ISSN 1808-8694 printed version
ISSN 1808-8686 online version

INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS

• Editorial policy
• Preparation of Manuscripts
• Sending manuscripts

The editorial policy of the Brazilian Journal of Otorhinolaryngology aims the divulgation of scientific papers of great interest to the specialty and associated areas, privileging original articles (specially, clinical trials and experimental studies) and serving as outflow to the researches conducted in post-graduation courses of the area, but obeying the order of submission of the manuscripts. Case reports of great impact for the scientific knowledge, as well as review articles may be also considered to publication. In addition, each issue has an editorial that discusses maters of scientific, academic or professional interest to the specialty.

All manuscripts submitted are peer reviewed by two or more reviewers of acknowledged scientific activity in private or public institutions related to the education and training in otolaryngology.

The journal is directed basically to otolaryngologists of all over the world, since it has an indexed English version, but also to professional of correlated areas, such as audiologists, speech therapists, head and neck surgeons, plastic surgeons, pediatricians, odontologists, among others.

The Brazilian Journal of Otorhinolaryngology supports the policy for clinical trials registry of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), acknowledging the importance of this initiatives for the registry and international divulgation of information about clinical studies, in open access. Then, we only accept clinical trials for publication if they have a number of identification issued by one of the WHO and CMJE certified Clinical Trial Registries, whose websites are available in the ICMJE website. This number of identification must be at the end of the abstract.

Size and Layout

The complete paper must not exceed 25 pages of A4 (21cm x 29.7cm) size paper, written in size 12 Times New Roman type, double spacing between the lines. If the reviser deems pertaining, he/she may suggest the author to suppress graphs and tables or even to condense the text.

Title and authors

A good title enables the readers to identify the topic and helps the documentation center classify and catalogue the material. The title must be limited to a maximum of ten words, and its content should describe in a concise and clear way the topic discussed by the paper. Please, avoid titles which are too general, acronyms and abbreviations.
Only those who actually participated in the study must be declared authors. Other means of mentioning may be used at the end of the paper. A paper with more than 7 authors will only be accepted if the topic is multidisciplinary in nature or involving basic sciences.
Those responsible for the paper should state the professional position of each one of the authors who participated in the study. Those who perform the following tasks can and should be considered authors:

1. Conceive and plan the project, as well as those who analyze and interpret the data,
2. Organize the text or critically review the manuscript's content,
3. Provide support and final approval of the paper to be submitted.
All three criteria must be met for the individual to be considered an author or coauthor.

The criteria which do not qualify the individual as author are the following:

1. Provide funds or supports the study,
2. Collect data for the study,
3. Provide general supervision to a study group,
4. Be the head of the service or Head of the Department.

If the individual does not fit the description for author, but is nevertheless relevant for the paper, he/she may be acknowledged at the end of the paper.

Summary and Keywords

Each paper MUST be have a summary (abstract) in Portuguese and another one in English with approximately 200 words, with its topics duly highlighted (structured), and the following must be clearly indicated:

1) the theoretical assumptions and justifications for the study (introduction);
2) the study goals (objective);
3) basic method utilized (materials and methods);
4) scientific design utilized (case study, series study, retrospective study, prospective study, clinical and experimental study);
5) main results and their statistical interpretation (results) and
6) conclusions reached (conclusion).

The abstract should not have any information that is not in the text. It must be written in an unbiased way and it MUST NOT contain abbreviations or bibliographic references. The abstract must be able to help the reader decide whether or not the entire paper is worth reading. It will be, together with the title, the only part of the study that will be available in most libraries and cataloguing and indexation agencies, therefore, it represents the very business card of the study published. The abstract structure of a review paper must be: Introduction / Objective / Methodology / Conclusions.
After the abstract and for indexing purposes, the keywords must be listed, and they should be based on the DeCS (Health Sciences Keywords) and MeSH (Medical Subject Headings), which can be accessed at the BIREME (Regional Medical Library) website: www.bireme.org or at the BJORL website, during the step 4 of the paper submission process, where the authors can search for DeCS and MeSH).

Paper body

Papers describing investigations or studies must be in the so called IMRDC format: Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion and Conclusions.
It is in the Introduction that we establish the objective and the reasons for doing the study. In it we must have the reasons and the very pertinence for the study, its importance and scope, gaps, controversies, theoretical incoherencies and assumptions or personal experiences which led the author to investigate the topic. The goal (s) must be discussed in the last paragraph of the introduction.
In the Materials and Methods one expects to find a description of the sample studied and enough details concerning the investigation instrument.
In studies involving human beings or animals, the authors must inform the approval protocol number from the Ethics Committee of the institution where the study was carried out.
The sample must be well defined and the inclusion and exclusion criteria must be clearly informed, as well as the selection criteria and group allocation (pairing, random, sequencing, stratification, etc.).
The method must be coherent vis-à-vis the issue presented, and the study design must be explained (cohort, case-control, experimental, contemporary, historic, patient chart studies, etc.)
All use of another's classification or method must have a correspondence in the pertaining literature.
Results must be presented in a clear and summarized way. Everything discussed in this item must have come from the method. We encourage the use of graphs and tables, as well as descriptive and comparative statistical analyses.
In the Discussion, we expect the author to present his/her own experience with the subject, explore his/her theories and discuss the results associated with these assumptions. This is also the place to mention possible methodological difficulties.
Conclusions must be succinct and confined to the paper's objective. It is paramount that the method and results achieved be enough to support the items listed in the conclusion.
CASE REPORTS must have an introduction with the pertaining review which justifies its importance, because of rarity or clinical impact. The case should be rich in visual details and final remarks, discussing the details which make this case eligible for publication. There is no need to send a summary for it.

1) Title - concise and descriptive, with a maximum of 100 characters. It must not include the words: case report and literature review.
2) Keywords - a maximum of 5 and in alphabetical order.
3) Case reports should have no more than five authors. If you wish to list more, you have to justify it.
4) The text's body must be structured as: introduction, case presentation, discussion and final remarks.
5) the complete text, aside from the title and references must not have more than 600 words.
6) References - a maximum of 6.
7) We accept only one table or figure.

The LETTER TO THE EDITOR should be used by the readers to express their opinions on the topics and papers published in the journal. It is submitted via the Web, just like any other paper, and it must have the following structure:

1) As far as format is concerned, it must follow the same rules applied to Case Reports.
2) The letter will be sent to the paper's author, who will have six weeks to answer it.
3) The answer must have the same format as Case Reports.
4) Both the letter and the answer will be published in the same journal issue, and there will be no more replies.
5) The letters will not be revised by the editorial board. Nevertheless, should they be too personal or aggressive, as judged by the Editor, they might not be published.

Bibliographic references

These are essential to identify the original sources of the concepts, methods and techniques mentioned in the text and which are part of previous techniques, investigations or studies; to corroborate the actions and opinions from the author; and to provide the reader with the reference information he/she needs in order to consult primary sources.
References must be pertinent and updated.
All references must be mentioned in the text with consecutive superscripted numbers , following the order in which they appear. At the end of the paper the citations will be part of the reference.

Tables

The tables, which purpose is to group values in lines and columns, making it easier to read and interpret, must be presented in an intelligible way to the reader; they must be self-explanatory and complementary - not to repeat the text. They must not bear any excess of statistical information, because then they become incomprehensible and confusing. Use the exact number of lines and columns in order to create the table. Empty or merged lines/columns may deform table, rendering it incomprehensible.
They must have a brief, but complete title, in such a way that the reader may be able to easily determine what was plotted there, and also to indicate place, data and source of information. The title must come on top of the table. The header of each column must include the measurement unit and be as concise and possible; it must clearly indicate the bases of the relative measures (percentages, rates and indices), when used. You must only leave blanks those cells corresponding to non-applicable data; you should use three points for missing information because observations were not inserted. Footnote indices will be done through letters used as exponents in alphabetical order: a, b, c, etc.
Type or print each table with double spacing in a separate sheet of paper. Do not submit tables as photographs. Number the tables consecutively in the order they are cited in the text. Give each column a short or abbreviated title. Insert the necessary explanations in the footnote, not in the title. In footnotes, explain all the off-standard abbreviations used in each frame. For footnotes, use the following symbols, in the following sequence:
Identify variation statistical measures, such as standard deviation and mean standard error .
Do not use internal vertical or horizontal lines.
Make sure each table is mentioned in the text.
If you use data from another source, published or unpublished, have permission and fully acknowledge it.
The use of too many tables in relation to the text length may cause difficulties in page layout. Please, remember that the Brazilian Journal of Otorhinolaryngology accepts papers with a total of 25 pages.
The editor, upon accepting the paper, may recommend that additional charts which contain important data but very extensive be deposited in a file service, such as the Ancillary Publishing Service in the United States, or make them available to the readers. Should it happen, a proper statement will be added to the text. Submit such charts for appreciation together with the paper.

Figures

Illustrations (graphs, diagrams, maps or photographs, amongst others) are be used to highlight trends and comparisons in a clear and exact way: they should be easy to understand and add information, not replicate it. Their titles must be as concise as possible, but very explicit at the same time, located in the lower portion of the figure. Notes are not placed at the foot of the figure, but the source is mentioned if taken from another publication. Having enough room, the explanations for the maps and graphs must be included in the figure. The excess of charts and graphic material, or both, is costly, reduces the desired effect and occupies a lot of space. It is necessary to select this type of material carefully. All the figures and photographs may be published in color.
Figures must be professionally designed or photographed. Free-hand drawings or typed are not acceptable. Instead of original drawings, x-ray films, and other material alike, send good photographs, in shiny paper, around 127 × 173 mm, never larger than 203 × 254 mm. Letters, numbers and symbols must be clear and in the proper size, so that even when reduced for publication each letter be legible. Titles and detailed explanations must be in the caption, not in the figure.
Microphotographs must bear internal scale markers. Symbols, arrows or letters used in microphotographs must contrast with the background.
If pictures of people are used, either the latter should not be identifiable in the former, or their pictures must come with a written permission for their publication.
The figures must be consecutively numbered according to the order in which they were cited in the text. If a figure has been previously published, the original source must be acknowledged and you must also submit a written permission from the owner concerning copyrights to reproduce the material. Permission is required regardless of authorship or publisher, except for documents in the public domain.
For colorful illustrations, show the color negative images, files in at least 300 dpi, positive transparencies or quality color prints. Drawings following the pictures can be useful to locate the region to be reproduced.

Captions for Illustrations

Type in double spacing, starting in a separate page, with Arabic numbering corresponding to the illustration. When using symbols, arrows, numbers or letters to identify the parts of the illustrations, you must clearly identify and explain each one in the caption. Explain the internal scale and report on the coloring method used in the microphotographs.

Unit of Measurement

Length measures, such as height, weight and volume must be informed in metric units (meter, kilogram, or liter) or their decimal multiples.
Temperature must be informed in degrees Celsius. Blood pressure must be reported in millimeters of mercury.
Blood data and laboratorial analyses values must be shown in the metric system vis-à-vis the International System (IS).

Abbreviations and acronyms

Use the least possible. The first time an abbreviation or acronym appears in the text, it must be spelled out, being followed by the acronym or abbreviation within parenthesis, e.g. Broad Immunization Program (BIP). They must be written in Portuguese, e.g. DP (desvio padrão) and not SD (standard deviation), except when corresponding to Federal Agencies (FBI) or those internationally known by the non-Portuguese acronym (e.g.UNICEF), or chemical substances which acronyms in English are established as International Denomination, such as GH (Growth Hormone), and not HC (hormônio do crescimento).

GENERAL INSTRUCTIONS ON HOW TO SUBMIT MANUSCRIPTS ONLINE USING THE BJORL SGP (PUBLISHING MANAGEMENT SYSTEM OF THE BRAZILIAN JOURNAL OF OTORHINOLARYNGOLOGY

The manuscripts must be submitted either in Portuguese or in English.
They must be typed in double space, on A4 (21cm x 29.7cm) size paper, and the margins should not be defined, because the SGP will define them automatically.
The online submission must be made through the SGP/BJORL URL: www.rborl.org.br/sgp. When you enter this website, the system will ask for your username and password if you are already registered. If not, click on "I wish to register" and register yourself. Or even, should you have forgotten your password, use the reminder mechanism to remind you of your password, it will send you an email with your password.
The rules for paper formatting can be found at: http://www.rborl.org.br/criterios.asp.

All manuscripts will be submitted in Portuguese. We can accept articles in English only when none of the authors is Brazilian. The manuscripts must be written in double space.

The submission must be made on-line through the internet address: www.rborl.br/sgp. The system will ask the user name and password. If the author is not yet registered, he or she must click on "Quero me cadastrar" and proceed to the register.

The rules for formatting and the steps for submission are described in the link http://www.rborl.org.br/criterios.asp.