The following provides details on submission and formatting requirements pertaining to manuscript submission to Patient Experience Journal. As final formatting will be placed into standard PXJ templates, formal typesetting is not required, but it is requested that the general guidelines offered below are adhered to.

At time of submission you will be asked to:

• Provide a cover letter that includes your paper title, the corresponding author(s), and an overview paragraph on how you believe the submission speaks to the patient experience and the Objectives & Principles of the journal.
• Provide an abstract of up to 250 words in paragraph format. This will be reviewed and potentially revised by the editors.
• Provide a list of associated keywords in support of your article.

General Submission Formatting

• Submit your manuscript, including tables, figures, appendices, etc., as a single file (Word files preferred).
• Double-space your text.
• Provide your article in English. PXJ will maintain the spelling associated with your geography to honor author’s contribution versus standardizing spelling.
• Do not include headers, or footers. These will be added by the editors.
• Page size should be 8.5 x 11-inches.
• All margins (left, right, top and bottom) should be 1 inch, including your tables and figures.
• Use a single column layout for draft submissions and left margin justified. This will be updated in publication stage.
• Font: Prefer 10 or 12 pt. Garamond, Times or the closest comparable font available.
• If figures are included, use high-resolution figures.
• Table should be provided as created, not as image files so they can be manipulated, if needed, in final layout.
• Copyedit your manuscript.
• When possible, there should be no pages where more than a quarter of the page is empty space.

Article Length

Because this journal publishes electronically, we can offer authors greater flexibility to include material that they might otherwise have to cut for print submissions. We request papers do not exceed 5000 words in length depending on type of submission.

Colored Text

Set the font color to black for the majority of the text. We encourage authors to take advantage of the ability to use color in the production of figures, maps, etc.; however, you need to appreciate that this will cause some of your readers problems when they print the document on a black & white printer. For this reason, you are advised to avoid the use of colors in situations where their translation to black and white would render the material illegible or incomprehensible.

Please ensure that there are no colored mark-ups or comments in the final version, unless they are meant to be part of the final text. (You may need to "accept all changes" in track changes or set your document to "normal" in final markup.)

Emphasized Text

Whenever possible use italics to indicate text you wish to emphasize rather than underlining it. The use of color to emphasize text is discouraged.

Font Faces

Except where special symbols are needed, use Garamond (or Times).

Font Size

The main body of text should be set in 10 or 12pt. Avoid the use of fonts smaller than 6pt.

Foreign Terms

Foreign terms should be set in italics rather than underlined.

Headings

Headings (e.g., start of sections) should be distinguished from the main body text by the size of their fonts (e.g., 11pt. versus 10pt.) and bolded. Use the same font face for all headings. There should be space above and below headings.

Main Text

The font for the main body of text must be black and, as possible, in Garamond (or Times).

Titles

Titles of books, movies, etc., should be set in italics rather than underlined.

Tables and Figures

Tables and figures should appear in the document near where they are referenced in the text. Large tables or figures should be put on pages by themselves. Avoid the use of overly small type in tables. In no case should tables or figures be in a separate document or file and we ask they are not submitted as picture files, but embedded so they can be manipulated during final formatting. All tables and figures must fit within 1" margins on all sides (top, bottom, left and right) in both portrait and landscape view.

Mathematics

Roman letters used in mathematical expressions as variables should be italicized. Roman letters used as part of multi-letter function names should not be italicized. Whenever possible, subscripts and superscripts should be a smaller font size than the main text.

Short mathematical expressions should be typed inline. Longer expressions should appear as display math. Also expressions using many different levels (e.g., such as the fractions) should be set as display math. Important definitions or concepts can also be set off as display math.

Equations should be numbered sequentially. Whether equation numbers are on the right or left is the choice of the author(s). However, you are expected to be consistent in this.

Symbols and notation in unusual fonts should be avoided. This will not only enhance the clarity of the manuscript, but it will also help insure that it displays correctly on the reader's screen and prints correctly on her printer. When proofing your document under PDF pay particular attention to the rendering of the mathematics, especially symbols and notation drawn from other than standard fonts.

References

It is the author's obligation to provide complete references with the necessary information. After the last sentence of your submission, please insert a line break—not a page break—and begin your references on the same page, if possible. The heading for this section should be “References” and follow the requirements for “headings” noted above. References should appear right after the end of the article. References should have margins that are left justified.

PXJ follows AMA citation style and we request that you provide references in this format. This requires identifying references in the body of your paper with a superscript number and reporting references at the close of the paper in the order in which presented. A simple guide to AMA formatting can be found here

Questions

For further questions, please contact us via email at info@pxjournal.org.