Information For Authors

Guidelines for authors

Nature of the works

Contributions received for possible publication must be original results of academic work or high-level medical practice in the field of Urology.

Non-simultaneous postulation

The submitted works must be unpublished and their authors undertake to not simultaneously submit them to other publications, this way it is necessary to attach the Statement of originality.

Extension and format

The articles in full (title, authors, adscriptions, abstracts, body of article, illustration legends and references) must have a 1.5 spacing, letter size format (21.5 x 28 cm), 2.5 cm margins, Times New Roman, 12 points. The article may be written in English or Spanish. Any word processor is accepted, including tables (PDF files will not be accepted). The text must not include abbreviations, only international symbols.

Anonymity in the authors’ identities

The articles must neither include in the body nor in the footnotes any information that reveals the authors’ identity, this with a view to ensuring an anonymous review by the referees. After the possible acceptance of the collaboration, all the identifying information shall be included in the front page. 

Front page content

In a separate file, other than the article’s, the following must be included:

1. Article title: in Spanish and English, it is recommended that it is brief and descriptive (ideally under 15 words).
2. Names and surnames of the authors: in the strict order intended for publication. The order and number of authors shall not be modified after submission (for further information see: Author’s obligations and Policies regarding authorship).
3. Authors’ ID: it is essential that each and every author provides their ORCID, for further information, access https://orcid.org/register.
4. CRediT taxonomy: it is essential to describe each and every author’s contribution in function of CRediT taxonomy (for further information, see: Policies regarding authorship).
5. Ascription institution and country of each and every author: only the first level institution must be mentioned, with no initials, acronyms or translations of the institutions’ names (unless non-western characters are used).
6. Indicate the corresponding author: name, address, telephone and email address (for further information, see: Policies regarding authorship).
7. Acknowledgements: in the case there are.
8. Declaration of absence of conflicts of interest.
9. Disclose the funding source; in the case there is none, explicitly indicate so.

Abstracts

All the abstracts must be written both in Spanish and English in an understandable way so that the reader finds a concise and adequate summary of the work. Abstracts must not include bibliographic references, acronyms —save in the case they are indispensable for drafting conciseness.

For Original articles, abstracts will have a maximum extension of 250 words and must be structured with the following sections, in the order given, both in Spanish and English:

1. Goal
2. Design, methodology or approach
3. Results
4. Limitations or implications of the study
5. Originality or relevance
6. Findings or conclusions

For Clinical cases, abstracts will have a maximum extension of 200 words and must be structured with the following sections, in the order given, both in Spanish and English:

1. Description of the clinical case
2. Relevance
3. Clinical implications
4. Conclusions

For Review articles, abstracts will have a maximum extension of 200 words and must be structured with the following sections, in the order given, both in Spanish and English:

1. Brief description of the topic
2. Relevance
3. Conclusions

For Brief articles, abstracts must have a maximum extension of 70 words and must be structured with the following sections, in the order given, both in Spanish and English:

1. Brief description of the topic
2. Conclusions

Keywords

After the abstracts in Spanish and English, 3 to 5 keywords will be included, following the standard defined by Medical Subject Headings (MeSH).

Contents of collaborations

Original articles: the body of text of Original articles will comprise the following sections:

1. Background
2. Materials and methods
3. Results
4. Discussion
5. Conclusions
6. References in Vancouver format
7. Tables (placed in sequential order, after the references, never in the text) with their respective headings and legends.
8. Figures, progressively numbered, with their respective headings and legends.

Clinical cases: the body of text of Clinical cases will comprise the following sections:

1. Background
2. Clinical case
3. Discussion
4. References in Vancouver format
5. Tables (placed in sequential order, after the references, never in the text) with their respective headings and legends.
6. Figures, progressively numbered, with their respective headings and legends.

 

Review articles: they can be divided into sections with appropriate titles and subtitles. Tables and figures must follow the format above. The maximum number of references is 50 (Vancouver format), taking care or reporting recent references.

Brief communications: they will not be divided into sections, no more than five references (Vancouver format) are allowed. Tables and figures must follow the format above and will not be more than 3 (or one of each). In this case, no more than five authors will be accepted.

Letters to the editor: they must be written as a response to any content already published in RMU, references must be provided (no more than 5 in Vancouver format) and never more than two authors.

Elaboration of references

Use of reference management software

Priority will be given to contributions that deliver references standardized by using any reference management software such as: Zotero, Bibme, Reference Manager, RefWorks, EndNote, or any other compatible with scientific-medical edition.

References’ DOI

When applicable —particularly in references to electronic documents— the corresponding DOI must be provided. 

Vancouver citation style

Vancouver citation style will be utilized. References must be listed and numbered in their order of appearance, with the corresponding citation as a superscript (no parentheses, no spaces, separated by commas and dashes in the case of more than two in a row). They will be copy-pasted as in the cited source, this is: authors, article title, journal name, year, period, volume, number, pages and DOI (if applicable). 

Journal articles: a) Surnames and initials of all the authors; b) article title; c) name or initials of the journal; d) year; volume (number): pages.

1. Ennis SS, Guo H, Raman L, Tambyah PA, Chen SL, Tiong HY. Premenopausal women with recurrent urinary tract infections have lower quality of life. Int J Urol. 2018;25(7):684–9, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/iju.13698.

Books: a) Surnames and initials of all the authors; b) title and subtitle; c) edition (if it is not the first); d) city; e) publishing house; f) year.

2. Gray, M, Moore K. Urologic Disorders: Adult and Pediatric Care: Adult and Pediatric Care, St. Louis Missouri, Mosby Elsevier, 2009.

 

Book chapter: a) Surnames and initials of all the authors of the chapter; b) chapter title; c) editors, authors, compilers of the book; d) book title; e) edition (if it is not the first); f) city; g) publishing house; h) year; i) pages.

3. Jansen PK, Albaugh JA. Erectile dysfuntion: Identification, assesment, treatment, and follow-up. Lajiness M. & Quallich S. (eds). The nurse practitioner in urology, Switzerland, Springer, 2016, p. 83-118, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28743-0_4

Figures and tables

Figures

1. Titles will be presented in the same page as the figures, in the upper part (heading), indicating the number of the corresponding figure (with Arabic numerals) (Ex.: Figure 1. Title).
2. Abbreviations shall be written in the lower part and must include their definition.
3. Figures must be sent separately as indicated by the electronic management system.
4. Figures must be delivered in high-resolution TIFF or JPG format (300 dpi or higher).
5. No text must be included in the figure. Every text, either heading or legend shall be written at the end of the references.
6. Photographs of anatomic parts must be preferably against a black background.

Tables

1. Tables must be produced in world processor; they must not be images.
2. Each table must occupy one page.
3. The heading will bear the table number in Arabic numerals, followed by the title according to the order or appearance in the text (Ex.: Table 1. Title)
4. Abbreviations shall be written in the lower part and must include their definition.
5. Eight tables at most.

Legal requirements to submit manuscripts

Revista Mexicana de Urología neither makes nor receives payments for receiving, processing and publishing texts. Manuscripts submitted for possible publication in RMU must sent the following documents in their entirety and final version over the OJS platform. No submission will be accepted if sent otherwise:

1. Statement of originality and non-duplicity, this letter has to be filled in with the data of the author and in the case of articles by two or more authors, each and every author’s data have to be provided. The corresponding author, who has to provide an email address and a telephone number, must be clearly identified.
2. Transfer letter of patrimonial rights, it must be filled in and signed by all the authors. In the case of articles by two or more authors, each and every author’s data have to be provided, and the corresponding author must be identified.
3. In the case of previously published material, whose content is subject to copyright —graphs, images, photographs, artistic work, etc., either by the author(s) or third parties—, a copy of the reproduction authorization from the holder of the patrimonial rights must be delivered.
4. Photographs or images where patients appear must be accompanied by their respective Informed Consent, as established in Authors’ obligations in RMU.
5. Attach the full content of the article as defined in Guidelines for authors according to the section in which it is intended to publish.

No changes will be accepted once the process starts.

Technical requirements to submit manuscripts

In order to deliver material, the following criteria must be considered:

1. Deliver textual content in electronic formats for word processor with no password (submitting textual files as PDFs will not be accepted).
2. Deliver photographs and images as electronic files in JPG format (or compatible) of at least a 300-dpi resolution.
3. It is essential to attach graphs, tables or charts in a separate spreadsheet. The images of graphs, tables or charts are not suitable for the editorial process.

Once all the submission requirements are met, the text will be sent to Editorial Review.

Authors’ rights

According to the current Copyright legislation, Revista Mexicana de Urología recognizes and respects the authors’ moral right, as well as the ownership of patrimonial right, which will be transferred –in a nonexclusive manner– to the journal in order to legally disseminate it in Open Access.

The authors may enter independent and additional contractual agreements for the nonexclusive distribution of the version of the article published in Revista Mexicana de Urología (for instance including it into an institutional repository or disseminate it over printed or electronic media), as long as it is clearly and explicitly stated that the work was published for the first time in Revista Mexicana de Urología.

For all the above, the authors must submit the form of Transfer letter of patrimonial rights of the first publication duly filled in and signed by the authors. This form must be sent together with the manuscript over the OJS platform.

Filing

Revista Mexicana de Urología utilizes LOCKSS system to create a storage system distributed among the participant libraries; it allows the creation of permanent files in the journal with conservation and restoration ends. More…

Code of Ethics

Revista Mexicana de Urología (RMU) adheres to the code of ethics for the actuation and performance of personnel involved in the journal’s publication process (editors, editorial committee, authors and reviewers) established by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), available at www.publicationethics.org, in like manner, the patterns indicated by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) are observed, available at www.icmje.org

Plagiarism detection

Revista Mexicana de Urología (RMU) uses specialized software to detect plagiarism. The text received will undergo a screening before being sent to editorial and academic review. It will be sought that articles are at least 20% original. This is to say, at least 20% of the information is original in the field of knowledge, regardless of the properly referred citations.

If possible plagiarism is detected or reported for a previously published text, the procedure to follow will be the one COPE summarizes in this flowchart.

The consequences may vary from a warning, if the case is an error or misunderstood, up to the rejection of the article and denounce the author(s) before their institutions.

Reasons for rejection

Lack of observation to any of the instructions in these guidelines for authors. A delay longer than four weeks to answer the comments of the editor or reviewers or disagreement with any of them.

Authors’ obligations

Protection of people and animals

In studies conducted on human beings, it must be stated if the methods used met the critical norms of the corresponding Research Committee or Committee of Clinical Analysis (of the country, hospital, research center or institution) and the revised 1975 Declaration of Helsinki available at: http://www.wma.net/s/policy/b3.html. No images, names, initials or hospital data that allow identifying the subjects of study. When experiments with animals are included, it must be specified if the regulations of the center or the National Research Council or the possible national laws, as regards the care and use of laboratory animals, have been followed

Redundant or duplicated publication

The submission of a text implies that the work has not been previously published in the version sent to RMU (except as a summary or part of thesis), if the text has been previously placed in a pre-print repository, the corresponding author must disclose it at the time of submitting the manuscript and indicate the corresponding DOI. If the article is accepted, the authors undertake to take care that any dissemination after publication refers to RMU as the space in which it was published for the first time and as well that the citation refers to RMU and the DOI assigned.

Funding and declaration of possible conflict of interest

The authors must communicate any commercial connection, material or financial help received over the research, drafting or publication, or any potential economic interest as regards the article topic and that may give rise to a conflict of interest. If there is no funding source, the manuscript must include the section and state: “the authors did not receive any funding to carry out this study-article”. The authors with no conflict of interest related to the subject of the work, likewise, will have to declare that “There is not any sort of interest regarding the subject of the work”. This information will be placed at the end of each collaboration in a visible place. 

Informed consent (Concern)

If applicable, the authors must mention in “Materials and methods” that the procedures and controls they used on the patients were applied after receiving their informed consent.

Privacy

The authors are responsible to secure the patients’ right to privacy protecting their identity both in the text and images of the article. No names, initials or numbers of the clinical history of the hospital shall be used, or any other sort of relevant information for the research that may identify the patient, neither in the text nor in the photographs; unless such information is essential for the article’s scientific goals, in which case it may be gathered in the article as long as the patient (or parent or guardian) provides their written informed consent (concern) to publish these data.

Obtaining of permits

Authors who on their article reproduce previously published materials (text, tables or figures) will be directly in charge of obtaining the necessary permits for them to be reproduced in the journal. Authors must have obtained the proper written authorization of the publishing house that published such material and send a copy to the journal. Should the authors have a query as to how to proceed, the editorial coordination of the RMU will be able to help them.

Statement of originality

The authors declare that the content of the manuscript is original and that it has neither been previously published nor submitted for consideration to any other publishing format, either in full or partially. The contrary is a serious breach of scientific ethics.

Policies regarding authorship

RMU follows the recommendations by International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) as regards authorships and contributions, in which it is established that authorship bases upon four criteria:

1. Significant participation in the conception / design of the study, data gathering or the analysis / interpretation of data;
2. Participation in the drafting or revision of the manuscript;
3. Approval of the manuscript’s final version for publication; and,
4. Responsibility for the accuracy and integrity of every aspect of the research.

According to ICMJE, authors “must be able to identify which coauthors are responsible for other specific parts of the work… [and] have confidence in their coauthor’s contributions”.

ICMJE also notes that an author must have produced “substantial intellectual contributions” for the manuscript. Creative contribution is, therefore, more apt for authorship than purely mechanic work. A technician who merely acquires data, a main researcher who only obtains funding or provides supervision, a collaborator that only provides a new reagent or samples, and other research-related tasks, not creative though, do not deserve authorship on their own. These people and their contributions must be referred to in acknowledgements.

CRediT taxonomy

With a view to decreasing possible disputes from authorship conflicts, the authors interested in publishing in RMU are asked to describe the contribution of each author in function of CRediT Taxonomy (Contributor Roles Taxonomy), which has been widely adopted by editors of biomedical journals that adhere to ICMJE’s recommendations. Such taxonomy must be sent together with the submission files and must be read and approved by all the authors involved.

Number of authors

The number of authors will depend on the sort of manuscript submitted. For original studies and reviews, the maximum number of authors is eight. Only in the case of multicentric studies will the maximum number of authors be twelve, as long as it is justified according to the previous guidelines.

Policies on the order and number of authors

Once the manuscript is sent, it will not be possible to make changes in the order or number of authors, consequently every issue related to authorship must be resolved before submitting the manuscript for the first time.

Corresponding author

The only person that takes main responsibility for the communication with the journal over submission, peer review and publication process, and will make sure that all the journal’s administrative requirements (such as providing authorship details, approval by the ethics committee, the proof of registration documentation, compilation of forms and declarations of conflicts of interest) are correctly completed. And even if some of such tasks may be delegated to one or more coauthors, the corresponding author must be always available along the entire process to timely answer any editorial question and must be available after publication to answer criticisms to the work and cooperate with any request from the journal to obtain further information or data. Questions on the article arise after publication.

Responsibility for the content

When submitting the manuscript, it is assumed that each and every author has had full access to all the data in the study and takes up full and public responsibility for the integrity and accuracy of data. For that reason, RMU declines any responsibility for possible conflicts derived from the authorship of works it publishes.

Collective authorship

In the case of collective authorship, the name of the drafters or responsible for the work will be included followed by «and the group…» when all the members of the group are considered coauthors. If the name of the group is to be included, despite not all the members are considered coauthors, the responsible authors will be mentioned followed by «on behalf of the group…» or «for the group». In any case, the names and institutions of the group members will be included as an annex at the end of the manuscript.