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

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for World 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	Find the style here: output styles overview
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

O’Callaghan T. Introduction: The prevention agenda. Nature. 2011 Mar 24;471(7339):S2-4.

A journal article with 2 authors

Abbott A, Gitschel U. German scientists left in the cold as Berlin rejects rescue plan. Nature. 2000 Aug 17;406(6797):663–4.

A journal article with 3 authors

Morgan AD, Gandon S, Buckling A. The effect of migration on local adaptation in a coevolving host-parasite system. Nature. 2005 Sep 8;437(7056):253–6.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Shao X, Lu W, Zhang R, Pan F. Enhanced photocatalytic activity of TiO₂-C hybrid aerogels for methylene blue degradation. Sci Rep. 2013 Oct 22;3:3018.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Anderson RK. Visual Data Mining. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd; 2012.

An edited book

Sartor G, Casanovas P, Biasiotti M, Fernández-Barrera M, editors. Approaches to Legal Ontologies: Theories, Domains, Methodologies. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands; 2011. XIV, 282 p. (Law, Governance and Technology Series; vol. 1).

A chapter in an edited book

Clayton WS, Petri BG, Huling SG. Fundamentals of ISCO Using Ozone. In: Siegrist RL, Crimi M, Simpkin TJ, editors. In Situ Chemical Oxidation for Groundwater Remediation. New York, NY: Springer; 2011. p. 193–232. (SERDP/ESTCP Environmental Remediation 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 World Medical Journal.

Blog post

O`Callaghan J. How To Make A Diamond With Acid [Internet]. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2015 [cited 2018 Oct 30]. Available from: https://www.iflscience.com/chemistry/new-theory-diamond-formation-acidic-water-proposed/

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. The San Francisco Regional Office, 1954-1987: Interview With Harold J. D’Ambrogia, Kenneth A. Pollock, Richard A. Sheldon, and Charles F. Vincent. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 1991 Sep. Report No.: OP-20-OH.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Beard JA. Evidence of Leadership Competencies in the Journal of Mary Easton Sibley, a Pioneering 19th Century Women’s College Founder [Doctoral dissertation]. [ St. Charles, MO]: Lindenwood University; 2014.

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

Whiteside K. With City Passing By in a Blur, a Star Adds Yet Another Title. New York Times. 2016 Nov 7;F2.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in square brackets:

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	World Medical Journal
ISSN (print)	0049-8122
Scope