Goals and content | General information | Open access | Word count and page charge >Original research and discussion papers >Short communication >Systematic reviews | Types of manuscripts >Original research articles >Reviews >Discussion papers | Preparation of manuscripts >Arrangement >References >Tables >Figures >Protection of Research Participants >Informed Consent >Conflict of Interest & Funding | Proofs | Submission of manuscripts
The aim of the Journal is to promote research in the fields of occupational and environmental health and safety and to increase knowledge through the publication of original research articles, systematic reviews, and other information of high interest. Areas of interest include occupational and environmental epidemiology, occupational and environmental medicine, psychosocial factors at work, physical work load, work-related mental and musculoskeletal problems, aging, work ability and return to work, working hours and health, occupational hygiene and toxicology, work safety and injury epidemiology as well as occupational health services. In addition to observational studies, quasi-experimental and intervention studies are welcome as well as methodological papers, and studies associated with economic evaluation. The Journal also publishes short communications, commentaries, discussion papers, and consensus reports, provided that these are of scientific interest.
Papers are accepted on the understanding that they are submitted solely to the Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment & Health and subject to editorial review. A double-blind peer review process is used. The editors cannot enter into correspondence about papers that are rejected as being unsuitable for publication, and their decision is final.
All submitted papers must conform to the "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals" (see: http://www.icmje.org), which is often referred to as the Vancouver style.
As of 1 January 2021, Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment & Health accepts only open access content. Exceptions from the open access fee (€2500 or €1250 for short communications) can be granted but only under very special conditions. All open access articles are published with a CC-BY 4.0 licence, which allows them to be shared and built on according to the restrictions of the licence. Click here for more details.
For reasons of readability and brevity, all submissions must be concise. We have the following limits:
Authors are required to note the Word Count and numbers of tables/figures on the title page. Under some rare circumstances, the editors may allow authors to publish an article that exceeds the word count limits.
Original full paper/communication. These articles should report original research studies that are relevant to occupational and environmental health in a way that is accessible to readers of the Journal. A concise writing style is encouraged.
Short communication. These articles report original data using a limited study question or a topic that can be reported concisely.
Reporting of original research articles. The Journal requires authors to follow a pertinent guideline from the current existing guidelines on the reporting of various study types (presented in the table below). If a randomized controlled trial is reported, authors should complete a CONSORT checklist and flow-chart and be prepared to submit it if requested. The Equator network of reporting guidelines provides a more extensive list of links and topics at www.equator-network.org. The Journal instructions provide further advice on format and layout of the manuscript.
| Name of guideline | Topic of guideline |
|---|---|
| STROBE | Observational studies (1) |
| CONSORT | Randomized controlled trials (2, 3) |
| PRISMA | Systematic reviews and meta-analyses of intervention studies (4) |
| MOOSE | Systematic reviews and meta-analyses of observational studies (5) |
| TREND | Nonrandomized evaluations of behavioral and public health interventions (6) |
| STARD | Diagnostic studies (7) |
| MIAME | Microarray studies (8) |
| COREQ | Qualitative studies (9) |
Systematic reviews. The Journal views systematic reviews as reports of reviews of the literature on specific questions relevant to occupational health and safety, and environmental health. Therefore, a systematic review is characterized by a well-defined question, concrete inclusion and exclusion criteria, a systematic search of the literature, and well-defined methods of synthesizing the results from individual studies. A systematic review must include a sufficient number of original studies to be worth considering. A meta-analysis is defined as a systematic review that includes a statistical pooling of the results of individual studies.
Other reviews. The Journal prefers systematic reviews whenever such a review can be performed. When a systematic review is not feasible, for example, when the topic is more theoretical, nonsystematic reviews will also be considered. However, a search strategy and criteria for included studies will still be required.
Reporting of reviews. The Journal requires authors of systematic reviews on experimental studies to complete the PRISMA checklist and flowchart and be prepared to submit it if requested. When a meta-analysis of observational studies is carried out, authors should use the PRISMA checklist when possible, and, when not possible, the MOOSE checklist should be used.
Research or practical questions relevant to occupational and environmental health can be presented with a free format in a Discussion Paper. These papers can, for example, suggest a new research area; they can also suggest a new approach in research or prevention or treatment practice in occupational health. Although the format of presentation is more flexible than that of a review, the approach should still be critical and scientifically valid.
Some examples of good Discussion Papers include:
Manuscripts should be in English and should be concise as possible without detracting from clarity. The abstract should be structured (maximum 250 words with the titles Objectives, Methods, Results and Conclusions with key terms not listed in the title). The acknowledgments should include credit for contributions that do not justify authorship, note of technical help, acknowledgment of financial and material support, disclosure of any relationships that may pose conflicts of interest (financial relationships with industry, affiliation with or involvement in an organization with a direct financial interest in the subject matter, etc) and information about protection of research participants.
All equations should be done with Microsoft Equation editor.
Manuscripts should be typewritten, double-spaced. They should be divided into two documents: (1) a title page [title; names by which each author is known; one academic degree per author; authors' affiliations; address for correspondence (including e-mail address); a 60-word summary of what is new in the paper/what are the policy implications of the paper and a running head of no more than 60 characters]; and (2) the anonymous main manuscript with a max 250-word abstract and key terms (none that are in the title), followed by and introduction and sections on Methods, Results, Discussion, Concluding Remarks (optional), Acknowledgements (including acknowledgement of financial material support, conflicts of interest, protection of research participants), references, tables, figures. Any appendix/supplementary material should be placed at the end of the document, after the tables/figures.
References should STRICTLY follow the style recommended by the "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals" (see: Section IV.A.9.). Vancouver referencing style is in line with these requirements. References should be numbered consecutively in the order in which they are first mentioned in the text and identified in the text, tables, and legends by Arabic numerals in parentheses (no superscripts!). For example: "Thus, for example, Pan et al (25) reported a dose‒response relationship between shift work exposure and risk of developing type-2 diabetes, such that every five years exposure to rotating night shifts was associated with a 5% increased risk. Dose‒response relationships have also been observed between shift work exposure and other related health complaints such as metabolic syndrome (26) and cardiovascular heart disease (27)."
Unpublished observations and personal communications cannot be used as references; they can, however, be mentioned in the text in parentheses. If a publication has six or fewer authors, all the authors are listed. If there are more than six, list the first six authors and add "et al".
Abbreviate all journal titles. You can use this Web of Science resource to find the correct abbreviation: https://images.webofknowledge.com/images/help/WOS/A_abrvjt.html
Examples of typical reference entries:
For a more extensive list of examples see: International Committee of Medical Journal Editors Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals: Sample References. In addition, Citing Medicine: the NLM Style Guide for Authors, Editors and Publishers offers extensive coverage of how to cite references.
When submitting tables, place the tables at the end of the text after the reference list. Do not use spacebar/ENTER/tabs or macros in the table (each value should be in its own cell) and keep formatting to a minimum. All results sharing a column must be the same type of value (ie, percent, number, standard deviation etc) and that value must be written on the top of each column. However, you can place entities that are closely linked to each other such as Mean (SD), N (%) or OR (95% CI) together in the same column. Define all acronyms used in the table in the table legend. Use alphabetical footnoting. Tables should be constructed to fit in one or two columns of the Journal (the font cannot be reduced to squeeze extra wide tables). All tables should be self-explanatory and should supplement the text, not duplicate it. The table numbers should be mentioned in the text. See this simple do’s and don’ts of table construction (document from inera.com website). Tables that present measures of relative risk (e.g., odds ratios, risk ratios, hazard ratios) should also show number of exposed individuals and percentage of cases (or number of cases per person-years) for each exposure category, as this will help readers to put the relative risks into perspective.
Some good tables from our own publications:
All illustrative material should be considered as figures. When submitting figures, place the figures at the end of the text after the reference list. If for technical reasons this is not possible than submit the figures as a separate file (preferable pdf file). All figures should be mentioned in the text and numbered consecutively in Arabic numerals. All the figures should have a minimum resolution of 800 dpi. Letters, numbers, and symbols should be clear and of sufficient size that, when reduced to fit the columns of a printed page, each item will still be legible. All figures should be of the same proportions (ie, drawn and lettered to the same scale). Color figures will be accepted at the special request of the author, who will then be responsible for paying the extra expenses incurred.
All submitted research articles must include a statement (either in the Method section or the Acknowledgement) that the study obtained ethics approval (or a statement that it was not required and why), including the name of the ethics committee(s) or institutional review board(s), the number/ID of the approval(s), and a statement that participants gave informed consent before taking part. If no formal ethics committee is available, authors should indicate the procedures followed were in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration as revised in 2008. If doubt exists whether the research was conducted in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration, the authors must explain the rationale for their approach and demonstrate that the institutional review body explicitly approved the doubtful aspects of the study.
Any article that contains personal medical information about an identifiable living individual requires the patient’s explicit consent before it can be published. If consent cannot be obtained because the patient cannot be traced then publication will be possible only if the information can be sufficiently anonymized. Identifying information, including names, initials, or hospital numbers, should not be published in written descriptions, photographs, or pedigrees unless the information is essential for scientific purposes and the patient (or parent or guardian) gives written informed consent for publication. Informed consent for this purpose requires that an identifiable patient be shown the manuscript to be published. Authors should disclose to these patients whether any potential identifiable material might be available via the Internet as well as in print after publication.
Authors must declare all conflicts of interest. If there are none, this must also be stated ("Authors declare no conflicts of interest"). Authors must declare all sources of funding and describe the role of the study sponsor(s), if any, in the (i) study design, (ii) the collection, analysis and interpretation of the data, (iii) the writing of the report, and (iv) the decision to submit the paper for publication. If the funder(s) had no such involvement, this should be stated. Please click here to read the journal's policy on Declaration on Competing Interests.
Authors will receive a PDF of their article for proofreading.
Only electronic submissions are accepted. Click here to submit your manuscript. If there are any problems, consult the Journal's secretary, Johanna Parviainen (johanna.parviainen@ttl.fi).
In the accompanying letter, the author should include a (i) information on prior or duplicate publication or on submission elsewhere of any part of the work, (ii) financial or other relationships that might lead to a conflict of interest, (iii) a statement that the manuscript has been read by all authors, that the requirements for authorship have been met by all authors and that each author believes that the manuscript represents honest work, and (iv) any other information that may prove useful to the editor (e.g., the type of article that the manuscript represents).
