Note: These instructions comply with those formulated by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE). For further details, authors should consult the following article: International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. “Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals” New Engl J Med 1997, 336:309–315. The complete document appears at www.icmje.org.

Scope
The Medical Resarch Journal (MRJ) is a semiannual medical journal in English presenting original research and reports of clinical practice in all fields of medicine including basic medical sciences. It is the official publication of the Medical Research Division of the National Research Center (NRC) of Egypt and has a broad scope encompassing both clinical and basic science topics of medicine in health and diseases. It provides timely publication of original research, case reports and review articles and is an international peer reviewed journal.

Redundant or duplicate publication
We ask you to confirm that your paper has not been published in its current form or a substantially similar form (in print or electronically, including on a web site), that it has not been accepted for publication elsewhere, and that it is not under consideration by another publication. The ICMJE has provided details of what is and what is not duplicate or redundant publication. If you are in doubt (particularly in the case of material that you have posted on a web site), we ask you to proceed with your submission but to include a copy of the relevant previously published work or work under consideration by other journals. In your covering letter to the editors, draw attention to any published work that concerns the same patients or subjects as the present paper.

Conflicts of interest
MRJ requires authors to state all possible conflicts of interest, including financial and other relationships on a separate line in the Acknowledgements section of the paper. If you are sure that there is no conflict of interest, please state so. The ICMJE provides further information on conflicts of interest. Remember that sources of funding should also be acknowledged in your paper on a separate line in the Acknowledgements section.

Permissions to reproduce previously published material
MRJ requires you to send us copies of permission to reproduce material (such as illustrations) from the copyright holder of the previously published material. Articles cannot be published without these permissions.

Patient consent forms
The protection of a patient's right to privacy is essential. Please send copies of patients’ consent forms on which patients or other subjects of your experiments clearly grant permission for the publication of photographs or other material that might identify them. If the consent form for your research did not specifically include this, please obtain it or remove the identifying material. A statement to the effect that such consent had been obtained should be included in the ‘Methods’ section of your paper.

Ethics committee approval
Submission of a manuscript to MRJ implies that all authors have read and agreed to its content and that any experimental research that is reported in the manuscript has been performed with the approval of an appropriate ethics committee. Research carried out on humans must be in compliance with the Helsinki Declaration. A statement to this effect should appear in the Methods section, including the name of the body which gave approval. Informed consent should also be documented. Similarly, for experiments involving animals you must state the care of animal and licensing guidelines under which the study was performed. If ethics clearance was not necessary, or if there was any deviation from these standard ethical requests, please state why it was not required. Please note that the editors may ask you to provide evidence of ethical approval. If you have approval from a National Drug Agency (or similar) please state this and provide details, this can be particularly useful when discussing the use of unlicensed drugs. Manuscripts may be rejected if the editorial office considers that the research has not been carried out within an ethical framework.

Authorship
We ask all authors to confirm that they have read and approved the paper. Second, we ask all authors to confirm that they have met the criteria for authorship as established by the ICMJE, believe that the paper represents honest work, and are able to verify the validity of the results reported.

All persons designated as authors should qualify for authorship and all those who qualify should be listed. Each author should have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for appropriate portions of the content. One or more authors should take responsibility for the integrity of the work as a whole, from inception to published article. Authorship credit should be based only on 1) substantial contributions to conception and design, or acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data; 2) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content; 3) final approval of the version to be published. Conditions 1, 2 and 3 must all be met. Acquisition of funding, the collection of data or general supervision of the research group, by themselves, do not justify authorship. All others who contributed to the work who are not authors should be named in the Acknowledgements section.

Copyright assignment
Papers are accepted for publication on the understanding that exclusive copyright in the paper is assigned to the Publisher. Authors are asked to sign a copyright assignment form at the revision stage and to submit it with their revised manuscript. Without the signed copyright form, the manuscript cannot be published. Authors may use material from their paper in other works published by them.

Peer review policy
The decision to publish a manuscript is based on the opinion of the editor and at least two other reviewers. Articles containing statistical analysis will also receive a statistical review. Reviewers’ names will not be revealed to the author, nor will authors’ names be revealed to editors. Manuscripts are accepted for publication on the understanding that they have not been submitted simultaneously to another journal and that the work was not previously published. Prior publication of abstracts will not prejudice publishing of the complete study. The editors reserve the right to make editorial and grammatical corrections. The editors cannot be considered responsible for damage or loss of typescripts, illustrations or photographs. Statements and opinions expressed in the articles are those of the authors and the editors disclaim any responsibility or liability for this material.

Manuscript preparation:
Manuscripts should be written in Word file format, double spaced, Times New Roman, size 12, regular style. Avoid justified right margins. All of the pages of the manuscript should be numbered consecutively, beginning with the title page.

• Title: should carry the following information:
 
1. The title of the article.
2. Authors’ names in order.
3. The name of the department(s) and institution(s) to which the work should be attributed.
4. Disclaimers, if any.
5. Corresponding author. The name, mailing address, telephone and fax numbers, and email address of the author responsible for correspondence about the manuscript with clear indication whether his or her email address is to be published.
6. Source(s) of support in the form of grants, equipment, drugs, or all of these.
 
• Abstract: Should be brief, factual, not more than 200 words, and structured; providing the study’s objective, basic methods (selection of study subjects or laboratory animals, observational and analytical procedures), main results (giving specific effect sizes and their statistical significance, if possible), and principal conclusions. Identify, as such, 3 to 10 key words or short phrases that capture the main topics of the article (avoid using title words as much as you can).
 
• Background: Should provide a context for the study (i.e., the nature of the problem and its significance). State the specific purpose or research objective of, or hypothesis tested by, the study or observation.
 
• Methods: Describe your selection of participants (patients or laboratory animals, including controls) clearly, including eligibility and exclusion criteria and a description of the source population. Identify the methods, apparatus (give the manufacturer’s name and address in parentheses), and procedures in sufficient detail to allow other workers to reproduce the results. Describe statistical methods with enough detail to enable a knowledgeable reader with access to the original data to verify the reported results.
 
• Results: Table titles should be written above the table. Example: ‘Table 4. Demographic comparison between the study groups.’ Do not use internal horizontal or vertical lines, just a horizontal line below the headings. Give each column a short or abbreviated heading in bald font. Figure titles should be written below the figure in this way: ‘Fig. 2. Percentage distribution of studied children according to age and weight.’ Measurements of length, height, weight, and volume should be reported in metric units (meter, kilogram, or liter) or their decimal multiples. Laboratory information should be reported in both the local and International System of Units (SI).
 
• Discussion: Should include interpretation of study findings, and results considered in the context of results in other trials reported in the literature. Do not recapitulate your results, discuss them. Assess the results for their validity with respect to the hypothesis, relevance of methods, and significance of differences observed. Discuss relevant literature providing evidence or counterevidence for your findings. Assess the significance of the conclusions for the application in further research.
 
• References: Authors are responsible for the accuracy and completeness of their references and for correct text citation. Number references in the order they appear in the text; do not alphabetize. Refer to print version or electronic PDF version for method of reference numbering within the text. Abbreviate names of journals according to Index Medicus. Note: List all authors and/or editors up to 6; if more than 6, list the first 6 followed by et al. For example: Weiss R, Dziura J, Burgert TS, Tamborlane WV, Taksali SE, Yeckel CW, et al. Obesity and the metabolic syndrome in children and adolescents. N Engl J Med 2004; 350:2362–2374.
 
• Figures: For x-ray films, scans, and other diagnostic images, as well as pictures of pathology specimens or photomicrographs, send sharp, glossy, black-and-white or color photographic prints, usually 127 _ 173 mm (5 _ 7 inches).

1. The manuscript both as paper version (3 copies) as well as electronic version, whether on disk or as an email attachment.
2. Four sets of all illustrations, clearly labeled as described in the instructions, all submitted in original format and not copied.
3. The filled and signed manuscript submission form.
4. Informed consent forms for identifiable patient descriptions, photographs, and pedigrees.
5. Copies of any permission to reproduce published material.

All correspondence should be sent electronically to the Deputy Editor
Dr. Adel Naguib
Mobile: +0123440310
E-mail: [email protected]