 300 words), Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusion, Acknowledgements, References. It may be appropriate to combine the results and discussion sections in some papers. Tables and Figures should not be placed within the text, rather provided in separate file/s.
For the reporting of statistical analyses please consider the following additional points:
- Focus the statistical analysis at the research question.
- Provide information about participation and missing data.
- As much as possible, describe results using meaningful phrases (e.g., do not say "beta" or "regression coefficient", but "mean change in Y per unit of X"). Provide 95% confidence intervals for estimates.
- Report the proportions as N (%), not just %.
- Report P values with 2 digits after the decimal, 3 if <0.01 or near 0.05 (e.g., 0.54, 0.03, 0.007, <0.001, 0.048). Do not report P values greater than 0.05 as "NS".
- Always include a leading zero before the decimal point (e.g., 0.32 not .32).
- Do not report tests statistics (such as chi-2, T, F, etc.)."
For acknowledgements, figures and measures see above.
Review Articles
Manuscripts should be a maximum of 10,000 words, excluding tables, figures/diagrams and references.
Reviews may be invited. They generally address recent advances in health policy, health systems and implementation. Systematic reviews are welcomed but may not be appropriate for every topic. If authors are submitting a review article that is not a systematic review, then the paper should explain why a systematic review was not feasible/desirable, and the review methods should be described in a way that is as clear and as replicable as possible.
The manuscript will generally follow through sections: Abstract (no more than 300 words), Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusion, References. However, it may be appropriate to combine the results and discussion sections in some papers. Tables and Figures should not be placed within the text, rather provided in separate file/s.
Although the PRISMA checklist may not be fully relevant for all types of review, we request you fill in the checklist as fully as possible as part of your submission.
Checklists have been developed for a number of study designs, including randomized controlled trials (CONSORT), systematic reviews (PRISMA), observational studies (STROBE), diagnostic accuracy studies (STARD) and qualitative studies (COREQ, RATS). We recommend authors refer to the EQUATOR Network website for further information on the available reporting guidelines for health research, and the MIBBI Portal for prescriptive checklists for reporting biological and biomedical research where applicable. Authors are requested to make use of these when drafting their manuscript and peer reviewers will also be asked to refer to these checklists when evaluating these studies.
Commentaries
Short commentaries on topical issues in health systems are welcomed - please email the editorial office prior to submission. Most commentaries are commissioned by the editors, but the journal will also consider unsolicited submissions…which must be within the parameters of the journal’s overall focus and sections. Commentaries should be of broad interest to readers of Health Policy and Planning, and while they are not research papers, they should be well substantiated. Manuscripts should preferably be a maximum of 1,200 words, excluding tables, figures/diagrams and references.
The manuscript will generally contain a short set of key take-home messages. Tables and Figures should not be placed within the text, rather provided in separate file/s.
How To Do...Or Not To Do
These explain how to use a particular research or analytical method (e.g. social network analysis, discrete choice experiment etc.). The research or analytical methods discussed should be well accepted and clearly defined: this category of paper is not meant to address methodological debates but rather to help disseminate and promote the use of well-accepted methodologies.
Manuscripts should be a maximum of 3,000 words excluding tables, figures/diagrams and references.
- The sections must be arranged as follows: i) Title page, ii) Abstract, iii) Introduction, iv) Body of the paper, and v) References. Main sections should be coordinated by the author and inserted between Introduction and Reference sessions. Please contact our office before submitting a manuscript in this category.
Tables and Figures should not be placed within the text, rather provided in separate file/s.
10 Best Resources
This is a series of articles that identify and outline the 10 most useful resources from a range of sources to help facilitate a better understanding of a particular issue in global health.
We often commission these articles but we also welcome unsolicited suggestions.
For acknowledgements, figures and measures see Title page.
Methodological Musings
This series addresses methodological issues in health policy and systems research, where there is currently a lack of clarity about accepted research methods. This series supports the development of the health policy and systems research field, through methodological discussion.
Manuscripts should preferably be a maximum of 3,000 words, excluding tables, figures/diagrams and references.
The sections must be arranged as follows:
- Title page
- Key Points. Please note a 2-3 bullet point summary about the ‘methodogical gap’ that the paper addresses and the methodological development(s) covered in the paper.
- Abstract
- Introduction
- Body of the paper
- References.
Main sections should be coordinated by the author and inserted between Introduction and Reference sessions. Please contact our office before submitting a manuscript in this category.
For acknowledgements, figures and measures see Title page.
Innovation and Practice Reports
These short reports are narratives and/or reflections/experiences from the perspective of health leaders, managers and practitioners operating at the national or sub-national level which focus on innovative approaches to strengthen health systems. They do not need to report a completely new activity or practice but could consider an adaptation or modification to an existing one. Papers should highlight the experience of health system practitioners in taking action to strengthen health systems through innovative activities. These activities might address governance or human resource management approaches, for example, rather than having a health care focus. Other relevant activities include practices to build capacity, develop new partnerships, new approaches to management, or restructuring relationships within health systems implemented at scale with the intention of promoting changes in practice. The innovations should preferably have been implemented for sufficient time to allow authors to demonstrate their potential system benefits, including sustained improvement over time. We encourage authors to think how the experience they report adds to existing work in their own setting, as well as other settings - but this is not essential.
We will not consider clinical and pharmaceutical innovations and practices.
Manuscripts should be a maximum of 2,000 words. The manuscript will generally present the following sections:
- Key Messages 3-4 key messages focusing on the main points in the paper, ideally explaining the rationale for the research/paper, key finding(s), and implication(s) and lessons for health systems and health policy. Text should not be taken verbatim from the abstract. Please see this article as an example.
- Abstract (no more than 300 words)
- Introduction – outline the background to and context of the activity or practice: what is it and why does it matter in your health system? Please also clarify how you generated the reflections presented in this report: who was involved, what did you do, what forms of evidence are used?
- Implementation – how was the activity or practice developed and implemented? was it adapted over time and if so, how and why? how was it scaled up, and to what level was it scaled?
- Achievements/Challenges – what benefits have been seen in the health system? at what scale? What challenges were faced?
- Enablers/Constraints – what factors enabled implementation, scale-up and achievements, and what factors constrained them?
- Conclusions: what are the key lessons for other health leaders in other settings concerning this activity/practice
- References
If used, Tables and Figures should not be placed within the text, rather provided in separate file/s. In the main body of the paper, sub-headings may be useful to signal key elements of the experience reported.
Ethics approval is not required for this type of article, which is intended to allow reflections on innovative approaches to strengthen health systems written by health system leaders and managers working at national or sub-national level.
However, in the introduction, please briefly clarify how you generated the reflections presented in this report including who was involved, what you did and what forms of evidence were used.
If you require writing assistance, please do contact us at [email protected].
Disclosure of Potential Conflict of Interest
Authors must declare any conflicts of interest during the online submissions process. The lead author is responsible for confirming with the co-authors whether they also have any conflicts to declare.
Ethical Research
A requirement of publication is that research involving human subjects was conducted with the ethical approval of the appropriate bodies in the country where the research was conducted and of the ethical approval committees of affiliated research institutions elsewhere. Furthermore, subjects’ consent must have been obtained according to the Declaration of Helsinki. A clear statement addressing all these points must be made in any submitted manuscript presenting such research. In original articles, this information must also be included in the methods section of the submitted manuscript. Please note that it is the responsibility of the corresponding author to ensure that the relevant ethical approval described above is provided. The Editors-in-Chief reserve the right to refuse publication where the required ethical approval/patient consent is lacking, or where the approval/consent provided is deemed incomplete or ambiguous.
Funding
Details of funding sources should be listed in a separate section entitled "Funding". This should appear before the acknowledgements section.
The following rules should be followed:
- The sentence should begin: ‘This work was supported by …’
- The full official funding agency name should be given, i.e. ‘the National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health’ or simply 'National Institutes of Health' not ‘NCI' (one of the 27 subinstitutions) or 'NCI at NIH’ - see the full RIN-approved list of UK funding agencies for details
- Grant numbers should be complete and accurate and provided in brackets as follows: ‘[grant number ABX CDXXXXXX]’
- Multiple grant numbers should be separated by a comma as follows: ‘[grant numbers ABX CDXXXXXX, EFX GHXXXXXX]’
- Agencies should be separated by a semi-colon (plus ‘and’ before the last funding agency)
- Where individuals need to be specified for certain sources of funding the following text should be added after the relevant agency or grant number 'to [author initials]'.
An example is given here: ‘This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health [P50 CA098252 and CA118790 to R.B.S.R.] and the Alcohol & Education Research Council [HFY GR667789].
Oxford Journals will deposit all NIH-funded articles in PubMed Central. See Author self-archiving policy for details. Authors must ensure that manuscripts are clearly indicated as NIH-funded using the guidelines above.
Third-Party Content in Open Access Papers
If you have chosen to publish under an open access licence but have not obtained open access re-use permissions for third-party material contained within the manuscript, this must be stated clearly by supplying a credit line alongside the material with the following information:
- Title of content
- Author, Original publication, year of original publication, by permission of [rights holder]
- This image/content is not covered by the terms of the Creative Commons licence of this publication. For permission to reuse, please contact the rights holder.
Change of Address
Please notify the editors of any change of address. After manuscript acceptance, please also notify the publishers: Journals Production Department, Oxford University Press, Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, UK. Telephone +44 (0) 1865 556767.
Important Notes to Authors
The manuscripts will not be returned to authors following submission unless specifically requested.
Proofs
Authors are sent page proofs by email. These should be checked immediately and corrections, as well as answers to any queries, returned to the publishers as an annotated PDF via email or fax within 3 working days (further details are supplied with the proof). It is the author's responsibility to check proofs thoroughly.
Permission to Reproduce Figures and Extracts
Permission to reproduce copyright material, for online publication in perpetuity, must be cleared and if necessary, paid for by the author; this includes applications and payments to DACS, ARS and similar licensing agencies where appropriate. Evidence in writing that such permissions have been secured from the rights-holder must be made available to the editors.
It is also the author's responsibility to include acknowledgements as stipulated by the particular institutions. Please note that obtaining copyright permission could take some time. Oxford Journals can offer information and documentation to assist authors in securing online permissions: please see the Guidelines for Authors section on the Rights & permissions page.
Should you require copies of this then please contact the editorial office of the journal in question or the Oxford Journals Rights department on [email protected].
For a copyright prose work, it is recommended that permission is obtained for the use of extracts longer than 400 words; a series of extracts totalling more than 800 words, of which any one extract is more than 300 words; or an extract or series of extracts comprising one-quarter of the work or more. For poetry: an extract of more than 40 lines; series of extracts totalling more than 40 lines; an extract comprising one-quarter or more of a complete poem.
Supplementary Data
Supporting material that is not essential for inclusion in the full text of the manuscript, but would nevertheless benefit the reader, can be made available by the publisher as online-only content, linked to the online manuscript. The material should not be essential to understanding the conclusions of the paper but should contain data that is additional or complementary and directly relevant to the article content. Such information might include more detailed methods, extended data sets/data analysis, or additional figures.
It is standard practice for appendices to be made available online-only as supplementary data. All text and figures must be provided in suitable electronic formats. All material to be considered as supplementary data must be submitted at the same time as the main manuscript for peer review. It cannot be altered or replaced after the paper has been accepted for publication and will not be edited. Please indicate clearly all material intended as supplementary data upon submission and name the files e.g. 'Supplementary Figure 1', 'Supplementary Data', etc. Also ensure that the supplementary data is referred to in the main manuscript where necessary, for example as '(see Supplementary data)' or '(see Supplementary Figure 1)'.
Publication Ethics
Health Policy and Planning and Oxford University Press are members of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). This journal follows the guidance provided in COPE’s 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. The journal expects all parties involved in the publication of content in the journal (the publisher, editors, authors, and reviewers) to follow these guidelines on best practice and publication ethics.
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. Only one appeal per manuscript will be considered. The appeal will be considered carefully by the Editor-in-Chiefs and the Editorial Board.
The authors should provide the appeal in a word document and attach it to an email to the HPP Editorial Office. 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 Scholar One
- An explanation outlining why the final decision was unfair or not merited
- Specific comments in relation to the peer review reports
Complaints
To register a complaint regarding non-editorial decisions, the Journal’s policies and procedures, editors, or staff, please contact us at [email protected]. Complaints will be taken seriously and will be carried forward following COPE guidelines and processes and/or sanctions will be enacted if deemed appropriate
CrossRef Funding Data Registry
In order to meet your funding requirements authors are required to name their funding sources, or state if there are none, during the submission process. For further information on this process or to find out more about the CHORUS initiative please see CHORUS at Oxford University Press page.
Post-submission and promotion
Manuscript Transfer
Health Policy and Planningsends and receives transfers from other journals on related topics published by Oxford University Press. All transfers are sent according to the choice of the authors. Reviewer reports and the original decision letter are included in the transfer, but the reviewer identities are not shared.
Transferred manuscripts may be sent out for additional peer review, and a decision will be made on the manuscript based on the feedback from all reviewers and the judgment of the editorial team.
Article Promotion
Once your article has been published it is important to ensure it is read widely, helping drive article downloads, impact of your research and citations. The Oxford Academic platform provides robust search, browse, and SEO capabilities, and expert SEO and discovery teams work in partnership with Google, Google Scholar, and leading discovery services ensuring your article will gain maximum discoverability. Oxford University Press’ marketing team have a dynamic presence across traditional, online, email and social media channels ensuring your article is promoted to a global audience. Health Policy and Planning have a dedicated podcast and blog where authors can discuss and disseminate their work and a proactive X channel with over 11,000 followers @HPP_LSHTM.
As an author you can help maximize the discoverability of your article by posting on your social media channels. Remember to use the Share button you will find in your online article to share to these social media sites and always tag your co-authors and colleagues so they can help you share more widely.
