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

Bolker J. Model organisms: There’s more to life than rats and flies. Nature. 2012 Nov 1;491(7422):31–3.

A journal article with 2 authors

Keinan A, Clark AG. Recent explosive human population growth has resulted in an excess of rare genetic variants. Science. 2012 May 11;336(6082):740–3.

A journal article with 3 authors

Lopinski GP, Wayner DD, Wolkow RA. Self-directed growth of molecular nanostructures on silicon. Nature. 2000 Jul 6;406(6791):48–51.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Ogawa Y, Kim SK, Dana R, Clayton J, Jain S, Rosenblatt MI, et al. International Chronic Ocular Graft-vs-Host-Disease (GVHD) Consensus Group: proposed diagnostic criteria for chronic GVHD (Part I). Sci Rep. 2013 Dec 5;3:3419.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Lipiansky E. Electrical, Electronics, and Digital Hardware Essentials for Scientists and Engineers. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2012.

An edited book

Wheeler DS, Wong HR, Shanley TP, editors. Pediatric Critical Care Medicine: Volume 2: Respiratory, Cardiovascular and Central Nervous Systems. 2nd ed. 2014. London: Springer; 2014. XXIII, 737 p. 263 illus., 81 illus. in color.

A chapter in an edited book

Dabbagh N, Benson AD, Denham A, Joseph R, Al-Freih M, Zgheib G, et al. Augmented Reality. In: Benson AD, Denham A, Joseph R, Al-Freih M, Zgheib G, Fake H, et al., editors. Learning Technologies and Globalization: Pedagogical Frameworks and Applications. Cham: Springer International Publishing; 2016. p. 27–30. (SpringerBriefs in Educational Communications and Technology).

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

Taub B. Legal Marijuana Has Given Colorado A Massive Economic Boost [Internet]. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2016 [cited 2018 Oct 30]. Available from: https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/legal-marijuana-given-colorado-massive-economic-boost/

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. Impact of Illegal Aliens on Public Assistance Programs: Too Little Is Known. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 1977 Dec. Report No.: GGD-78-20.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Chin SH. A performer’s guide to Howard Hanson’s “Four Poems (Poèmes érotiques)”, Opus 9 [Doctoral dissertation]. [Long Beach, CA]: California State University, Long Beach; 2009.

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

Shpigel B. This Jet Still Answers to ‘Coach.’ New York Times. 2017 Sep 15;D1.

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

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