INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS

AUTHOR GUIDELINES

Scope of the Journal

The International Journal of Pharmacy Practice (IJPP) is a Medline-indexed, peer-reviewed, international journal publishing innovative research at the intersection of pharmacy, medicines, and healthcare. It is a great source for creating evidence-based policy and informing practice for all healthcare professionals and policymakers.

IJPP is a multidisciplinary journal reflecting the increasingly collaborative approach in the delivery of healthcare. Topics include (but are not limited to):

• Safe and effective medicine use: e.g., medication adherence; polypharmacy; deprescribing; pharmacoepidemiology; pharmacovigilance, drug safety; antimicrobial stewardship; advanced therapy medicinal products (ATMPs).
• Health promotion and public health: e.g., cardiovascular disease, mental health; smoking cessation, healthy eating and exercise; reproductive/sexual health and HIV; substance use; vaccination; pharmacy disaster planning.
• Education: e.g., pharmacy education, training, and workforce development; health education relevant to medicines.
• Emerging areas: e.g., stratified medicine and pharmacogenomics; digital health and big data; skill mix and service redesign; new technologies; telepharmacy, and automation.
• Clinical management of long-term illnesses including behavioural approaches: e.g.  asthma, cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, mental health and age-related conditions.
• Methodological articles developing new approaches or drawing on other disciplines e.g., anthropology, health economics, psychology, sociology, statistics.

Methods include both evaluative and exploratory work including: structured reviews of the literature such as systematic or scoping reviews; randomised controlled trials, controlled trials, before and after studies, observational studies; intervention development including feasibility studies; epidemiological approaches, surveys, case studies, simulated client studies; interviews and focus groups.

Peer Review

IJPP uses double-anonymous peer review where both the reviewer and author identities are concealed. Visit Fair editing and peer review for more information about the peer review process.

How to Submit

Please submit your manuscript online via https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/ijpharmp. You will need to create an account if this is your first submission to the journal.

For assistance please visit ScholarOne Manuscripts Author Support or email [email protected].

Title Page

As IJPP uses double-anonymous peer review, the title page must be submitted separately from the main paper and contain the following information:

• Manuscript title
• Full author names, affiliations and countries at the time the work described in the manuscript was carried out. Authors should meet all criteria for authorship, and all who meet the criteria should be identified as authors, as defined in the ICMJE guidelines.
• Corresponding author email address and postal address.
• Declaration of interest statement noting any potential conflicts of interest for all authors, as defined here. If no conflict exists, please state: The author(s) declare that there are no conflicts of interest.
• Author contribution statement briefly detailing the contribution of each author to the research including their roles in formulating the research question(s), designing the study, carrying it out, analysing the data and writing the article.
• Data access statement indicating whether the authors had complete access to the study data, with an explanation of the nature and extent of access, including whether access is ongoing.
• Data availability statement indicating whether the materials supporting the findings are available, and if so, where readers may access them. Please find sample statements at Research Data Policy.
• Funding statement fully citing all relevant information, e.g. 'This work was supported by the Medical Research Council [grant number xxx]' or ‘This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors’.
• State whether the funding sources were involved in the study design; collection, analysis, and interpretation of data; writing of the report; any restrictions regarding the submission of the report for publication; or state that the supporting source had no such involvement or restrictions regarding publication.
• Acknowledgements recognising individuals or organisations who provided non-financial advice and/or support such as materials and results obtained from outside the authors’ laboratories, as defined in the ICMJE guidelines. Their contribution should be specified and ensure named individuals consent to be included in your article.
• Word count excluding abstract and references.

Anonymisation

Please anonymise the main document, figures, tables and supplementary files before submission.

• Remove the author or username in the document properties.
• Check that your figures and schemes do not include author details.
• Avoid phrasing which might reveal your identity. For example, “We have previously shown that….ref” should be replaced with “It has been shown previously that….ref” or “Earlier studies found that….ref”.
• When responding to reviewers’ comments please avoiding signing it with your details.

Article Types

Research Paper

• The maximum word count is 3,000 words. The paper may include up to 30 references and six tables and figures (e.g. four tables and two figures). The word count should be calculated after excluding the abstract and references.
• The paper must include a structured abstract with the headings: objectives, methods, key findings and conclusions. The maximum word count is 250 words and abstracts must not contain references or abbreviations.
• The main text should include the following sections:
  • Introduction providing a background to the study appropriate for an international audience and stating the specific aims of the study. Please ensure that any abbreviations and all symbols used in equations are fully defined. Approximate length: 500-1000 words
  • Methods describing the materials and methods used in sufficient detail to allow the study to be replicated. Please include details of ethical approval in this section. Approximate length: 500-1000 words
  • Results providing detailed response rates, participant demography, outcome data. It is essential to include statistical analyses or other indicators to enable assessment of the variance of replicates of the experiments. Figures and tables should not report the same data.  Approximate length: 700-1000 words
  • Discussion starting with a short sharp paragraph summarising the main findings of the study and followed by a critique of the strengths and limitations of the research. The full results should then be discussed in the context of international published literature and the contribution made to the field. Please include any policy, practice and research implications. Approximate length: 700 - 1000 words    
  • Conclusions briefly summarising the salient findings of the study. Authors are strongly advised to emphasise the contribution made to the field by their study in this section. Approximate length: 150 -250 words

Review Article

• The maximum word count is 6,000 words. The paper may include up to 60 references and six tables and figures (e.g. four tables and two figures).
• Reviews must demonstrate a systematic, structured approach as follows:
  • Clearly state the question(s) the review aims to answer
  • Describe the literature search strategy/method and results
  • State the quality criteria used to assess papers and explain reasons for excluded studies.
• Please follow the PRISMA guidelines and upload the relevant checklist during submission.
• The heterogeneity of pharmacy practice research methods may often preclude traditional statistical meta-analysis, so robust narrative reviews are also welcomed, as long as they have been conducted and reported systematically as per above
• Reviews of the literature critically assessing published material on any aspect of pharmacy practice or medicines management are particularly welcomed

Commentaries

• The maximum word count is 2,000 words and may include up to 10 references. Commentaries should not include headings.
• No abstract required.
• Commentaries are persuasive opinion pieces that use current research to address controversial or new topics.

Letters to the Editor

• The maximum word count is 500 words and may include up to 5 references.
• No abstract required.
• All letters must be submitted via the online manuscript submission system and submissions will be peer reviewed.
• Readers may submit comments, questions or criticisms about recently published articles. Please include the title and authors of the relevant article.  The authors of the original paper will be invited to respond.
• The journal will also consider letters describing case reports or original material.

Short Communications

• The maximum word count is 1,000 words. The paper may include up to 10 references and two tables and figures (e.g. one table and one figure).
• The paper must include a structured abstract with the headings: objectives, methods, key findings and conclusions. The maximum word count is 100 words and abstracts must not contain references or abbreviations
• Short communications are appropriate for smaller pieces of research such as pilot studies and preliminary results. They should be of high quality and novel in context.
• They should follow the same structure as research articles with shorter Introduction and Discussion sections.

Special Feature

• Word length would normally be a maximum of 5000 words. Exact numbers of references, tables and figures are at the discretion of the authors but should be kept to a minimum.
• IJPP Special Feature Papers are submitted in response to a specific call from IJPP inviting contributions for Themed Collections. They are extended Commentary papers about a novel or current topic within the Journal scope and should be well argued and referenced and agreed with the Editor.
• Unlike the standard Commentary they require an abstract and sub-headings.

Preparing your Manuscript

Style

• Please use UK spelling throughout, except in quotations and in references. Please define nonstandard abbreviations at the first occurrence. For more information, visit Oxford SCIMED.
• Authors are urged to be succinct, use the minimum number of tables and figures necessary and avoid repetition of information between these two media. 
• Please number the pages and lines of the manuscript.
• Manuscripts should be written in the passive voice.

Graphical Abstracts

Authors of Research papers or Review articles are encouraged to submit a graphical abstract in addition to a text abstract for their manuscript at initial submission.

A graphical abstract is a single figure prepared by the authors that summarizes the key point(s) of an article and serves as a visual introduction to encourage interest in the content. When preparing your graphical abstract, keep in mind that they are ideally suited for promoting your article on social media, so text should be large enough to be read in that context and the image should be oriented in landscape format.

Please also consider the accessibility of your graphical abstract to all readers. See OUP’s Guidelines for making figures accessible.

Graphical abstracts are peer reviewed and published as part of the article online and in the PDF. It also appears in the table of contents and some other journal pages including in search results.

Submission Instructions

Your graphical abstract should be submitted as a separate file, selecting the appropriate file type designation in the online submission system. The file should be named “graphical_abstract”. Please see OUP's guidance on appropriate file format and resolution for graphics.​ 

References

You may format references in any readable numbered style at submission. If an author/date system is used then this will be queried by the production team for a resupply. Please also note that the author is responsible for the accuracy of reference information. Please include the full DOI link where available.​

LaTeX

Information on LaTeX files and formatting is available.

Tables

You must number all tables (e.g., table 1, table 2, table 3) and reference them in the text. You must place all tables at the end of the main text. Tables should be in an editable format rather than embedded as an image file.

Figures

You must include figure titles and legends within the manuscript file rather than be included in the image file.

You must submit each figure as an individual image file. Submit all panels of a multipanel figure on a single page as one file. For example, if the figure has 3 panels, the figure should be submitted as one file. Each panel should be labelled as a letter (A, B, C, D, etc.) in the upper-left corner of each panel.

Images of photographs or paintings can be provided as raster images. Common examples of raster images are .tif/.tiff, .raw, .gif, and .bmp file types. The resolution of raster files is measured by the number of dots or pixels in a given area, referred to as “dpi” or “ppi.”

• minimum resolution required for printed images or pictures: 350dpi
• minimum resolution for printed line art: 600dpi (complex or finely drawn line art should be 1200dpi)
• minimum resolution for electronic images (i.e., for on-screen viewing): 72dpi

Images of maps, charts, graphs, and diagrams are best rendered digitally as geometric forms called vector graphics. Common file types are .eps, .ai, and .pdf. Vector images use mathematical relationships between points and the lines connecting them to describe an image. These file types do not use pixels; therefore resolution does not apply to vector images.

Figures prepared as .doc/.docx or .jpeg/.jpg files will not be accepted.

 

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. 

 

Supplementary Material

• You must submit supplementary data or supplementary material at the same time as the main manuscript
• Please identify files sequentially e.g., Supplemental material S1, Supplemental material S2 etc.
• Supplementary material must be cited in the text of the main manuscript.
• Supplementary material will be available online only and will not be copyedited or typeset.
• Style and formatting of supplementary material should be consistent with that of the manuscript. 
• Supplementary material should be formatted to function on any internet browser.
• Supplementary material files should be no larger than 2MB each.

Third-Party Permissions

If you wish to reproduce any material for which you do not own the copyright—including quotations, tables, or images—you must obtain permission from the copyright holder. The permissions agreement must include the following documents:

• nonexclusive rights to reproduce the material in your article
• both print and electronic rights, preferably for use in any form or medium
• lifetime rights to use the material
• worldwide English-language rights

Further information on obtaining permissions is available.

Pre-submission Language Editing

If you are not confident in the quality of your English, you may wish to use a language-editing service to ensure that editors and reviewers understand your manuscript. IJPP partners with Enago, a leading provider of author services. Prospective authors are entitled to a discount of 30% for editing services at Enago, via the Specialist English Editing Services for Oxford University Press Authors page.

Enago is an independent service provider that will handle all aspects of this service, including payment. As an author you are under no obligation to take up this offer. Pre-submission language editing is optional and does not guarantee that your manuscript will be peer reviewed nor accepted.

ORCID

IJPP requires all submitting authors to provide an ORCID ID at submission to the journal. You can find out more about ORCID, and the benefits of using an ORCID ID here. If you do not already have an ORCID ID, you can register for free via the ORCID website. 

Editorial Policies

PUBLICATION ETHICS

We will consider your manuscript as long as:

• it is your own original work and does not duplicate any previously published work, including your own;
• it is not under consideration, in peer review, or accepted for publication in any journal other than IJPP;
• it has not been published in any other journal; and
• it contains nothing abusive, defamatory, libelous, obscene, fraudulent, or illegal.

Authors should observe high ethical standards and comply with publication best practices. The following are all unacceptable:

• data falsification or fabrication
• plagiarism, including duplicate publication of your own work without proper citation
• misappropriation of work

We treat any case of ethical or publication malpractice very seriously. We will address them in accordance with the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines. Further information about OUP’s ethical policies is available.

Ethical Approval

Original research studies involving animals or human volunteers must include details of ethical approval. These should include:

• the name of the Institutional Review Board or Ethics Committee that approved the study and all protocols,
• the date of this approval and (c) the number of the certification or document which verified approval of the study.

If you have not needed to seek ethical approval for the work, we also require this to be independently justified with either a reference to a regulation or details of external independent third party confirmation of this decision. Papers that do not comply with internationally accepted ethical criteria will not be accepted for publication.

Please also include details of any other approvals that were required e.g., UK Research and Development approval.

Transparent Reporting

Authors are requested to follow standard reporting guidelines when reporting their studies. For example manuscripts reporting randomised controlled trials must be written in accordance with the CONSORT Statement, systematic reviews must written in accordance with the PRISMA guidelines, and qualitative studies in accordance with COREQ. Guidelines for other study designs can be found on the EQUATOR network (http://www.equator-network.org/). Please complete and submit checklists and flow charts together with your articles.

Data Policy

Where ethically feasible, IJPP strongly encourages authors to make all data and software code on which the conclusions of the paper rely available to readers. We suggest that data be presented in the main manuscript or additional supporting files or deposited in a public repository whenever possible. Information on general repositories for all data types, and a list of recommended repositories by subject area, is available at Choosing where to archive your data.

Sample data availability statements can be found at Research Data Policy. We ask authors to include a data availability statement in your manuscript. If all data are incorporated into the article and its online supplementary material we recommend stating “The data underlying this article are available in the article and in its online supplementary material.”

IJPP supports the Force 11 Data Citation Principles and requires that all publicly available datasets be fully referenced in the reference list with an accession number or unique identifier such as a digital object identifier (DOI). Data citations should include the minimum information recommended by DataCite:

    [dataset]* Authors, Year, Title, Publisher (repository or archive name), Identifier

*The inclusion of the [dataset] tag at the beginning of the citation helps us to correctly identify and tag the citation. This tag will be removed from the citation published in the reference list.

Preprints

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.

Self-Archiving

You may self-archive versions of your work on your own webpages, on institutional webpages, and in other repositories. If you want more information about the reuse rights you retain if you publish with us, please visit our Author Self- Archiving Policy page.

Use of Chatbots and Large Language Models

IJPP supports the World Association of Medical Editors’ recommendations on chatbots and scholarly manuscripts. If a chatbot or similar program is used in the development of a paper for IJPP, the following is required:

• The Large Language Models (LLM) cannot be credited as an author, as authorship requires that the author be accountable for the submitted/published work, and artificial intelligence cannot fulfil this requirement of authorship;
• Authors listed on the paper must review the content generated by the LLM and take full responsibility for it, as they would for any other content within the submitted/published work;
• The use of LLM tools must be noted in the cover letter;
• The use of LLM tools must be documented in the Methods, Acknowledgments, or another appropriate section of the paper.

Production

Licence to Publish and Open Access Options

Authors may choose to publish under either a standard licence or an open access licence. Some funders require open access publication as a condition of funding, please clarify any requirements with your funder or institution.

If you choose to publish your article open access, please select your choice of open access licence in our online system after your article has been accepted for publication. You will need to pay an open access charge to publish under an open access licence. Please visit the Charges and Licences pages for more information.

OUP has a growing number of Read and Publish agreements with institutions and consortia which provide funding for open access publishing. This means authors from participating institutions can publish open access, and the institution may pay the charge. Please visit the list of participating journals and institutions.

Author Toll Free Link and Discounts

All corresponding authors will be provided with a free access link to their article upon publication.  The link will be sent via email to the article’s corresponding author who is free to share the link with any co-authors.  Please see OUP’s Author Self-Archiving policy for more information regarding how this link may be publicly shared depending on the type of license under which the article has published.