How to format your references using the Chinese Medical Journal citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Chinese Medical Journal. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Download the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeX	BibTeX syles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author

Jacobs M. A career is like a love affair. Science. 2015 Apr 3;348(6230):150.

A journal article with 2 authors

Brochier C, Philippe H. Phylogeny: a non-hyperthermophilic ancestor for bacteria. Nature. 2002 May 16;417(6886):244.

A journal article with 3 authors

Gridi-Papp M, Rand AS, Ryan MJ. Animal communication: complex call production in the túngara frog. Nature. 2006 May 4;441(7089):38.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Huang ZT, Li YF, Jiang PK, Chang SX, Song ZL, Liu J, et al. Long-term intensive management increased carbon occluded in phytolith (PhytOC) in bamboo forest soils. Sci Rep. 2014 Jan 8;4:3602.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book

Lieberman NP. Troubleshooting Vacuum Systems. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2012.

An edited book

Indulska J, Raymond K, editors. Distributed Applications and Interoperable Systems: 7th IFIP WG 6.1 International Conference, DAIS 2007, Paphos, Cyprus, June 6-8, 2007. Proceedings. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2007. XII, 340 p. (Lecture Notes in Computer Science; vol. 4531).

A chapter in an edited book

Tribollet A. The boring microflora in modern coral reef ecosystems: a review of its roles. In: Wisshak M, Tapanila L, editors. Current Developments in Bioerosion. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2008. p. 67–94.

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for Chinese Medical Journal.

Blog post

Hamilton K. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2016 [cited 2018 Oct 30]. How Animals Are Adapting To Cope With Their Noisiest Neighbours – Humans. Available from: https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/how-animals-are-adapting-to-cope-with-their-noisiest-neighbours-humans/

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report

Government Accountability Office. Aviation Security: Weaknesses in Airport Security and Options for Assigning Screening Responsibilities. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 2001 Sep. Report No.: GAO-01-1165T.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation

Cross A. Tinkering in k-12: an exploratory mixed methods study of makerspaces in schools as an application of constructivist learning [Doctoral dissertation]. [Malibu, CA]: Pepperdine University; 2017.

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article

Wagner J. Robles Melts Down at End Of a Strange Mets Loss. New York Times. 2017 Aug 4;B9.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in parentheses:

This sentence cites one reference (1).
This sentence cites two references (1,2).
This sentence cites four references (1–4).

About the journal

Full journal title	Chinese Medical Journal
Abbreviation	Chin. Med. J. (Engl.)
ISSN (print)	0366-6999
Scope	General Medicine