Author Guidelines

Thank you for choosing to submit your paper to us. These instructions will ensure we have everything required so your paper can move through peer review, production and publication smoothly. Please take the time to read and follow them as closely as possible, as doing so will ensure your paper matches the journal's requirements. For general guidance on the publication process at Taylor & Francis, please visit our Author Services website.

This journal uses Editorial Manager to peer review manuscript submissions. Please read the guide for Editorial Manager authors before making a submission. Complete guidelines for preparing and submitting your manuscript to this journal are provided below.

Preparing your paper

All authors submitting to South African Journal of Clinical Nutrition (SAJCN) should conform to the Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals, prepared by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE).

Disclosure statement

Please include a disclosure of interest statement, using the subheading "Disclosure of interest." If you have no interests to declare, please state this (suggested wording: The authors report no conflicts of interest). For all NIH/Wellcome-funded papers, the grant number(s) must be included in the disclosure of interest statement. Read more on declaring conflicts of interest.

Clinical Trials Registry

In order to be published in a Taylor & Francis journal, all clinical trials must have been registered in a public repository at the beginning of the research process (prior to patient enrolment). Trial registration numbers should be included in the abstract, with full details in the methods section. The registry should be publicly accessible (at no charge), open to all prospective registrants, and managed by a not-for-profit organization. For a list of registries that meet these requirements, please visit the WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP). The registration of all clinical trials facilitates the sharing of information among clinicians, researchers, and patients, enhances public confidence in research, and is in accordance with the ICMJE guidelines.

Complying with ethics of experimentation

Please ensure that all research reported in submitted papers has been conducted in an ethical and responsible manner and is in full compliance with all relevant codes of experimentation and legislation. All papers which report in vivo experiments or clinical trials on humans or animals must include a written statement in the Methods section. This should explain that all work was conducted with the formal approval of the local human subject or animal care committees (institutional and national), and that clinical trials have been registered as legislation requires. Authors who do not have formal ethics review committees should include a statement that their study follows the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki.

Consent

All authors are required to follow the ICMJE requirements on privacy and informed consent from patients and study participants. Please confirm that any patient, service user, or participant (or that person’s parent or legal guardian) in any research, experiment, or clinical trial described in your paper has given written consent to the inclusion of material pertaining to themselves, that they acknowledge that they cannot be identified via the paper; and that you have fully anonymized them. Where someone is deceased, please ensure you have written consent from the family or estate. Authors may use this Patient Consent Form, which should be completed, saved, and sent to the journal if requested.

Health and safety

Please confirm that all mandatory laboratory health and safety procedures have been complied with in the course of conducting any experimental work reported in your paper. Please ensure your paper contains all appropriate warnings on any hazards that may be involved in carrying out the experiments or procedures you have described, or that may be involved in instructions, materials, or formulae.

Please include all relevant safety precautions; and cite any accepted standard or code of practice. Authors working in animal science may find it useful to consult the International Association of Veterinary Editors’ Consensus Author Guidelines on Animal Ethics and Welfare and Guidelines for the Treatment of Animals in Behavioural Research and Teaching. When a product has not yet been approved by an appropriate regulatory body for the use described in your paper, please specify this, or that the product is still investigational.

Article Publishing Charges

The SAJCN is an open access journal, meaning all articles are available online immediately on publication to anyone, anywhere, at any time. To support open access, the journal has an Article Publishing Charge (APC).

The standard APC for South African Journal of Clinical Nutrition is:

Authors from Sub-Saharan Africa:  ZAR12 000

Authors from the rest of the world: USD1 500

The APC is levied upon acceptance of the article and will need to be paid before publication.

This charge applies to accepted articles. Corresponding authors will receive an invoice outlining payment terms. Depending on your location local taxes may apply.

Contributions to the journal that are not peer-reviewed, including editorials, guest editorials, case reports, book reviews, and conference reports, will not attract an APC.

Authors who do not benefit from institutional or other research support and, as a consequence, are unable to pay the APC may apply to the Editor for a waiver of part or all of the APC.

Copyright

Material submitted for publication in the SAJCN is accepted provided it has not been published elsewhere. Copyright forms will be sent with acknowledgement of receipt and the SAJCN reserves copyright of the material published.

The SAJCN does not hold itself responsible for statements made by the authors.

Authorship

All named authors must give consent to publication. Authorship should be based only on substantial contribution to: (i) conception, design, analysis and interpretation of data; (ii) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content; (iii) final approval of the version to be published. All three of these conditions must be met (Uniform requirements for manuscripts submitted to biomedical journals; www.icmje.org/index.html).

Conflict of interest

Authors must declare all sources of support for the research and any association with the product or subject that may constitute conflict of interest.

Protection of patient's rights to privacy

Identifying information should not be published in written descriptions, photographs, and pedigrees unless the information is essential for scientific purposes and the patient (or parent or guardian) gives informed written consent for publication. Informed consent for this purpose requires that the patient be shown the manuscript to be published. (www.icmje.org)

Ethnic classification

Work that is based on or contains reference to ethnic classification must indicate the rationale for this.

Manuscripts 

Short items are more likely to appeal to our readers and therefore to be accepted for publication.

• Manuscript should not exceed 4000 words in total all contents inclusive.
• Original articles of 4 000 words or less, with up to 6 tables or illustrations, should normally report observations or research of relevance to the field of nutrition. References should preferably be limited to no more than 25.
• Short reports or scientific letters, which include case reports, side effects of nutrient supplements/drugs and brief or negative research findings should be 1000 words or less, with 1 table or illustration and no more than 6 references.
• Editorials, Opinions, Issues in the field of nutrition . should be about 1000 words and are welcome, but unless invited, will be subjected to the SAJCN peer review process.
• Review articles are rarely accepted unless invited.
• Letters to the editor , if intended for the correspondence column, should be marked 'for publication', signed by all authors and presented in triple spacing. Letters should be no longer than 400 words with only one illustration or table.
• Obituaries should not exceed 400 words and may be accompanied by a photograph.

Manuscript preparation

Please submit your manuscript electronically at www.sajcn.co.za

Research articles should have a structured abstract not exceeding 250 words (50 for short reports) comprising: Objectives, Design, Setting, Subjects, Outcome measures, Results and Conclusions.

Refer to articles in recent issues for guidance on the presentation of headings and subheadings.

Abbreviations should be spelt out when first used in the text and thereafter used consistently.

Scientific measurements should be expressed in SI units except: blood pressure should be given in mmHg and haemoglobin values in g/dl. If in doubt, refer to www.icmje.org/index.html

Illustrations

Figures consist of all material that cannot be set in type, such as photographs and line drawings.

Tables and legends for illustrations should appear on separate sheets and should be clearly identified.

Line drawings should be arranged to conserve vertical space. Note that reduction to 80 mm for a single column or 170 mm for double columns should not render lettering illegible. Explanations should be included in the legend and not on the figure itself.

Figure numbers should be clearly marked on the back of prints and the top of illustrations should be indicated.

If any tables or illustrations submitted have been published elsewhere, written consent to republication should be obtained by the author from the copyright holder and the author(s).

References

References should be inserted in the text as superior numbers and should be listed at the end of the article in numerical and not in alphabetical order.

Authors are responsible for verification of references from the original sources.

References should be set out in the Vancouver style and approved abbreviations of journal titles used; consult the List of Journals in Index Medicus for these details.

Names and initials of all authors should be given unless there are more than six, in which case the first three names should be given followed by et al. First and last page numbers should be given.

Journal references should appear thus:

1. Price NC . Importance of asking about glaucoma. BMJ 1983; 286: 349-350.

Book references should be set out as follows:

1. Jeffcoate N. Principles of Gynaecology. 4^th ed. London: Butterworth, 1975: 96-101.
2. Weinstein L, Swartz MN. Pathogenic properties of invading microorganisms. In: Sodeman WA jun, Sodeman WA, eds. Pathologic Physiology: Mechanisms of Disease. Philadelphia: WB Saunders, 1974: 457-472.

Manuscripts accepted but not yet published can be included as references followed by (in press).

Unpublished observations and personal communication s may be cited in the text, but not in the reference list.

Manuscript revisions

In the event of a manuscript needing revision following the peer review process, all revision changes to the original manuscript should be made using the “track changes” function in Microsoft Word, or in any other such similar format so as to facilitate the speedy completion of the review process. In the event of an “author-reviewer” difference of opinion, the author(s) should state their opinion in writing in the text, which should be bracketed. Revised manuscripts which do not conform to this revision format will be returned to the authors for editing.

Revised manuscript should be resubmitted electronically within 3 weeks of receipt thereof.

Galley proofs

Galley proofs will be forwarded to the author before publication and if not returned within 2 weeks will be regarded as approved.

Changes of address

Please notify the Editorial Department of any address changes so that proofs and invoices may be mailed without delay.

CPD points

Authors can earn CPD points for published articles. The CPD questionnaire and certificates can be found at https://www.mpconsulting.co.za.

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 RTF file format

When available, the URLs to access references online are provided, including those for open access versions of the reference. The URLs are ready to click (e.g., http://pkp.sfu.ca).

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, which is found in About the Journal.

If submitting to a peer-reviewed section of the journal, the instructions in Ensuring a Blind Review have been followed.

The manuscript has an abstract.

Copyright Notice

Material submitted for publication in the SAJCN is accepted provided it has not been published elsewhere. Copyright forms will be sent with acknowledgement of receipt and the SAJCN reserves copyright of the material published.

The SAJCN does not hold itself responsible for statements made by the authors.

Privacy Statement

The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party.

Publication ethics

Material submitted for publication in the SAJCN is accepted provided it has not been published elsewhere. Copyright forms will be sent with acknowledgement of receipt and the SAJCN reserves copyright of the material published.

The SAJCN does not hold itself responsible for statements made by the authors.

Privacy Statement

The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party.

The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party.