I'm the editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Gynecological Cancer, and what I wanted to do today was to share with you some ideas with regards to what we consider will be ideal in terms of setting up and writing a manuscript. And one of the things, obviously, in terms of rationale for publishing is that we want to obviously impact the science and advance our field. And certainly, we know that personal anecdotes in medicine and science don't mean anything. So therefore, results are only believable when these are published. So as it pertains to, let's see, am I moving the slides forward or are you moving the slides forward? You are, since you're sharing the screen. Yeah. I don't know why it's not moving forward. I don't know, one second, let's see if that's sharing. Okay, so basically, in terms of what we give high criteria or high priority for criteria for publication, obviously, ideally, new and original research gets the highest priorities and of course, ideally, prospective randomized trials have the highest priority from the editorial team for publication. But one of the other things that we look for are large retrospective series on a topic of interest to the gynecologic oncology community, even obviously, if there have been a number of retrospective reports on a particular topic. If you have like the largest series, of course, that's always going to be attractive for publication. I think also anytime there is data or research that actually contradicts previously established results, it's appealing to a journal and appealing to the gynecologic oncology community because we want to know why is it that you have had findings that are different from what has been published in the literature. In addition, I mean, I think that certainly when we have fellows or residents who say, well, I don't have the time or the data collected from my own institution to do a retrospective study or even a prospective study, what can I publish? And I think that certainly doing a review article on a relevant topic and a current topic of interest is always appealing. So certainly, for example, now with all of the changes in the indications for PARP inhibitors, I think that a review article on how we should approach the management of patients with ovarian cancer with PARP inhibitors, that would be something that would be appealing as an example. And then of course, obviously, publications of videos of new and novel techniques is always attractive. We typically don't give priorities to case reports or commentaries or editorials or letters to the editors. And definitely no priorities given to what we call the Me Too papers, that the papers where an institution decides to publish or aims to publish a laparoscopic approach to endometrial cancer. And we already know the extensive literature on that. And they might say, well, we just wanted to look at it in our institution to see what the results were. Yes, that might be of interest to the internal elements of the institution, but not to the GYN oncology community as a whole. So as a result then, what are the suggestions with regards to then getting the information and finding a topic of interest? One of the things that we always remark to our fellows is obviously doing a literature search to assure that what you're aiming to publish is not already published and published multiple times. You have to review the current literature and discuss with an expert in the field. We always say, not just a friend that will also tell you, oh yeah, that sounds interesting. Go for it. And then find out that there's been so much already published in this area. It needs to attempt to capture the missing element. So obviously we want to know what can we write in a manuscript that basically says, this is what I am contributing to the literature. And we always encourage to certainly go to the abstracts or posters at meetings so that one will be able to then learn what's going on and what's current in the field. And then also ideally, we always recommend that anytime there's an idea that comes up to discuss it in a group setting, and particularly in your institution, just to make sure that one of your colleagues is not already working on something like this and it's about to publish it so that you're not working on the same thing. I think in terms of finding the journal, one needs to have obviously realistic expectations. So if publishing or aiming to publish on a retrospective study, it's highly unlikely that it's going to get into a New England Journal of Medicine or Cell or Nature. Obviously that's something that you aim to publish in that when you have something that is practice changing. So learning what is your target audience and determining who's going to want to read this paper will help in determining what type of journal to choose. I think it's also evaluating the scope of the journal. So if the journal never publishes anything on basic science, then why send a manuscript on basic science to that particular journal? And looking for what are the similarities in the articles of that journal to help you determine that. And then of course, obviously determining the impact factor. And that is always very helpful in terms of wanting to ideally then have a gauge with regards to the type of journal that you're submitting and also obviously the type of return on investment that you're going to get from publishing in that particular journal. As it pertains to writing the manuscript, we certainly always aim to be concise and to the point. One of the things that I always tell the fellows in residence is that a lot of words doesn't equal a good story. And often you'll see an introduction that is over two and a half pages long. So obviously that's not what we aim to do and see in a manuscript. And we always talk about the manuscript should tell a story. So it should have a beginning, a middle, and an end, meaning why you're doing this study, where you are now with regards to the literature and the point of that topic, and then what you found. Always emphasize not to use non-scientific language. So saying a surgical approach was done in the easiest manner, or blood loss was less than expected, or the approach was done as routine. These are completely very subjective terms and they don't really mean anything. And not using language that can be misinterpreted. And as I mentioned, as the examples above, blood loss less than expected is, well, how do we know what is expected and what was it that you expected? So therefore, using just the facts. And that's something that we always emphasize. In terms of the language that must be misinterpreted, I talked about the examples here, some of the other examples. Length of stay was very short, the symptom length of detection was outstanding, complication rates were minimal. And these are actually quotes that I've taken from papers that have been submitted to the journal. And also, one of the things that we emphasize is don't use Google Translate for non-English speaking writers because it's a massive amount of mistakes that we see when Google Translate is used in these manuscripts. The title of the manuscript should certainly always represent the overall message of the manuscript. One of the things we always emphasize, the author should be the person who wrote it and did most of the work. The last is the one who developed the idea and ultimately responsible. And then the second usually is the next in contribution and in promotion often as well. Abstract should be short, but always remembering that this is often the only thing that people read about your work. So you have to be very definitive and very clear and concise with regards to what is the message of your research. In terms of the introduction, we always talk about not exceeding three to four paragraphs. The first paragraph having the background, the second, the relevance of the subject of interest and the third paragraph, just what are the gaps in knowledge and what are the goals of the study. In terms of the methods, there should always be documentation of IRB approval. And if there isn't the IRB approval, a documentation as to why there isn't IRB approval, what was the data that was collected, who was the study group, providing the details for ease of replication, and then also obviously meeting with a statistician to provide the right statistical analyses for the study. Particularly if the study was randomized, there has to be a documentation of the process of randomization. And one thing that really I think often upsets reviewers is when you say this is a prospective study when in fact it's not a prospective study. So a lot of times we hear or we get calls back from authors where they say, well, this was prospectively collected data. Yes, but you retrospectively evaluated it, so therefore it is not a prospective study. With regards to the results, I think it's very important that the results reflect what you say you were collecting in the methods. It should always begin with a number of patients that were included, not with a random statement about the outcomes of the study. And it should be a chronological sequence of data. In other words, often we see studies that are talking about a surgery or a surgical outcome and the first paragraph of the results is the postoperative outcomes. And the long-term follow-up. And then they go into the details of the how many patients and the BMI. So there should be a chronological in terms of how it actually happens in real life. That is the patient age, the histology, the BMI, the operative time, the blood loss, then the postoperative outcomes. Always very, very important, I think, obviously, is to make sure that the numbers match the abstract and the table. And that's something that for many reviewers, if the numbers don't match, it's already a sign that you're going to reject. Because it's like, how much do you believe this data if all the numbers don't match? And then also provide data that will be of interest to the reader. So obviously, if it's speaking about some pathology finding or pathology description, the reader for that is going to be somebody who's interested in the pathology of that. So they don't really care what might have been the blood loss for that patient group in that particular study. And then also in the results, there should not be any interpretation of the data. It should just be the facts. What did you find? And don't tell me whether this was good or bad or whether this should be interpreted one way or another. And then lastly, the discussion we always talk about beginning with a simple statement of the overall findings. And it should not be a repeat of the results. And we often see papers where they kind of go through again the p-value and the confidence intervals and the medians of data that was already presented in the results. I think it's also very helpful for the reader to have your data presented in the context of previously published literature. So in other words, you found this in your study, and how does this relate to what has been published previously? If you found in your study that minimally invasive surgery for cervical cancer in less than two centimeters had a worse disease pre-survival, then just talk about the LAC trial and everything else that's been published after that, and then how this may add to that story. And then of course, obviously, including the strengths and the weaknesses of the manuscript, what should be potentially the future directions, and really providing details as to how is this study contributing to the literature. One of the things that we always look in terms of the conclusion or the discussion is, how does this make me change how I speak to a patient on Monday, or how I practice on Monday, or make me think differently about the literature? Not just leave it sort of like as a blank statement, you know, this is what I found and that's it, without really putting it in a form of what are you contributing to this. And then in terms of the references, obviously, always look at the guide for authors format for that journal. And of course, obviously, the managing editors can work and format the references, but it always is much better if you have already put it in the format for that particular journal. The references only to the relevant ones, so if somebody is talking about laparoscopic hysterectomy for endometrial cancer, not to give 25 references of retrospective studies, but rather of the two main studies, the GOG Lab 2 or the LACE trial. And then also, you know, I think certainly it is always helpful to potentially include references of potential reviewers. So if you're, you know, if you're writing about, you know, vulvar cancer, sentinel lymph node mapping and not use references by somebody like Atev Andersey, that may be a mistake because he may be certainly one of the people who is reviewing your manuscript. And as I mentioned, this is the details with regards to the authorship. And then this is just from the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors with regards to what the authorship order should be and who should be crediting for the authors. Just for our journals to conclude is that when we get a paper, this is submitted to the associate editors. There's a first assessment of the associate editors, then we proceed to a formal review by the reviewers and they will get either accept minor revisions, major revisions, or reject. Typically that, you know, it will be very unusual for a paper to just get accepted without any absolute, any comments. But generally the manuscripts will go out for review and then typically then it will be one of those three potential choices. Our acceptance rate now in the journal is 21% of all manuscripts that are accepted. And then the other number that I would highlight is that the average time for our journal from submission till the actual article is published is 27 days. So that includes the reviewers, the edits to the reviewers, response to reviewers, and sometimes even the medical edit for, we always edit for language. So within a month, pretty much if the article is going to be accepted, it will be in publication. So thank you. I know that that was sort of like right quickly through our process, but happy to answer any questions.

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