GENERAL INFORMATION
Introduction
Health Prospect: Journal of Public Health is an open access journal published from Institute of Medicine, Kathmandu, Nepal, affiliated with Nepal Public Health Students’ Society. Health Prospect has the mission of providing firm scientific base for public health researches and policy analyses, and a forum for dissemination of public health issues. This peer reviewed journal publishes articles related to researches done in the field of public health, medico-sociology, anthropology, health care management, including ethical and social issues pertaining to health; that explores inequities and disparities between and within the populations, and at the same time provides forum for discussion and dissemination of evidence on priority public health topics. The journal gives preference to socio-demographic studies relating to public health over clinical, experimental and animal studies. The accepted manuscripts after peer review and necessary proofing are published online in the nearest possible issue. Health Prospect adheres to the guidelines of Committee on Publication Ethics.
Submission and Inquiry
Authors are strongly advised for submission of the manuscripts in the format indicated in Instructions for Authors. Latest edition of ‘Instructions for Authors’ is available online at https://www.nepjol.info/index.php/HPROSPECT/information/authors
For submission of the manuscript and inquiry about the current progress of a submitted manuscript, authors can e-mail to the journal office at hpec@iom.edu.np. All the manuscripts submitted to Health Prospect are supposed not to have been published elsewhere, simultaneously submitted or under-consideration of publication elsewhere. Detected attempt of dual-publication will automatically get a manuscript rejected and the author blacklisted for future submission. In case of failure of a manuscript for compliance with these specifications, the authors will be requested to re-submit the manuscript in the specified format. So, the authors are requested to check this document as a checklist before submission of manuscripts.
Preparing your manuscripts
Health Prospect gives preference to definitive papers on Public Health and related disciplines. The Journal publishes Original Research Articles, Guest Editorial, Editorial, Viewpoints, Review Articles, Commentaries and Letter to the Editor solicited by the Editorial Committee. Health Prospect does not publish preliminary reports of work in progress or brief reports of single cases. All the submission should be accompanied with a Cover Letter addressed to the journal office.
All the manuscripts submitted to Health Prospect must include a title page.
Title Page
The title page should contain:
Note: The identity of the authors should not be disclosed elsewhere in the manuscript as the manuscripts under peer-review are double-blinded.
ORIGINAL RESEARCH ARTICLES
Original research articles related to public health discipline are published in Health Prospect. The information below details the section headings that you should include in your manuscript and what information should be within each section. Total length of the original research article should not be more than 6000 words (excluding abstract). Peer Reviewer will support the Editorial Committee in making the decision of the quality of research articles.
The article should strictly be on the format mentioned below:
Abstract:
Abstract should be structured and not more than 350 words. The abstract must include the following segments:
Background:
The background section should explain the background to the study, its aims, and a summary of the existing literature and why this study was necessary or its contribution to the field.
Methods:
The methods section should include:
Results:
This should include the findings of the study including, if appropriate, results of statistical analysis which must be included either in the text or as tables and figures.
Discussion:
This section should discuss the implications of the findings in context of existing research and highlight strengths and limitations of the study.
Conclusions:
This should state clearly the main conclusions and provide an explanation of the importance and relevance of the study reported.
References:
The authors are strictly advised to follow Vancouver style referencing with consecutively numbered inside a parenthesis followed by a full stop for in-text citation.
List of abbreviations:
If abbreviations are used in the text they should be defined in the text at first use, and a list of abbreviations should be provided.
Declarations:
Author should declare competing interests, acknowledgement and funding source, if any.
GUEST EDITORIAL
Guest Editorial on topic of current relevance will be published upon request by Editorial Board to a guest. The guest will be a renowned public health figure with distinct experience on the field of public health. This column will not be peer-reviewed. Guest Editorial will be limited to 1500 words and with 15 references at most. No specific format has been pre-specified for Guest Editorial.
EDITORIAL
Editorial Committee will decide a member of the committee to write for this column. The topic of editorial will be selected based upon ongoing public health issues of general concern. Proper referencing of this section will be done. Editorial will be limited to 2000 words excluding references. No specific format has been pre-specified for Editorial.
VIEWPOINT
Viewpoint from students and public health professionals will be published on Health Prospect. Word limit for viewpoint is 2000 excluding abstract. The article should follow:
Abstract: Unstructured abstract with 250 words limit.
Keywords: No more than five keywords representing the main content of the article.
The writer is expected to be analytical on the issue submitted for the Editorial Committee. It should contain:
Introduction: This section should introduce the subject matter, its importance and aim of the viewpoint.
Main Body: The main body should discuss on the views that the author is trying to put forward (with appropriate heading). This can be further divided into subheadings.
Conclusion: This should state clearly the main conclusions of the view put forward.
References: Vancouver style of referencing. 15 references at most.
Editorial Committee in consultation with Peer Reviewers will make decision about the submitted viewpoints.
REVIEW ARTICLES
This section has systematic critical assessments of literature and data sources. Words must be limited to 6000 words excluding abstract and tables.
Abstract: Unstructured abstract with 250 words limit.
Keywords: No more than five keywords representing the main content of the article.
The writer is expected to be analytical on the issue submitted for the Editorial Committee. It should contain:
Introduction: This section should introduce the subject matter, its importance and aim of the viewpoint.
Main Body: The main body should discuss on the views the author is trying to put forward (with appropriate heading). This can be further divided into subheadings.
Conclusion: This should state clearly the main conclusions of the view put forward and its importance.
References: Vancouver style of referencing. No limits on references.
Editorial Committee in consultation with Peer Reviewers will make decision about the publication of submitted Review Articles.
COMMENTARIES
This section contains comments which accompany papers published in Health Prospect: Journal of Public Health or on issues of wide-reaching concern in Public Health policy. The commentaries should be submitted which can provide a forum for varying perspectives on a certain topic to advance the research field. Comments linked to policy decisions are highly welcomed. Words must be limited less than 1000 words with one figure, panel, or small table.
Abstract: Unstructured abstract with 175 words limit.
Keywords: No more than five keywords representing the main content of the article.
It should contain:
Introduction: This section should introduce the subject matter its importance and aim of the commentaries.
Main Body: This section must draw attention to current advances on certain topic and speculate on future directions. The author may also include original data as well as personal opinion he/she is trying to put forward with appropriate heading. This can be further divided into subheadings.
Conclusion: This should state clearly the main conclusions of the view put forward and its importance.
References: Vancouver style of referencing. 10 references should be included at most.
Comments may be peer reviewed or be decided by Editorial Committee alone.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Letter to the editor regarding the contents published on the journal are welcome. Letter to the Editor are published for increasing debate over the published contents. It should be limited to 600 words and 8 references. Editorial Committee alone makes refinements in the Letter to the Editor before making decision about the publication.
Apart from these authors should strictly consider these points while preparing their manuscripts
Font and Font size:
The manuscripts submitted must be typed in Microsoft® Word in Times New Roman font, 12 points. Title of paragraphs can be designed in Times New Roman font, 16 points. The text is double-spaced; uses a 12-point font; employs italics, rather than underlining (except with URL addresses)
Tables and Figures:
The text should not contain any graphs, tables or figures. They should be forwarded separately with filename as indicated in the text within the parenthesis. The images should be in .png or .tiff format with highest possible resolution (>300 dots per inch).
Language
The manuscript must have clear and concise English language (either American or British English) throughout the text.
Measurement
Use of SI unit as unit of measurement is prescribed.
Abbreviations
Use only the standard abbreviations. Spelled out abbreviation followed by abbreviation in parenthesis should be used during first mention.
References
For uniformity, the authors are strictly advised to follow referencing in Vancouver style (Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals). In the text followed by a full stop, references should be numbered consecutively in parenthesis. Reference to unpublished communications is unaccepted. Personal communications should be cited in the text in parentheses.
Example:
Adhikary P, Sheppard ZA, Keen S, van Teijlingen E. Risky work: Accidents among Nepalese migrant workers in Malaysia, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Health Prospect. 2017;16(2):3-10.
Editorial review
After the submission of a manuscript, Editorial Committee will have thorough observation of the manuscript. It will be checked for compliance to the Instructions for Authors, public health significance of the issue and format of the manuscript. In case of affirmative conclusion, the author will be replied with ‘Letter of Receipt’ along with the reference ID for their manuscript. In case of non-compliance, manuscript will either be rejected or asked to be modified by the authors, depending upon the type of incompatibility. Then, the manuscript will be checked for plagiarism. Health prospect uses viper- the anti-plagiarism scanner for plagiarism checking. So, authors are advised to refrain from plagiarizing other’s work.
Peer Review
For each manuscript a Senior Editor is assigned based on the scope of the manuscript and expertise on the subject matter. The Senior Editor then sends the article for peer review. Generally, an article is reviewed by two peer reviewers. The content of the article and its standard to be published in Health Prospect will be checked. The peer reviewer then sends back the report of his/her review. Based upon the reports, the Senior Editor then forwards the journal office about the initial decision and modifications needed to be made in the manuscript (if any). The journal office then forwards the reviewer report to the author who has to make required modifications within two weeks of receiving comments (with provision for extension of due dates, if necessary). In some cases, manuscript may be subject to second round of peer review.
In second round of Peer Review, the modified manuscript is again forwarded to the original Peer Reviewers to check whether the required changes have been made. In case of any further modification needed, the author will be asked to make final changes. If the revised manuscript is still unacceptable for the publication, it will be rejected. If it is now acceptable for publication, it will be checked for grammatical flaws and punctuation by the Editorial Committee.
Then, the manuscript gets published in the nearest possible Issue of Health Prospect by the production editors.
The details of the journal workflow can be seen on Annex I
Copyright and Permissions
Authors are required to transfer the copyright of their articles to Health Prospect; a Public Health Journal of NPHSS.
The articles in this journal are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
This work may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, or otherwise used provided that the original work is properly cited. Author e-mails are available at the end of the article.
Annex 1 Health Prospect Work Flow
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1.1 what data we collect
1.2 why we collect the data
1.3 what we do (and don’t do) with the data
1.4 what to do if you want to get a copy of your data, or want your data to be removed
2.1 what data we collect
2.2 why we collect the data
2.3 what we do (and don’t do) with the data
2.4 why we store the data
2.5 what to do if you want to get a copy of your data, or want your data to be removed
3.1 what data we collect
3.2 why we collect the data
3.3 what we do (and don’t do) with the data
3.4 what to do if you want to get a copy of your data, or want your data to be removed
4.1 what data we collect
4.2 why we collect the data
4.3 what we do (and don’t do) with the data
4.5 what to do if you want to get a copy of your data, or want your data to be removed
5.1 what data we collect
5.2 why we collect and store the data, and for how long
5.3 what we do (and don’t do) with the data
5.4 what to do if you want to get a copy of your data or want your data to be removed
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(Updated: 18 May 2018)
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