Journal Guidelines

Author Guidelines Manuscripts
Preparations
Author Undertaking Form: Ethical Approval of Research: Who is an Author Acknowledgement/
Copyrights
Editorial Policies Aims and Scope Peer Review Policy Open Access Publication Plagiarism Policy Processing fees

Author Guidelines

We invite authors to submit their articles for publication. The guidelines are given to endorse smooth submission, review, and publication processes. Content should be unique, and original, also the presentation must be of potential interest to the readers.

Articles that describe original research, short communication, case report, comments, commentary, reviews, letters to the editor, opinion, and special reports may be submitted for publication. All articles must be submitted through the journal's online system after registration on the Pakistan Journal of Neurological Surgery website (www.pakjns.org).

Manuscripts must be submitted by one of the authors of the manuscript, and should not be submitted by anyone on their behalf. The principal/corresponding author must submit an undertaking along with the mswrod copy of the manuscript on behalf of all co-authors (please refer to the undertaking form). The author(s) will confirm that the manuscript (or any part thereof) has not previously been published or is being considered for publication elsewhere. In addition, any illustration, structure, figure, or table must be included with permission from a third party. 

In case of any difficulty/ problem through the online submission, the article may be submitted via email to admin@pakjns.org, chiefeditor.pjns@gmail.com 
Hard-copy submissions are not accepted. Properly format your manuscript as per journal format. 
Supporting document i.e. undertaking/conflict of interest forms can be downloaded from the website.

Manuscripts Preparations
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Define abbreviations at their first appearance. Use generic names of drugs. Number the references by their first appearance in the text and cite them by that subscripted number. The original article must be under the following heads:

Title:
It must be brief and contain no abbreviations.

Structured Abstract:
This section should clear concise and accurate summary of not more than 250 words, containing no abbreviations, citation and should describe the Introduction/Objective, Materials &Methods, Results,  Conclusion and six Keywords (as per Medical Subject Heading -MeSH). Choose important and relevant keywords.  The abstract should briefly and focus the main objectives and results/conclusions of the research work; it should give the reader a clear idea of what has been achieved.

Introduction:
This section should briefly state what was studied and why including its relationship to previous work in the field, especially the previous 10 years of international literature.

Materials and Methods
: It should contain the place of the study, study design & setting, sampling technique, sample size calculations, patient population, and the methodology of the study in detail. Neurosurgical techniques, procedure/investigation should be clearly explained. Inclusion /exclusion criteria and statistical methods, data collection procedures should also be clearly explained.

Results
: This section should include the results of the study with tables, and illustrations. Images should be of a minimum of 300 dpi. No comparison should be done in this section with other studies. Repetition of data must be avoided and should be well explained. Blurred or unclear photographs and figures not be accepted. Tables should be cited in parenthesis after the punctuation mark e.g. (Table1). Images and Figures may be sent in the form of JPG, PNG. Images of MRI and CT scans that patient identity like name and date should not be mentioned.

Discussion:
It includes the comparison of results with other studies, specifically in the light of relevant literature.
Highlight the unique and key features of your research and put your results in the context of the totality of the significant proof. Do not repeat in detail like data or other information given in other parts of the manuscript, such as in the Introduction or the results section.

Conclusion:
It may be included to briefly summarize the net result of your study.

References
: The references should be listed as they appear in the text. It should contain the name of the authors, the title of the article, its volume number, the year of publication, and the page numbers. All references should be enlisted in Vanocur style. The following web addresses can be logged on for various sources that can be used for reference/ citation purposes.

https://guides.library.uq.edu.au/referencing/vancouver/introduction


Scientific Reporting Guidelines
Authors are recommended to consult following scientific reporting guidelines while writing and compiling the research and manuscript. The guidelines developed by EQUATOR Network, are available online for each type of study design. Authors can use the following checklists for each study design:
STROBE (https://www.strobe-statement.org/) for observational studies in epidemiology (cross-sectional, cohort & case-control);
ORION (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17376385/) for infection control intervention studies; REMARK (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29873743/) for tumor marker prognostic studies; STREGA (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19278015/) for genetic association studies;
CONSORT for randomized control trials; (https://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/consort/)
TREND for non-randomized controlled trials; (https://www.cdc.gov/trendstatement/index.html)
STARD for diagnostic accuracy studies; (https://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/stard/)
GRRAS for reliability and agreement studies; (https://www.equator-network.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/GRRAS-checklist-for-reporting-of-studies-of-reliability-and-agreement.pdf)
PRISMA for systematic reviews and meta-analyses; (https://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/prisma/)
SPIRIT for study protocols; (https://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/spirit-2013-statement-defining-standard-protocol-items-for-clinical-trials/)
MOOSE for meta-analysis of observational Studies; (https://www.elsevier.com/__data/promis_misc/ISSM_MOOSE_Checklist.pdf)
SRQR for qualitative research studies; (https://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/srqr/)
COREQ for qualitative research; (https://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/coreq/)
SQUIRE for quality improvement studies and TRIPOD for multivariate prediction models. (https://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/squire/)

The Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) Statement: guidelines for reporting observational studies:
https://www.strobe-statement.org/index.php?id=strobe-home

See link below for more information:
https://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/strobe/ 

Case Reports: Studies of more than 5 patients are considered as the original study. If the number of patients is 4 or fewer it is considered a case report.

Review Article
should be on any subject reviewing the literature in its past, present, and future aspects.

Editorial
may be on any topic and it may or may not be related to scientific research.
Experimental Work includes the work done in the laboratory or on cadavers or animals.
Email: Please send articles online. Articles may be sent by Email on:
admin@pakjns.org
dranwarchaudary@yahoo.com

Author Undertaking Form
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Pakistan Journal of Neurological surgery follows the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors 

Authorship statement:

All authors should declare their contribution to the research and the preparation of the publication.

Conflicts of Interest/Funding Source


All authors must disclose individual or financial conflicts of interest at the time of submission, which might bias or be seen to bias their work. This includes, for example, personal or institutional financial interest in drugs, materials, or devices described in the document. The source of financial support and industry affiliations of all those involved must be stated. All grants relevant to the submission must be documented. Any conflicts should be disclosed in the Author Agreement form AND in the title page file. If there is no conflict(s), it should be clearly expressed. Disclosure statements are published with each article.

Copyright Form

The copyright form is completed by the principal/corresponding author once the manuscript is send to Pakistan Journal of Neurological Science.

Forms can be download from the following link
Authors undertaking
Conflict of interest

 

Ethical Approval of Research ||
If any human or animal studies were carried out during the research work a letter of ethical approval from the institutional ethical review board (IRB) should be attached.
Note: All authors will submit copy of research approval from the ethical review board/IRB.

Who is an Author
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The ICMJE recommends that authorship be based on the following 4 criteria:

  • Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
  • Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
  • Final approval of the version to be published; AND
  • Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.
    Other article contributors who do not fit into these four criteria should be just acknowledged.

Acknowledgement: Acknowledged those authors & institutional administrative support who did not qualify for authorship (define in journal policy and recommended by ICMJE). Acknowledge anyone who provided intellectual writing assistance, technical editing, language editing, data entry and proofreading. ||

Copyrights: Once an article is published the copyright ownership of the article is transferred to the Journal of Pakistan Journal of Neurological Surgery. Copy right statement policy is given in the author’s submission form and it should be duly signed by all the authors. In case of rejection of the manuscript, copy rights are transferred back to the author automatically. ||
Limitation:
If there is any limitations (Sample size calculation/ latest References) in the manuscript please mention at the end of the conclusion.


Editorial Policies


About the journal


Pakistan Journal of Neurological surgery is a quarterly multidisciplinary, double-blind peer-reviewed, open-access, quarterly journal, published in both printed and online versions, published by Pakistan Society of Neurosurgeons and Department of Neurosurgery, Punjab Institute of Neurosciences, Lahore General Hospital, Lahore, agrees to accept manuscripts prepared in accordance with the “Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to the Biomedical Journals” as approved by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), last updated in December 2017.

It has now enhanced the rules about the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Works in Medical Journals: www.icmje.org

Aims and Scope
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1. Encourage all neuroscientists to exchange their research, opinions and ideas in the all fields of neuro and spine surgeries, in clinical neuroscience/neurology and other similar sub-specialties.
2. PJNS provides a platform for the readers regarding transfer of knowledge.
3. In PJNS domain, the journal covers a range of unique research, reviews, commentary, case reports in all areas of neuroscience.
4. The journal facilitates communication between neurosurgeons and related specialists around the world by providing an integrated and balanced vision of basic clinical research in neurosurgery.

Peer Review Policy ||


The peer-reviewed journal uses "double-blind" reviews, and reviewers and authors are still unknown in the entire review procedure. Submitted manuscripts are initially screened by the section editors to check the scope, suitability, plagiarism and formatting. Rejected manuscripts are send back to the authors. After intimal screening recommended manuscripts are then send to reviewers who are requested to respond within three weeks. If there is no reply from the reviewer with in the given time, they may be replaced with other suitable to keep the review process without any delay. Should the referees' reports contradict one another or a report is unnecessarily delayed, a further expert opinion will be sought.
Note: The authors are requested not check plagiarism themselves from unauthorized softwares of plagiarism detection.

Open Access Publication and Creative Commons Licensing
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This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Plagiarism Policy
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Pakistan Journal of Neurological Surgery is an equipped with Turnitin (text matching / anti-plagiarism software. The software check for plagiarism and repetition in submitted manuscripts. All submitted manuscripts are firstly screen for similarity index on Turnitin software. As per HEC policy, The similarity index (SI) must not be greater than 19%. From a single source, it must be below 5%. The similarity index greater than 19% will be automatically rejected and sent back to the authors.

Manuscript extracted by an author from his/her M.Phil. Or Ph.D. thesis must have to declare the “title of the thesis”, “Supervisor name”, Department and University name, “year of submission” on the original later paid and submit during the submission process.
Note: Authors must not chek plagiarism through unreliable or unauthent websites or softwares.

Text Recycling
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Publications effectively publish accepted manuscripts for text recycling prior to publication. Text recycling is not a tolerated practice. Manuscripts containing high-levels of self-plagiarism  will be reviewed by the Editor-in-Chief for originality. Authors found to have self-plagiarized will be asked to rewrite selected portions of their accepted manuscripts and or to quote exactly and cite the original source.

Journal management team will investigate any allegations of publication misconduct and may contact the authors' institutions or funders if necessary. If proof of misconduct is found, appropriate action will be taken to correct or retract/withdraw the publication. The editors of PJNS consider such distributing publishing ethics issues very seriously and are trained to continue in such cases with a zero-tolerance policy.

Processing fees
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Authors are required to pay amount as decided by editorial board for handling and publication of manuscript. Title of the account for the cross cheque/pay order is “Pakistan Journal of Neurological Sciences”. Publication fee may also be transferred online, details are given below:


Account Type: Current Account          Branch Code:1607                   
Account No: 4003291465              
Bank Name: National Bank of Pakistan, New Muslim Town Lahore


Publication Fee Details

  • Original Article: Rs. 17000/-
  • Case Report: Rs. 17000/-
  • Review Article: Rs. 17000/-

Wavier Policy: 

Eligibility Criteria to Apply for Waiver

  • Waivers will be provided to authors who are from low or middle-income countries defined by the World Bank. https://data.worldbank.org/income-level/lower-middle-income
  • The waiver policy will not be applicable if the research is funded.
  • Applicable for Undergraduate students.