How to format your references using the Health Services and Outcomes Research Methodology citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Health Services and Outcomes Research Methodology. 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:

PaperpileThe citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNoteFind the style here: output styles overview
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and othersThe style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeXBibTeX 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
Stachel, J.: 1905 and all that. Nature. 433, 215–217 (2005)
A journal article with 2 authors
Butchart, N., Scaife, A.A.: Removal of chlorofluorocarbons by increased mass exchange between the stratosphere and troposphere in a changing climate. Nature. 410, 799–802 (2001)
A journal article with 3 authors
Moreira, D., Le Guyader, H., Philippe, H.: The origin of red algae and the evolution of chloroplasts. Nature. 405, 69–72 (2000)
A journal article with 4 or more authors
Moulin, L., Munive, A., Dreyfus, B., Boivin-Masson, C.: Nodulation of legumes by members of the beta-subclass of Proteobacteria. Nature. 411, 948–950 (2001)

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
Zelterman, D.: Discrete Distributions: Applications in the Health Sciences. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, Chichester, UK (2005)
An edited book
AbuRahma, A.F., Bergan, J.J. eds: Noninvasive Peripheral Arterial Diagnosis. Springer, London (2010)
A chapter in an edited book
Lucas, J.C., Schroeder, D., Arnason, G., Andanda, P., Kimani, J., Fournier, V., Krishnamurthy, M.: Donating Human Samples: Who Benefits? Cases from Iceland, Kenya and Indonesia. In: Schroeder, D. and Cook Lucas, J. (eds.) Benefit Sharing: From Biodiversity to Human Genetics. pp. 95–127. Springer Netherlands, Dordrecht (2013)

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 Health Services and Outcomes Research Methodology.

Blog post
Andrew, E.: Artificial Tweezers Block HIV, Herpes And Hepatitis C, https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/artificial-tweezers-block-hiv-herpes-and-hepatitis-c/

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: Credit Cards: Marketing to College Students Appears to Have Declined. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC (2014)

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation
Ashrafzadeh, M.H.: Provision of community services for the mentally challenged population in Iran, (2008)

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
Shultz, G.P., Halstead, T.: Paris Deal Benefits Business, (2017)

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by name and year in parentheses:

This sentence cites one reference (Stachel 2005).
This sentence cites two references (Butchart and Scaife 2001; Stachel 2005).

Here are examples of in-text citations with multiple authors:

  • Two authors: (Butchart and Scaife 2001)
  • Three or more authors: (Moulin et al. 2001)

About the journal

Full journal titleHealth Services and Outcomes Research Methodology
AbbreviationHealth Serv. Outcomes Res. Methodol.
ISSN (print)1387-3741
ISSN (online)1572-9400
ScopeHealth Policy
Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health

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