Author Guidelines

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 Comments to the Editor).
  • The submission file is in Microsoft Word, or PDF document file format.
  • Where available, URLs for the references have been provided.
  • The text is single-spaced; uses a 12-point font; employs italics, rather than underlining (except with URL addresses); and all illustrations, figures, and tables are placed within the text at the appropriate points, rather than at the end.
  • The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in the Author Guidelines.

Author Guidelines

Submission

Manuscripts should be submitted by one of the authors of the manuscript via email to acm@heyttu.com.

Article Processing Charges

Article Processing Charges (APCs) allow the publisher to make articles immediately available online to anyone to read and reuse upon publication. Annals of Chinese Medicine charges 4800 Danish Kroner (DKK) for each accepted paper.

BUT, It’s free to publish with Annals of Chinese Medicine before Jan. 1, 2024.

Peer Review

All submitted articles are subject to be evaluated and peer-reviewed to ensure editorial appropriateness and technical correctness. Firstly, the assigned Editor will first consider if the manuscript meets the journal’s minimum editorial standards and fits within the scope of the journal. If an article is within scope, then the Editor will ideally solicit at least two external peer reviewers (whose identities will remain anonymous to the authors) to assess the article before confirming a decision to accept. Decisions to reject are at the discretion of the Editor-in-Chief.

Language Editing

Annals of Chinese Medicine has partnered with Heyttu Translation to provide an English-language editing service to authors prior to submission. Authors that wish to use this service will receive a 10% discount on all editing services provided by Heyttu Translation. To find out more information or get a quote, please click here.

Article Types

The journal considers all types of articles, including:

Review Articles

These articles describe new developments of significance in the field of Chinese Medicine, and highlight unresolved questions and future directions. Review articles should have an Abstract, an Introduction, and a brief main headings. The text should be limited to 5,000 words (including tables, figures and references).

Research Articles

These are expected to present major advances and important new research results related to Chinese Medicine. Section headings should be: Abstract, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Conflicts of Interests, Acknowledgments (if applicable), and References. The text should be limited to 4,000 words (including figures and references).

Short Articles

Short articles e.g. editorialperspectivecommentarybook review, and opinions are also welcome. 

Special Issues

  1. The Acupuncturist and Herbalist, primarily publishes non-peer-reviewed theory, hypothesis, case report and clinical experience, etc. 
  2. ACMCN, i.e Chinese Issues published in Annals of Chinese Medicine in Chinese language. An English title page including title, abstract, keywords is required.
  3. ACMCN, i.e Danish Issues published in Annals of Chinese Medicine in the Danish language. An English title page including title, abstract, keywords is required.

Formatting

An optional research article manuscript template can be downloaded here. We recommend that all manuscripts follow the structure below:

1. Title Page and Authorship Information

The title page should contain the following information:
Category of paper
Article title
The article title should not exceed two lines in print. This equates to 100 characters (including spaces) for articles. The article title does not normally include numbers, acronyms, abbreviations or punctuation. It should include sufficient detail for indexing purposes but be general enough for readers outside the field to appreciate what the paper is about.
· names (spelled out in full) of all authors**, and the institutions with which they are affiliated
The name of each author should be written with the family name last, e.g. Charles Darwin, Liu Xiang Tong, and Liu Tong. Authorship is restricted only to direct participants who have contributed significantly to the work.
Short running title not exceeding 50 characters
Corresponding author details (name, e-mail address, mailing address, telephone and fax numbers)
Declaration of any source of financial support

2. Abstract

Abstracts for Research Articles should be structured while Review Articles be unstructured. Abstract should not exceed 250 words, with 4-6 relevant keywords provided in alphabetical order.

3. Main Body

3.1 Introduction

The introduction section should be succinct, without subheadings.

3.2 Materials and Methods

In the methods section,  all necessary detail for others to be able to replicate the study should be provided, e.g. animal models, in vitro and in vivo studies, statistics, materials and reagents, etc.
Annals of Chinese Medicine have no space restriction on methods. Detailed descriptions of the methods (including protocols or project descriptions) and algorithms may also be uploaded as supplementary information or a previous publication that gives more details may be cited. If the method from a previous article is used then this article must be cited and discussed. If a method or tool is introduced in the study, including software, questionnaires, and scales, the license this is available under and any requirement for permission for use should be stated. If an existing method or tool is used in the research, the authors are responsible for checking the license and obtaining any necessary permission. If permission was required, a statement confirming permission was granted should be included in the Materials and Methods section.

3.3 Results and Discussion

This section may be divided into subsections or may be combined.

3.4 Main Text (For Review Article Only)

This section may be divided into subsections or may be combined.

3.5 Conclusions

The main conclusions of the article and highlighting its importance and relevance should be presented.

3.6 Ethical Approval

For animal or human experimental studies, appropriate institutional review board or ethics committee approval is required, and such approval should be stated in the methods section. Investigators who do not have formal ethics review committees should state whether the principles outlined in the Declaration of Helsinki were followed. For work involving experimental animals, the guidelines for the care and use of the animals that were followed should be included in the methods section.

3.7 Informed Consent

For studies on human subjects, state explicitly in the methods section that informed consent was obtained from all participating adult subjects and from parents or legal guardians for minors or incapacitated adults. The manner of obtaining consent (i.e. oral or written) should also be covered. 

3.8 Identification of Patients in Descriptions, Photographs, and Pedigrees

NO identity of the patient should be presented in a subscription. It is acceptable to omit data or make data less specific to de-identify patients but not change any such data.

3.9 Units

Units of measurement should be presented simply and concisely using the International System of Units (SI),  e.g. mmHg for blood pressure, Kg for body weight, Celsius degree for temperature, mm/cm/m for length, and so on. 

3.10 Acupuncture Nomenclature and Traditional Medicine Terminologies

Refer to the Standard Acupuncture Nomenclature and WHO International Standard Terminologies on Traditional Medicine in the Western Pacific Region.

3.11 Drug Names

Use the Recommended International Non-proprietary Name for medicinal substances unless the specific trade name of a drug is directly relevant to the discussion. References to Chinese herbs should include pinyin and pharmaceutical Latin names. Pinyin herb names should be italicized and in lowercase. The first letter of each pharmaceutical Latin herb name should be capitalized.

3.12 Controlled Trials of Acupuncture in Clinical Studies

Preferred reporting criteria based on the Guidelines for Clinical Research in Acupuncture.

3.13 Statistical Requirements

Use correct nomenclature of statistical methods (e.g. two-sample t-test, not unpaired t-test). All p values should be presented to the third decimal place for accuracy unless they are less than 0.001. Descriptive statistics should follow the scales used in the data description. Inferential statistics are important for interpreting results and should be described in detail. 

3.14 Funding Statement

Authors must state how the research and publication of their article were funded, by naming financially supporting body(s) (written out in full) followed by associated grant number(s) in square brackets (if applicable), for example: “This work was supported by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council [grant numbers xxxx, yyyy]; the National Science Foundation [grant number zzzz]; and a Leverhulme Trust Research Project Grant”.
If the research did not receive specific funding, but was performed as part of the employment of the authors, please name this employer. If the funder was involved in the manuscript writing, editing, approval, or decision to publish, please declare this.

3.15 Acknowledgments

All acknowledgments (if any) should be included at the very end of the manuscript before the references. Anyone who contributed to the research or manuscript but is not a listed author should be acknowledged (with their permission).

3.16 References Style

Annals of Chinese Medicine uses the Vancouver style. Authors are responsible for ensuring that the information in each reference is complete and accurate. All references should be numbered consecutively in the order of their first citation. Citations of references in the text should be identified using numbers in square brackets e.g., “as discussed by Kate [9]”; “as discussed elsewhere [9, 10]”. All references should be cited within the text, and uncited references will be removed. 

• Tables or figure legends references should be included in sequence at the point where the table or figure is first mentioned in the main text.
• Abstracts should not be cited unless the abstract is the only available reference to an important concept.
• Uncompleted work or work that has not yet been accepted for publication should not be cited as references.
• Complete title of the article and the last names and initials of all the authors up to 6 must be included. If there are seven or more authors, include the last names and initials of the first six authors only, followed by “et al.”.
• MEDLINE Abbreviations for journal titles should be confirmed.
• If citing a website, please provide the author information, article title, website address and the date you accessed the information.

Examples are given below.

Journal articles

Du ZH, Zhang CW, Xie WX, Chen Y, Cong WJ, Wang ZD, et al. Acupuncture: theory, efficacy, and practice. Evid Based Complement Alternat Med, 2019, 2019:4617464. 

Book

Like AJ, Cindy L. Clinical Electrophysiology: Electrotherapy and Electrophysiologic Testing, 2nd ed. Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2007.

Book Chapter
Baldry P. Acupuncture treatment of fibromyalgia and myofascial pain. In: Chaitow L, ed. Fibromyalgia Syndrome: A Practitioner’s Guide to Treatment, 2nd ed. Edinburgh: Churchill Livingstone, 2003.

Conference Proceedings

Pacak K, Aguilera G, Sabban E, Kvetnansky R, eds. Stress: Current Neuroendocrine and Genetic Approaches. 8th Symposium on Catecholamines and Other Neurotransmitters in Stress, June 28–July 3, 2003, Smolenice Castle, Slovakia. New York: New York Academy of Sciences, 2004.

Website

National Cancer Institute. Acupuncture (PDQ). Available at: https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/treatment/cam/hp/acupuncture-pdq [Date accessed: July 21, 2008]

3.17 Preparation of Figures and Tables

Upon submission of an article, authors should include all figures and tables in the PDF file of the manuscript. Figures and tables should not be submitted in separate files. If the article is accepted, authors will be asked to provide the source files of the figures. Each figure should be supplied in a separate electronic file. All figures should be cited in the manuscript in consecutive order. Figures should be supplied in either vector art formats (Illustrator, EPS, WMF, FreeHand, CorelDraw, PowerPoint, Excel, etc.) or bitmap formats (Photoshop, TIFF, GIF, JPEG, etc.). Bitmap images should be of 300 dpi resolution at least unless the resolution is intentionally set to a lower level for scientific reasons. If a bitmap image has labels, the image and labels should be embedded in separate layers.

Tables should be cited consecutively in the text. Every table must have a descriptive title, and if numerical measurements are given, the units should be included in the column heading. Vertical rules should not be used.

Proofs

Corrected proofs must be returned to the publisher within five working days upon receipt. The publisher will do everything possible to ensure prompt publication.

Copyright

Annals of Chinese Medicine applys open access (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) publishing. Read more Publishing Policy

Permissions

The use of general descriptive names, trade names, trademarks, and so forth in this publication, even if not specifically identified, does not imply that these names are not protected by the relevant laws and regulations. The submitting author is responsible for securing any permissions needed for the reuse of copyrighted materials included in the manuscript.

While the advice and information in this journal are believed to be true and accurate on the date of its going to press, neither the authors, the editors, nor the publisher can accept any legal responsibility for any errors or omissions that may be made. The publisher makes no warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein.

Publication Ethics

Annals of Chinese Medicine is committed to maintaining high standards through a rigorous peer-review together with strict ethical policies. Any infringements of professional ethical codes, such as plagiarism, fraudulent use of data, bogus claims of authorship, should be taken very seriously by the editors with zero tolerance. Annals of Chinese Medicine also follows the standard of COPE.

Submission

Manuscripts should only be submitted by the corresponding author. The submitted journal manuscript or monograph, or any translation of it, must neither be published nor be submitted for publication elsewhere. Violations of these rules will normally result in an immediate rejection of the submission without further review.

When a new submission is received, a couple of checks will be done at the publisher’s office:

    Initial check of format and completeness
    Initial check for the publication status
    Initial check for Plagiarism
    Check for machine produced manuscript
    Initial check of the author’s background

Plagiarism

Papers submitted to Heyttu journals and monographs must contain original material. An Initial Plagiarism Check is carried out for every manuscript submitted to Heyttu journals or monographs. We employ Google ScholarBaidu Xueshu, and CrossCheck to check for plagiarism. All its papers will be added to the CrossCheck database.

Data Fabrication and Falsification

The authors of submitted manuscripts or published articles that are found to have fabricated or falsified the results, including the manipulation of images, may incur sanctions, and published articles may be retracted.

Conflicts of Interest

Authors

Conflicts of interest (COIs, also known as ‘competing interests’) occur when issues outside research could be reasonably perceived to affect the neutrality or objectivity of the work, or its assessment Authors should concern about a possible Conflict of Interest. In such a case, authors can still take responsibility for the accuracy of their paper but must inform the reader with an appropriate statement in the Acknowledgements. The Conflicts of Interest cover 1) Financial: funding and other payments, goods and services received or expected by the authors relating to the subject of the work or from an organization with interest in the outcome of the work, 2) Affiliations: being employed by, on the advisory board for, or a member of an organization with interest in the outcome of the work, 3) Intellectual property, patents or trademarks owned by someone or their organization, 4) Personal, friends, family, relationships, and other close personal connections, 5) Ideology—beliefs or activism, for example, political or religious, relevant to the work, and 6) Academic—competitors or someone whose work is critiqued. A state of conflicts of interest will always be considered by the editor and reviewers and included in the published article. For more information on COIs, see the guidance from the ICMJE and WAME.

Reviewers, Editors and Journal Staff

Reviewers should be recalled at the time they are asked to critique a manuscript if they have conflicts of interest that could complicate their review. Reviewers are required to inform editors of any conflicts of interest that could bias their opinions of the manuscript and should recuse themselves from reviewing specific manuscripts if the potential for bias exists. Reviewers and editors are not allowed to use the information of the manuscript they’re reviewing before its publication to further their own interests. Editors who make final decisions about manuscripts should recuse themselves from editorial decisions if they have conflicts of interest or relationships that pose potential conflicts related to articles under consideration. Other editorial staff members who participate in editorial decisions must provide editors with a current description of their financial interests or other conflicts (as they might relate to editorial judgments) and recuse themselves from any decisions in which a conflict of interest exists. Editors should publish regular disclosure statements about potential conflicts of interest related to their own commitments and those of their journal staff. Guest editors should follow these same procedures.

Corrections and Retractions

When errors are found in published articles and monographs, the publisher will consider the required action and may consult the editors and the authors’ institution(s). Errors by the authors may be corrected by publishing a corrigendum and erratum.

If significant errors and misconduct are identified, this may require a publication of a retraction or an expression of concern following the COPE Retraction Guidelines.

All authors will be asked to agree to the content of the notice.

Authors may appeal if they feel that the decision to reject was based on: i) a major misunderstanding over a technical aspect of the manuscript or ii) a failure to understand the scientific advance shown by the manuscript. Appeals requesting a second opinion without sufficient justification will not be considered. To lodge an appeal, please contact the journal by email, quoting your manuscript number. Appeals will only be considered from the original submitting author.

Read more Author Guidelines

Review Articles

These describe new significant developments in Chinese Medicine and highlight unresolved questions and future directions. Review articles should have an Abstract, an Introduction, and brief main headings. The text should be limited to 6,000 words (including tables, figures and references).

Research Articles

These are expected to present major advances and important new clinical and basic research results related to Chinese Medicine. Section headings should be: Structured Abstract (Objective, Methods, Results, Conclusion), Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Conflicts of Interests, Acknowledgments, and References. The text should be limited to 5,000 words (including figures and references).

Short Articles

Short articles e.g. editerolpersitictivecommentarbook review, and opinions are also welcome. The text should be limited to 2,000 words (including figures and references). The manuscript submitted to this section will not be peer-reviewed. 

中医年鉴杂志

中文投稿请直接发邮件至 acm@heyttu.com

TCM Doctors

TCM Doctors is a special issue of Annals of Chinese Medicine, which covers theory, hypothesis, clinical experiences, personal experinces, etc. Articles submitted to TCM Doctors will not be peer reviewed.  

Chinese Medicine Publication Index

Chinese Medicine Publication Index (CMPI) is the unique issue published by the Annals of Chinese Medicine to present an index to the published articles on Chinese Medicine. 

Perspective and Opinion

Perspective and Opinion

Copyright Notice

Heyttu journals apply the open access (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) publishing method.

1. Open Access

Open access (OA) refers to free, unrestricted online access to research outputs such as journal articles and books. OA content is open to all, with no access fees. OA content can reach more reader and faster popularization.

The OA articles on Heyttu journals apply the Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). Read more about the policy in English/中文/Dansk/Deutsch.

Privacy Statement

General

Read our GDPR Privacy Policy 

HEYTTU operates the www.heyttu.com website and its subdomains e.g. www.heyttu.com/*, which provides the SERVICE.

This page is used to inform website visitors regarding our policies with the collection, use, and disclosure of Personal Information if anyone decided to use our Service, the Heyttu websites.

If you choose to use our Service, then you agree to the collection and use of information in relation with this policy. The Personal Information that we collect are used for providing and improving the Service. We will not use or share your information with anyone except as described in this Privacy Policy.

The terms used in this Privacy Policy have the same meanings as in our Terms and Conditions, which is accessible at www.heyttu.com, unless otherwise defined in this Privacy Policy.

Information Collection and Use

For a better experience while using our Service, we may require you to provide us with certain personally identifiable information, including but not limited to your name, phone number, and postal address. The information that we collect will be used to contact or identify you.

Log Data

We want to inform you that whenever you visit our Service, we collect information that your browser sends to us that is called Log Data. This Log Data may include information such as your computer’s Internet Protocol (“IP”) address, browser version, pages of our Service that you visit, the time and date of your visit, the time spent on those pages, and other statistics.

Cookies

Cookies are files with small amount of data that is commonly used an anonymous unique identifier. These are sent to your browser from the website that you visit and are stored on your computer’s hard drive.

Our website uses these “cookies” to collection information and to improve our Service. You have the option to either accept or refuse these cookies, and know when a cookie is being sent to your computer. If you choose to refuse our cookies, you may not be able to use some portions of our Service.

Service Providers

We may employ third-party companies and individuals due to the following reasons:

  • To facilitate our Service;
  • To provide the Service on our behalf;
  • To perform Service-related services; or
  • To assist us in analyzing how our Service is used.

We want to inform our Service users that these third parties have access to your Personal Information. The reason is to perform the tasks assigned to them on our behalf. However, they are obligated not to disclose or use the information for any other purpose.

Security

We value your trust in providing us your Personal Information, thus we are striving to use commercially acceptable means of protecting it. But remember that no method of transmission over the internet, or method of electronic storage is 100% secure and reliable, and we cannot guarantee its absolute security.

Links to Other Sites

Our Service may contain links to other sites. If you click on a third-party link, you will be directed to that site. Note that these external sites are not operated by us. Therefore, we strongly advise you to review the Privacy Policy of these websites. We have no control over, and assume no responsibility for the content, privacy policies, or practices of any third-party sites or services.

Children’s Privacy

Our Services do not address anyone under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect personal identifiable information from children under 13. In the case we discover that a child under 13 has provided us with personal information, we immediately delete this from our servers. If you are a parent or guardian and you are aware that your child has provided us with personal information, please contact us so that we will be able to do necessary actions.

Changes to This Privacy Policy

We may update our Privacy Policy from time to time. Thus, we advise you to review this page periodically for any changes. We will notify you of any changes by posting the new Privacy Policy on this page. These changes are effective immediately, after they are posted on this page. This Privacy Policy was created with the GDPR Privacy Policy Generator.

Contact Us

If you have any questions or suggestions about our Privacy Policy, do not hesitate to contact us by email acm@heyttu.com.

WordPress Cookie Notice by Real Cookie Banner