Healthcare Management Forum

Before submitting an article, please review the following questions to help focus the content of your submission: 

1. Is the topic relevant and timely to health leadership?
2. How original is the work?
3. Does the content advance knowledge in the practice of health leadership?
4. How well is the connection made between theory and practice?
5. Do the authors use sound methodology?
6. Are the conclusions appropriate and are they generally applicable to other situations?
7. What can be done to improve this paper that has not been specified above?
8. Is the manuscript clear, concise, and logical? 

Please consult the author guidelines below for further details on the requirements for submitting your paper to Healthcare Management Forum. The guidelines described in this document should be adhered to carefully, to ensure high-quality and rapid publication of your manuscript.

Summary of Minimum Specifications

Original articles should not exceed 2,500 words (excluding abstracts, references and tables). Methodology sections should be as short as necessary, while presenting the basic information necessary to enable the reader to understand the steps taken. The number of tables, graphs and figures (or a combination of all three) should not exceed three, for a 2,500-word article. Conversely, if long sections of descriptive text can be categorized and synthesized in a table or graph, this should be done. In addition, only those references essential to the integrity of the paper should be listed. If appropriate, authors should make complete methodology sections and lists of references available to readers on request. Manuscripts that do not meet these specifications will be returned to the author for appropriate revisions prior to being sent out for peer review.

Manuscript Submission Guidelines

This Journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics.

This Journal recommends that authors follow the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals formulated by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE).

Please read the guidelines below then visit the Healthcare Management Forum (HMF)’s submission site to upload your manuscript. Please note that manuscripts not conforming to these guidelines may be returned. Remember you can log in to the submission site at any time to check on the progress of your paper through the peer review process.

Only manuscripts of sufficient quality that meet the aims and scope of HMF will be reviewed.

There are no fees payable to submit or publish in this Journal.

As part of the submission process you will be required to warrant that you are submitting your original work, that you have the rights in the work, and that you have obtained and can supply all necessary permissions for the reproduction of any copyright works not owned by you, that you are submitting the work for first publication in the Journal and that it is not being considered for publication elsewhere. Please see our guidelines on prior publication and note that HMF may accept submissions of papers that have been posted on pre-print servers; please alert the Editorial Office when submitting (contact details are at the end of these guidelines) and include the DOI for the preprint in the designated field in the manuscript submission system. Authors should not post an updated version of their paper on the preprint server while it is being peer reviewed for possible publication in the journal. If the article is accepted for publication, the author may re-use their work according to the journal's author archiving policy. If your paper is accepted, you must include a link on your preprint to the final version of your paper.

If you have any questions about publishing with SAGE, please visit the SAGE Journal Solutions Portal.

1. What do we publish?
   1.1 Aims & Scope
   1.2 Article types
   1.3 Writing your paper
2. Editorial policies
   2.1 Peer review policy
   2.2 Authorship
   2.3 Acknowledgements
   2.4 Funding
   2.5 Declaration of conflicting interests
   2.6 Research ethics and patient consent
   2.7 Clinical trials
   2.8 Reporting guidelines
   2.9 Research Data
3. Publishing policies
   3.1 Publication ethics
   3.2 Contributor's publishing agreement
   3.3 Open access and author archiving
4. Preparing your manuscript
   4.1 Formatting
   4.2 Artwork, figures and other graphics
   4.3 Supplemental material
   4.4 Reference style
   4.5 English language editing services
5. Submitting your manuscript
   5.1 ORCID
   5.2 Information required for completing your submission
   5.3 Permissions
6. On acceptance and publication
   6.1 SAGE Production
   6.2 Online First publication
   6.3 Access to your published article
   6.4 Promoting your article
7. Further information
   7.1 Appealing the publication decision

1. What do we publish?

1.1 Aims & Scope

Before submitting your manuscript to HMF, please ensure you have read the Aims & Scope:

Healthcare Management Forum is the official peer-reviewed journal of the Canadian College of Health Leaders. It is published on-line-only, six times a year and is circulated to approximately 3,000 health leaders who work in a variety of environments including (but not limited to) medical companies, health authorities, multi-level care facilities, hospitals, public and private health agencies, health charities, the Canadian military and all levels of the Canadian government. It is also available in universities and libraries throughout Canada, the United States and overseas. The journal publishes articles on leading practices related to health leadership. This includes recent research, new technology and professional practices from health leaders' perspectives.

1.2 Article types

Original articles should not exceed 2,500 words (excluding abstracts, references and tables). Methodology sections should be as short as necessary, while presenting the basic information necessary to enable the reader to understand the steps taken. The number of tables, graphs and figures (or a combination of all three) should not exceed three, for a 2,500 word article. Conversely, if long sections of descriptive text can be categorized and synthesized in a table or graph, this should be done. In addition, only those references essential to the integrity of the paper should be listed. If appropriate, authors should make complete methodology sections and lists of references available to readers on request. Manuscripts that do not meet these specifications will be returned to the author for appropriate revisions prior to being sent out for peer review.

1.3 Writing your paper

The SAGE Author Gateway has some general advice and on how to get published, plus links to further resources.

1.3.1 Make your article discoverable

For information and guidance on how to make your article more discoverable, visit our Gateway page on How to Help Readers Find Your Article Online.

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2. Editorial policies

2.1 Peer review policy

All manuscripts will be acknowledged upon receipt and reviewed by the Managing Editor. Original articles will be sent for double anonymized review to two or more external referees. Referees make comments to the author and recommendations to the Managing Editor who then makes the final decision. Manuscripts will be evaluated according to the following criteria: their practical relevance and significance to health services management; the degree to which they advance knowledge; the quality of presentation; the soundness of the methodology; linkage between theory and practice; and the appropriateness of conclusions. A manuscript may be returned without review if judged to be inappropriate for publication. Authors should expect reviews to take from 30 to 60 days after receipt of their manuscript. Note special issue manuscripts follow the exact same workflow as regular submissions.

HMF is committed to delivering high quality, fast peer-review for your paper, and as such has partnered with Publons. Publons is a third party service that seeks to track, verify and give credit for peer review. Reviewers for the journal can opt in to Publons in order to claim their reviews or have them automatically verified and added to their reviewer profile. Reviewers claiming credit for their review will be associated with the relevant journal, but the article name, reviewer’s decision and the content of their review is not published on the site. For more information visit the Publons website.

The Editor or members of the Editorial Board may occasionally submit their own manuscripts for possible publication in the journal. In these cases, the peer review process will be managed by alternative members of the Board and the submitting Editor/Board member will have no involvement in the decision-making process.

2.2 Authorship

Papers should only be submitted for consideration once consent is given by all contributing authors. Those submitting papers should carefully check that all those whose work contributed to the paper are acknowledged as contributing authors.

The list of authors should include all those who can legitimately claim authorship. This is all those who:

• Made a substantial contribution to the concept or design of the work; or acquisition, analysis or interpretation of data,
• Drafted the article or revised it critically for important intellectual content,
• Approved the version to be published,
• Each author should have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for appropriate portions of the content.

Authors should meet the conditions of all of the points above. When a large, multicentre group has conducted the work, the group should identify the individuals who accept direct responsibility for the manuscript. These individuals should fully meet the criteria for authorship.

Acquisition of funding, collection of data, or general supervision of the research group alone does not constitute authorship, although all contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed in the Acknowledgments section. Please refer to the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) authorship guidelines for more information on authorship.

Please note that AI chatbots, for example ChatGPT, should not be listed as authors. For more information see the policy on Use of ChatGPT and generative AI tools.

2.3 Acknowledgements

All contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed in an Acknowledgements section. Examples of those who might be acknowledged include a person who provided purely technical help, or a department chair who provided only general support.

Upon submission, you will be asked to confirm that if any content is AI-generated, it is clearly identified within the text and acknowledged within your Acknowledgements section. Please note that AI bots such as ChatGPT should not be listed as an author. For more details on this policy, please visit this page.

2.3.1 Writing assistance

Individuals who provided writing assistance, e.g. from a specialist communications company, do not qualify as authors and so should be included in the Acknowledgements section. Authors must disclose any writing assistance – including the individual’s name, company and level of input – and identify the entity that paid for this assistance. It is not necessary to disclose use of language polishing services.

2.4 Funding

HMF requires all authors to acknowledge their funding in a consistent fashion under a separate heading. Please visit the Funding Acknowledgements page on the SAGE Journal Author Gateway to confirm the format of the acknowledgment text in the event of funding, or state that: This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

2.5 Declaration of conflicting interests

It is the policy of HMF to require a declaration of conflicting interests from all authors enabling a statement to be carried within the paginated pages of all published articles.

Please ensure that a ‘Declaration of Conflicting Interests’ statement is included at the end of your manuscript, after any acknowledgements and prior to the references. If no conflict exists, please state that ‘The Author(s) declare(s) that there is no conflict of interest’. For guidance on conflict of interest statements, please see the ICMJE recommendations here.

2.6 Research ethics and patient consent

Medical research involving human subjects must be conducted according to the World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki.

Submitted manuscripts should conform to the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, and all papers reporting animal and/or human studies must state in the methods section that the relevant Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board provided (or waived) approval. Please ensure that you have provided the full name and institution of the review committee, in addition to the approval number.

For research articles, authors are also required to state in the methods section whether participants provided informed consent and whether the consent was written or verbal.

Information on informed consent to report individual cases or case series should be included in the manuscript text. A statement is required regarding whether written informed consent for patient information and images to be published was provided by the patient(s) or a legally authorized representative. Please do not submit the patient’s actual written informed consent with your article, as this in itself breaches the patient’s confidentiality.

The Journal requests that you confirm to us, in writing, that you have obtained written informed consent but the written consent itself should be held by the authors/investigators themselves, for example in a patient’s hospital record. The confirmatory letter may be uploaded with your submission as a separate file.

Please also refer to the ICMJE Recommendations for the Protection of Research Participants.

2.7 Clinical trials

HMF conforms to the ICMJE requirement that clinical trials are registered in a WHO-approved public trials registry at or before the time of first patient enrolment as a condition of consideration for publication. The trial registry name and URL, and registration number must be included at the end of the abstract.

2.8 Reporting guidelines

The relevant EQUATOR Network reporting guidelines should be followed depending on the type of study. For example, all randomized controlled trials submitted for publication should include a completed CONSORT flow chart as a cited figure and the completed CONSORT checklist should be uploaded with your submission as a supplementary file. Systematic reviews and meta-analyses should include the completed PRISMA flow chart as a cited figure and the completed PRISMA checklist should be uploaded with your submission as a supplementary file. The EQUATOR wizard can help you identify the appropriate guideline.

Other resources can be found at NLM’s Research Reporting Guidelines and Initiatives.

2.9 Research data

At SAGE we are committed to facilitating openness, transparency and reproducibility of research. Where relevant, HMF encourages authors to share their research data in a suitable public repository subject to ethical considerations and where data is included, to add a data accessibility statement in their manuscript file. Authors should also follow data citation principles. For more information please visit the SAGE Author Gateway, which includes information about SAGE’s partnership with the data repository Figshare.

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3. Publishing policies

3.1 Publication ethics

Sage is committed to upholding the integrity of the academic record. We encourage authors to refer to the Committee on Publication Ethics’ International Standards for Authors and view the Publication Ethics page on the Sage Author Gateway

3.1.1 Plagiarism

HMF and Sage take issues of copyright infringement, plagiarism or other breaches of best practice in publication very seriously. We seek to protect the rights of our authors and we always investigate claims of plagiarism or misuse of published articles. Equally, we seek to protect the reputation of the Journal against malpractice. Submitted articles may be checked with duplication-checking software. Where an article, for example, is found to have plagiarized other work or included third-party copyright material without permission or with insufficient acknowledgement, or where the authorship of the article is contested, we reserve the right to take action including, but not limited to: publishing an erratum or corrigendum (correction); retracting the article; taking up the matter with the head of department or dean of the author's institution and/or relevant academic bodies or societies; or taking appropriate legal action.

3.1.2 Prior publication

If material has been previously published it is not generally acceptable for publication in a Sage journal. However, there are certain circumstances where previously published material can be considered for publication. Please refer to the guidance on the Sage Author Gateway or if in doubt, contact the Editor at the address given below.

3.2 Contributor’s publishing agreement

Before publication, Sage requires the author as the rights holder to sign a Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement. Sage’s Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement is an exclusive license agreement which means that the author retains copyright in the work but grants SAGE the sole and exclusive right and license to publish for the full legal term of copyright. Exceptions may exist where an assignment of copyright is required or preferred by a proprietor other than SAGE. In this case copyright in the work will be assigned from the author to the society. For more information please visit the Sage Author Gateway.

3.3 Open access and author archiving

HMF offers optional open access publishing via the Sage Choice programme. For more information please visit the Sage Choice website. For information on funding body compliance, and depositing your article in repositories, please visit SAGE Publishing Policies on our Journal Author Gateway.

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4. Preparing your manuscript

4.1 Formatting

The preferred format for your manuscript is Word. LaTeX files are also accepted. Word and (La)Tex templates are available on the Manuscript Submission Guidelines page of our Author Gateway.

Language

Please write your text in good English (American or British usage is accepted, but not a mixture of these). Use decimal points (not decimal commas); use a comma for thousands (1,000 and above).

Use of Word-processing Software

It is important that the file be saved in the "native" format of the word processor used. The text should be in single-column format. Keep the layout of the text as simple as possible. Most formatting codes will be removed and replaced on processing the article. In particular, do not use the word processor's options to justify text or to hyphenate words. However, do use bold face, italics, subscripts, superscripts etc. Do not embed "graphically designed" equations or tables, but prepare these using the word processor's facility. When preparing tables, if you are using a table grid, use only one grid for each individual table and not a grid for each row. If no grid is used, use tabs, not spaces, to align columns. The electronic text should be prepared in a way very similar to that of conventional manuscripts (see also SAGE’s Manuscript Submission Guidelines). Do not import the figures into the text file but, instead, indicate their approximate locations directly in the electronic text and on the manuscript. See also the section on Electronic illustrations. To avoid unnecessary errors you are strongly advised to use the "spell-check" and "grammar-check" functions of your word processor.

Abstract

A concise and factual abstract is required. The abstract should state briefly the purpose of the research, the principal results and major conclusions. An abstract is often presented separately from the article, so it must be able to stand alone. For this reason, References should be avoided. Abstracts must be limited
to a single paragraph with no more than 150 words.

Essential Title Page Information:

Title

Concise and informative. Titles are often used in information-retrieval systems. Avoid abbreviations and formulae where possible.

Author names and affiliations

Where the family name may be ambiguous (e.g., a double name), please indicate this clearly. Present the authors' affiliation addresses (where the actual work was done) below the names. Indicate all affiliations with a lower-case superscript letter immediately after the author's name and in front of the appropriate address. Provide the full postal address of each affiliation, including the country name, and, if available, the e-mail address of each author.

Corresponding author

Clearly indicate who is willing to handle correspondence at all stages of refereeing and publication, also post-publication. Ensure that telephone and fax numbers (with country and area code) are provided in addition to the e-mail address and the complete postal address.

Present/permanent address

If an author has moved since the work described in the article was done, or was visiting at the time, a "Present address"' (or "Permanent address") may be indicated as a footnote to that author's name. The address at which the author actually did the work must be retained as the main, affiliation address.
Superscript Arabic numerals are used for such footnotes.

Acknowledgements

Collate acknowledgements in a separate section at the end of the article before the references and do not, therefore, include them on the title page, as a footnote to the title or otherwise. List here those individuals who provided help during the research (e.g., providing language help, writing assistance or proof reading the article, etc.).

Footnotes

Footnotes should be used sparingly. Number them consecutively throughout the article, using superscript Arabic numbers. Many word processors build footnotes into the text, and this feature may be used. Should this not be the case, indicate the position of footnotes in the text and present the footnotes themselves separately at the end of the article. Do not include footnotes in the Reference list.

Table footnotes

Indicate each footnote in a table with a superscript lowercase letter.

Tables

Number tables consecutively in accordance with their appearance in the text. Place footnotes to tables below the table body and indicate them with superscript lowercase letters. Avoid vertical rules. Be sparing in the use of tables and ensure that the data presented in tables do not duplicate results described elsewhere in the article.

4.2 Artwork, figures and other graphics

For guidance on the preparation of illustrations, pictures and graphs in electronic format, please visit Sage’s Manuscript Submission Guidelines.

Electronic Artwork

• Make sure you use uniform lettering and sizing of your original artwork.
• Save text in illustrations as "graphics" or enclose the font.
• Only use the following fonts in your illustrations: Arial, Courier, Helvetica, Times, Symbol.
• Number the illustrations according to their sequence in the text.
• Use a logical naming convention for your artwork files.
• Provide captions to illustrations separately.
• Produce images near to the desired size of the published version.

Submit each figure as a separate file. For guidance on the preparation of illustrations, pictures and graphs in electronic format, please visit the Artwork Guidelines section on SAGE’s manuscript submission guidelines page. Figures supplied in color will appear in color on-line regardless of whether or not these illustrations are reproduced in color in the printed version. For specifically requested color reproduction in print, you will receive information regarding the costs from SAGE after receipt of your accepted article from the Production Editor.

Please do not:

• Supply embedded graphics in your word processor (spreadsheet, presentation) document.
• Supply files that are optimized for screen use (like GIF, BMP, PICT, WPG); the resolution is too low.
• Supply files that are too low in resolution.
• Submit graphics that are disproportionately large for the content.
• Mark the appropriate position of a figure in the article

Color Artwork

Please make sure that artwork files are in an acceptable format (TIFF, EPS or MS Office files) and with the correct resolution. If, together with your accepted article, you submit usable color figures then SAGE will ensure, at no additional charge, that these figures will appear in color on the journal web site.

Image Manipulation

While it is accepted that authors sometimes need to manipulate images for clarity, manipulation for purposes of deception or fraud will be seen as scientific ethical abuse and will be dealt with accordingly. For graphical images, this journal is applying the following policy: no specific feature within an image may be enhanced, obscured, moved, removed, or introduced. Adjustments of brightness, contrast, or color balance are acceptable if and as long as they do not obscure or eliminate any information present in the original. Non-linear adjustments (e.g. changes to gamma settings) must be disclosed in the figure legend.

Figure Captions

Ensure that each illustration has a caption. Supply captions separately, not attached to the figure. A caption should comprise a brief title (not on the figure itself) and a description of the illustration. Keep text in the illustrations themselves to a minimum but explain all symbols and abbreviations used.

Text Graphics

Present incidental graphics not suitable for mention as figures, plates or schemes at the end of the article and number them "Graphic 1", etc. Their precise position in the text can then be indicated. See further under Electronic Artwork. If you are working with LaTeX and have such features embedded in the text, these can be left, but such embedding should not be done specifically for publishing purposes. Further, high-resolution graphics files must be provided separately.

Submission Checklist

It is our hope that this list will be useful during the final checking of an article prior to sending it to the journal's Managing Editor for review.

Ensure that the following items are present:

• One Author designated as corresponding author
• E-mail address
• Full postal address
• Telephone and fax numbers
• All necessary files have been uploaded
• Keywords
• All figure captions
• All tables (including title, description, footnotes) Further considerations
• Manuscript has been "spell-checked" and "grammar-checked"
• References are in the correct format for this journal
• All references mentioned in the Reference list are cited in the text, and vice versa
• Permission has been obtained for use of copyrighted material from other sources (including the web)
• Color figures are clearly marked as being intended for color reproduction on the web (free of charge)

4.3 Supplemental material

This journal is able to host additional materials online (e.g. datasets, podcasts, videos, images etc.) alongside the full-text of the article. For more information, please refer to our guidelines on submitting supplemental files.

Material

HMF accepts electronic supplementary material to support and enhance your scientific research. Supplementary files offer the author additional possibilities to publish supporting applications, movies, animation sequences, high-resolution images, background datasets, sound clips and more. Supplementary files supplied will be published on-line alongside your article. In order to ensure that your submitted material is directly usable, please ensure that data are provided in one of our recommended file formats.

Video data

HMF accepts video material and animation sequences to support and enhance your scientific research. Authors who have video or animation files that they wish to submit with their article are strongly encouraged to include links to these within the body of the article. This can be done in the same way as a figure or table by referring to the video or animation content and noting in the body text where it should be placed. All submitted files should be properly labeled so that they directly relate to the video file's content. In order to ensure that your video or animation material is directly usable, please provide the files in one of our recommended file formats with a preferred maximum size of 50 MB. Please supply 'stills' with your files: you can choose any frame from the video or animation or make a separate image. These will be used instead of standard icons and will personalize the link to your video data. This journal is able to host approved supplemental materials on-line, alongside the full-text of articles. Supplemental files will be subjected to peer-review alongside the article. For more information please refer to SAGE’s Guidelines for Authors on Supplemental Files.

4.4 Reference style

HMF adheres to the AMA Manual of Style (11th edition). View the guide here to ensure your manuscript conforms to this style.

Journal Abbreviations Source Journal names should be abbreviated according to Index Medicus journal abbreviations: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/journals

• List of serial title word abbreviations: http://www.issn.org/2-22661-LTWA-online.php
• CAS (Chemical Abstracts Service): http://www.cas.org/content/references/corejournals

4.5 English language editing services

Authors seeking assistance with English language editing, translation, or figure and manuscript formatting to fit the Journal’s specifications should consider using Sage Language Services. Visit Sage Language Services on our Journal Author Gateway for further information.

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5. Submitting your manuscript

Submission to this journal proceeds totally on-line. Use the following guidelines to prepare your article. Via the on-line submission site of this journal (https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/hmf) you will be guided stepwise through the creation and uploading of the various files. The system automatically converts source files to a single Adobe Acrobat PDF version of the article, which is used in the peer-review process. Please note that even though manuscript source files are converted to PDF at submission for the review process, these source files are needed for further processing after acceptance. All correspondence, including notification of the Managing Editor's decision and requests for revision, takes place by e-mail and via the author's homepage, removing the need for a hard-copy paper trail. Exceptions may occur and, if necessary, the Managing Editor will contact the author through an e-mail account that is separate from the on-line submission system.

IMPORTANT: Please check whether you already have an account in the system before trying to create a new one. If you have reviewed or authored for the Journal in the past year it is likely that you will have had an account created. For further guidance on submitting your manuscript online please visit ScholarOne Online Help

5.1 ORCID

As part of our commitment to ensuring an ethical, transparent and fair peer review process Sage is a supporting member of ORCID, the Open Researcher and Contributor ID. ORCID provides a unique and persistent digital identifier that distinguishes researchers from every other researcher, even those who share the same name, and, through integration in key research workflows such as manuscript and grant submission, supports automated linkages between researchers and their professional activities, ensuring that their work is recognized.

The collection of ORCID IDs from corresponding authors is now part of the submission process of this journal. If you already have an ORCID ID you will be asked to associate that to your submission during the online submission process. We also strongly encourage all co-authors to link their ORCID ID to their accounts in our online peer review platforms. It takes seconds to do: click the link when prompted, sign into your ORCID account and our systems are automatically updated. Your ORCID ID will become part of your accepted publication’s metadata, making your work attributable to you and only you. Your ORCID ID is published with your article so that fellow researchers reading your work can link to your ORCID profile and from there link to your other publications.

If you do not already have an ORCID ID please follow this link to create one or visit our ORCID homepage to learn more.

5.2 Information required for completing your submission

You will be asked to provide contact details and academic affiliations for all co-authors via the submission system and identify who is to be the corresponding author. These details must match what appears on your manuscript. The affiliation listed in the manuscript should be the institution where the research was conducted. If an author has moved to a new institution since completing the research, the new affiliation can be included in a manuscript note at the end of the paper. At this stage please ensure you have included all the required statements and declarations and uploaded any additional supplementary files (including reporting guidelines where relevant).

5.3 Permissions

Please also ensure that you have obtained any necessary permission from copyright holders for reproducing any illustrations, tables, figures or lengthy quotations previously published elsewhere. For further information including guidance on fair dealing for criticism and review, please see the Copyright and Permissions page on the Sage Author Gateway.

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6. On acceptance and publication

Use of the Digital Object Identifier

The Digital Object Identifier (DOI) may be used to cite and link to electronic documents. The DOI consists of a unique alpha-numeric character string which is assigned to a document by the publisher upon the initial electronic publication. The assigned DOI never changes. Therefore, it is an ideal medium for citing a document, particularly 'Articles in press' because they have not yet received their full bibliographic information.

The correct format for citing a DOI is shown as follows (example taken from a document in the journal Physics Letters B): doi:10.1016/j.physletb.2003.10.071 When you use the DOI to create URL hyperlinks to documents on
the web, they are guaranteed never to change.

Proofs

One set of page proofs in PDF format will be sent by e-mail to the corresponding author (if we do not have an e- mail address then paper proofs will be sent by post). SAGE sends PDF proofs which can be annotated; for this you will need to download Adobe Reader version 7 (or higher) available free from http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html. Instructions on how to annotate PDF files will accompany the proofs. The exact system requirements are given at the Adobe site: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/acrrsystemreqs.html#70win.

If you do not wish to use the PDF annotations function, you may list the corrections (including replies to the Query Form) and return to SAGE in an e-mail. Please list your corrections quoting line number. If, for any reason, this is not possible, then mark the corrections and any other comments (including replies to the Query Form) on a printout of your proof and return by fax, or scan the pages and e-mail, or by post. Please use this proof only for checking the typesetting, editing, completeness and correctness of the text, tables and figures. Significant changes to the article as accepted for publication will only be considered at this stage with permission from the Editor. We will do everything possible to get your article published quickly and accurately. Therefore, it is important to ensure that all of your corrections are sent back to us in one communication: please check carefully before replying, as inclusion of any subsequent corrections cannot be guaranteed. Proofreading is solely your responsibility. Note that SAGE may proceed with the publication of your article if no response is received.

Offprints

Offprints can be ordered by the authors. An order form with prices will be sent to the corresponding author.

6.1 SAGE Production

Your SAGE Production Editor will keep you informed as to your article’s progress throughout the production process. Proofs will be made available to the corresponding author via our editing portal SAGE Edit or by email, and corrections should be made directly or notified to us promptly. Authors are reminded to check their proofs carefully to confirm that all author information, including names, affiliations, sequence and contact details are correct, and that Funding and Conflict of Interest statements, if any, are accurate. Please note that if there are any changes to the author list at this stage all authors will be required to complete and sign a form authorizing the change.

6.2 Online First publication

Online First allows final articles (completed and approved articles awaiting assignment to a future issue) to be published online prior to their inclusion in a journal issue, which significantly reduces the lead time between submission and publication. Visit the SAGE Journals help page for more details, including how to cite Online First articles.

6.3 Access to your published article

SAGE provides authors with online access to their final article.

6.4 Promoting your article

Publication is not the end of the process! You can help disseminate your paper and ensure it is as widely read and cited as possible. The SAGE Author Gateway has numerous resources to help you promote your work. Visit the Promote Your Article page on the Gateway for tips and advice.

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7. Further information

For inquiries relating to the submission of articles (including electronic submission where available) please visit this
journal's homepage or contact the Managing Editor at editor@sympatico.ca. Contact details for questions arising after acceptance of an article, especially those relating to proofs, will be provided by the publisher.

7.1 Appealing the publication decision

Editors have very broad discretion in determining whether an article is an appropriate fit for their journal. Many manuscripts are declined with a very general statement of the rejection decision. These decisions are not eligible for formal appeal unless the author believes the decision to reject the manuscript was based on an error in the review of the article, in which case the author may appeal the decision by providing the Editor with a detailed written description of the error they believe occurred.

If an author believes the decision regarding their manuscript was affected by a publication ethics breach, the author may contact the publisher with a detailed written description of their concern, and information supporting the concern, at publication_ethics@sagepub.com.