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Resources for authors

In these pages we hope to provide authors with tools and advice to put together the best possible article. Some instructions are specific to Open Heart; some advice is more general. For technical instructions on how to format and submit your article, see our instructions for authors.

How can I maximise my chances of being published?

Open Heart will publish submissions judged to be technically sound after peer review. Asking yourself these five questions will help maximise your chances of a successful submission.
  • Does my research fall within the journal’s aims and scope?
  • Is the research question clear?
  • Is the study design appropriate?
  • Is the study valid?
  • Is the research presented correctly?
These are intended to be aids to a successful submission and reflect the type of judgement we ask reviewers to make. If you have any questions please contact the editorial office.

Where can I find more general advice?

How can I pay the Article Publishing Charge?

Open Heart, like many open access journals, works on the 'author pays'principle. If accepted for publication, authors will be asked to pay an Article Publishing Charge (APC). This is to cover the costs of making everything we publish free from any form of subscription: costs include administering the peer review process, production (typesetting and proofreading), continuous hosting of the content online, and marketing the content to increase exposure for authors. Open Heart APC >> Funding agencies that may cover the APC >> APC discounts and waivers >>

Data management and sharing

Open Heart supports the idea that all appropriate datasets should be placed in open repositories. At present there is no major repository for clinical data, but Dryad has declared its willingness to accept medical datasets. Authors can start the deposition process while submitting to any BMJ journal. Dryad provides authors with a DOI for the dataset to aid citation and provide a permanent link to the data. Note that Dryad hosts data using a CC0 licence so authors should check that this is suitable for the data that they are depositing. The DataCite organisation has a growing list of other repositories for research data. Authors that agree to share their data are eligible for a 25% discount on the Open Heart article processing charge.