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Author Guidelines

Submitting your manuscript: Summary
Please make your submission online at https://jdp.sljol.info/about/submissions/ or by emailing to colpathsl@yahoo.com. Submissions can be as a Microsoft Word document (or equivalent) with separate title page, main manuscript file, figures (in JPEG or TIFF formats), and supplementary files. All submissions must be accompanied by a cover letter (in Microsoft Word/ PDF formats).

Should you face any difficulties with your submission please contact editors by email: colpathsl@yahoo.com.

General Instructions

The journal will publish the following types of articles.

Leading and review articles solicited by the editors that will update readers on day-to-day diagnostic work and new developments in the field. These articles will be based on a particular theme, system or disease. (Limited to 3000 words and 25 references).
Original research papers, including clinicopathological studies (Limited to 3000 words, five tables, five figures and 25 references).
Case reports (Limited to 1500 words, one table, three figures and 10 references).
Audits (Limited to 2000 words, six tables, five figures and 15 references).
Brief communications (Limited to 750 words, one table, one figure and 10 references).
Technical reports which are short papers describing a new or modified histopathological/cytopathological technique. (Limited to 1000 words, one table, one figure and 10 references).
Letters to the editor (Limited to 400 words and five references).
Images in cytology/histology which are histological or cytological images of rare conditions or classic examples of common entities accompanied by a brief description. The pictures should tell the story and catch the attention of the reader. (Limited to 500 words and six figures)

Material received for publication in this journal must not be submitted for publication elsewhere without the editors' permission. (This does not include published abstracts of oral presentations or posters).

All persons designated as authors should have participated sufficiently to take responsibility for the contents of the paper. All authors must disclose any affiliations that they consider to be relevant and involvement with any organization that has a direct interest on the title concerned.

Articles must be submitted in English (United Kingdom) style.

Manuscripts that do not conform to the requirements stipulated will be returned for amendments.

Every submission should contain the following files:

Cover letter:
A concise letter, addressed to the Editor-in-Chief, double spaced, as a Microsoft Word (or equivalent) or PDF file indicating the following:

A declaration by the authors that the content in part or whole has not been submitted for publication elsewhere. In the event that content (in part or whole) of the work has been submitted or published elsewhere, please include details of such and reason(s) for submission to Journal of Diagnostic Pathology.
A declaration by the corresponding author that the manuscript has been read and approved by all authors.
Any potential conflict of interest should be declared.

Title Page:

The title page file should be submitted in Microsoft Word (or equivalent editable file, not PDF) and should contain,

A brief and clear title that accurately describes the work contained within the manuscript.
A short running title (up to 80 characters including spaces)
List of authors (using given and family name, but not degrees)
Full affiliations of all authors and contact details of the corresponding author
A conflict-of-interest statement
Details of ethical clearance for the study
Details of funding sources
An acknowledgement section (optional)
A word count (from beginning of Introduction to end of Discussion).

Main manuscript file:
The main manuscript file should be submitted in Microsoft Word (or equivalent editable file, not PDF) and should contain,

An Abstract (structured and no more than 250 words)
Keywords (3 to 10) preferably chosen from the medical subject headings (MeSH) in Index Medicus.

It should be followed by (on next page) the main text containing the following subheadings:

Introduction
Materials and methods
Results
Discussion
References (in the correct format – see below)
Table(s)
Figure legends

As separate data files:

Figures (in the appropriate file format, size and resolution – see below)
Copyright transfer agreement (mandatory)
Supporting information files (if any)
Additional files for review but NOT for publication
Patient consent form (where relevant)

Preparation of manuscript: Detailed guideline

Submit your contribution on A4 paper (210mm x 297mm).
Manuscript typing should be in Times New Roman, size 12 and double spaced.
A 2.54 cm (1 inch) margin should be kept on all four sides.
Pages should be numbered consecutively
Upper case should be used for capital letters and lower case should be used for the rest of the text. Do not use upper case for words/sentences in the title and subheadings.
Components in the main manuscript should be in the following order with each component starting on a new page
- Abstract
- Keywords
- Text
- References
- Tables in numerical sequence
- Figure legends

Identifying information of authors (including any information pointing towards identification of authors such as the name of the institute/ ERC board) should not be included in the Identifiable information of patients including images, names, initials, and hospital numbers should not be included.main manuscript file. These can be included in the title page which is submitted as a separate file.
Identifiable information of patients including images, names, initials, and hospital numbers should not be included.
Abstracts are not required for review articles and case reports.

Title page

Title of article
Authors - Including first name and family name. List the authors in the order to be published.
All those designated as authors should qualify for authorship and all those who qualify should be listed. Each author should have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for appropriate portions of the content. Authorship credit should be based only on 1) substantial contributions to conception and design, or acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data; 2) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content; 3) final approval of the version to be published. Provision of funding, collection of data or general supervision of the research group alone does not justify authorship. All others who contributed to the work who are not authors should be named in the Acknowledgements section.
Full affiliations of all authors. This should include the name of the department(s) and institution(s) to which the work should be attributed.
Full details of the corresponding author including the full postal address, phone number and email address. The corresponding author should take the responsibility of the integrity of the full work, from inception and design to publication.
Conflict-of-interest statement. If there are no conflicts of interest to declare, a statement stating this should be included.
Details of ethical clearance for the study (include the institute granting ethical clearance and the number).
Information of financial support (include grant number and name of the granting agency if relevant). If financial support was not received for the work, this should be stated.
Acknowledgements (optional)
A word count (from beginning of Introduction to end of Discussion, excluding abstract, key words, references, tables and figure legends).

Main manuscript

Abstract and keywords

Abstract - up to 250 words, must be structured under subheadings: Background and objective(s), Materials and methods, Results and Discussion/Conclusion
Keywords - should be below the abstract, 3-10 in number, the words must help to cross index / trace your article and preferably chosen from the medical subject headings (MeSH) in Index Medicus.

Text

Original research must be structured under subheadings: Introduction, Objective, Material and methods, Results and Discussion/Conclusion
Case reports must be structured under subheadings: Introduction (optional), Case report/History, Pathological features and Discussion
Audit must be structured under the subheadings: Background, Aims and objective, Standards used to compare your practice against, Methods, Results/Conclusion, Recommendations and Action plan
Technical reports must be structured under subheadings: Introduction, Methods, Results, Conclusion
Brief communications/ Letters to the editor /Images in cytology/histology - do not need to be structured.

Units

Use SI units only (except for blood pressure and haemoglobin).
Other units may be given within brackets.
Use only Arabic numerals

Names of stains, drugs, instruments

Drugs - generic names only
Immunohistochemical stains - include name of manufacturer and dilution within brackets
Instruments - proprietary name, with name and location of manufacturer within brackets

References

References should be given in Vancouver style
Complete names of the journals should be provided
References must be numbered in the order they appear in the text and indicated by Arabic numerals in parentheses. Do not superscript.
If the number of authors is 6 or less - list all. If the number of authors is 7 or more, list the first 6 authors and add et al.
Unpublished material should not be used as references.

Examples:
Journal articles
Six or less authors:
Dabir PD, van der Post RS, Nagtegaal ID. Incidental morphological findings in colorectal adenomas. Histopathology. 2021;78(3):348-57.

If more than six authors:
Attygalle AD, Wren D, Dobson R, Vroobel KM, Sharma B, O’Connor S, et al. Lymphomatoid papulosis mimicking relapsed angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma on histology: the importance of clinicopathological correlation. Histopathology. 2021;78(3):470-3.

Books
WHO Classification of Tumours Editorial Board. Soft Tissue and Bone Tumours. 5 ed. Lyon (France): International Agency for Research on Cancer; 2020.

Chapters in Books
Thway K, Nielson TO. Myxoid liposarcoma. In: WHO Classification of Tumours Editorial Board, editor. Soft Tissue and Bone Tumours. WHO classification of tumours 3. 5 ed. Lyon (France): International Agency for Research on Cancer; 2020. p. 42-4.

Conference proceedings
Amarathunga P. Quality Assurance in Histopathology: the way forward. Annual Academic Sessions of the College of Pathologists of Sri Lanka 2019; Colombo, Sri Lanka 2019.

Websites
Xu B. Pleomorphic adenoma: PathologyOutlines.com website; 2021 [Available from:
https://www.pathologyoutlines.com/topic/salivaryglandspleomorphicadenoma.html.

Tables

Number the tables in Arabic numerals in the order in which they appear in the text after the references.
Each table should be on a separate page, typed using double spacing.
Give a brief title for each table which should be placed on top of the table.
Abbreviations used in a table should be explained as a footnote below the table.

Legends for figures

Type double spaced, on a separate page
When symbols, arrows, numbers or letters are used to identify parts of an image, identify and explain each one clearly in the legend of that figure.
Give the degree of magnification and the name of the stain for microscopic photographs at the end of the legend.

Preparation of figures

Number the figures in Arabic numerals in the order in which they appear in the text.
If sending more than 1 figure, each should be named as “Figure_1”, Figure_2” in the file name, in the order of appearance.
Images of macroscopic specimens must have a scale marker.
All macroscopic and microscopic photographs should be in JPEG or TIFF formats.
All figures must be in highest quality possible, up to 10 MB each in file size, at least 300 dpi in resolution.
Composite figures must have a black border clearly separating the individual cells (e.g., a border must clearly separate the elements of a Figure 1A, 1B, 1C, and 1D). Individual cells of composite figures must additionally have a black corner box, with white-font, bolded text identifying the individual cells (e.g., A, B, C, and D).
Clinical photographs must be cropped or otherwise masked so as not to disclose patients’ identities.

Manuscript submission

All manuscripts should be submitted online using either one of the two methods below:
(i). Online submission portal of Journal of Diagnostic Pathology via the portal at Sri Lankan Journals online website at https://jdp.sljol.info/about/submissions/
(ii). Direct email to the College of Pathologists of Sri Lanka at colpathsl@yahoo.com

All submissions should be accompanied by a cover letter and the copyright transfer agreement, signed by the corresponding author. The copyright transfer agreement can be found here. (please use 'open link in new tab' option to download this agreement}
When submitting via the Sri Lanka Journals online portal, the cover letter, title page and copyright agreement that accompany the manuscript file should be submitted as separate data files
All other components should be followed as stipulated above.
Any further correspondence can be made to the Editors through email colpathsl@yahoo.com

Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

The submission has not been previously published, nor is it before another journal for consideration (or an explanation has been provided in the cover letter).
The submission file is in Microsoft Word or equivalent (editable file) document file format.
Where available, URLs and DOIs for the references have been provided.
The text is double-spaced; uses a 12-point font; employs italics, rather than underlining (except with URL addresses and DOIs)
The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in the Author Guidelines, which is found in About the Journal.
Every effort has been made to ensure that author names and identifiable information such as institution names are removed from the manuscript file (following the instructions to ensure blind peer review).

Copyright Notice

Copyright on any research article is transferred in full to the College of Pathologists of Sri Lanka upon publication in the Journal of Diagnostic Pathology. The copyright transfer includes the right to reproduce and distribute the article in any form of reproduction (printing, electronic media or any other form).

Articles in the Journal of Diagnostic Pathology are Open Access articles, published under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

This license permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided it is licensed under the same terms and the original work is properly cited

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