How to format your references using the Medical Care citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Medical Care. 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

Gee H. Origin and evolution of vertebrates. Nature. 2015 Apr 23;520(7548):449.

A journal article with 2 authors

Hillebrand R, Gösele U. Physics. Woodpiles for photons. Science. 2004 Jul 9;305(5681):187–8.

A journal article with 3 authors

Chen I, Christie PJ, Dubnau D. The ins and outs of DNA transfer in bacteria. Science. 2005 Dec 2;310(5753):1456–60.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Ji Q, Luo ZX, Yuan CX, Wible JR, Zhang JP, Georgi JA. The earliest known eutherian mammal. Nature. 2002 Apr 25;416(6883):816–22.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Mahlberg R, Gilles A, Läsch A. Hämatologie. Weinheim, Germany: Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA; 2004.

An edited book

Fortunato S, Mangioni G, Menezes R, Nicosia V, editors. Complex Networks: Results of the 2009 International Workshop on Complex Networks (CompleNet 2009). Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2009. XVII, 225 p. (Studies in Computational Intelligence; vol. 207).

A chapter in an edited book

Duband JL. Neural Crest Delamination and Migration. In: Saint-Jeannet JP, editor. Neural Crest Induction and Differentiation. Boston, MA: Springer US; 2006. p. 45–77. (Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology).

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 Medical Care.

Blog post

Andrew E. Explainer: Why Reusable Rockets Are So Hard To Make. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2015.

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. Federal Aviation Administration: Challenges Facing the Agency in Fiscal Year 2009 and Beyond. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 2008 Feb. Report No.: GAO-08-460T.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Mack DL. The Cost of Credit: Protecting Consumers in a Regulated Fringe Credit Market [Doctoral dissertation]. [Washington, DC]: George Washington 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

Pilon M. Inspiring Horse Honored. New York Times. 2012 Jan 14;D4.

In-text citations

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

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	Medical Care
Abbreviation	Med. Care
ISSN (print)	0025-7079
ISSN (online)	1537-1948
Scope	Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health