CONSORT Guidelines

1. Select a journal for submission
   Each journal has a unique scope of interest and will only publish articles that fall within their selection criteria. English-language journals that are indexed by the National Institute’s of Health PubMed online database are more accessible to researchers the world over and increases the readership of the article. As well, journals with impact factors should be considered over those that do not as this rating is linked with the frequency of articles cited.
    
2. Step-by-step writing guide
   Three different guides have been developed in respect of the three main categories of journal articles. Determine which type is the most appropriate and acquire the Instructions for Authors either from the journal’s online site or within an issue of the journal itself. Note, that there may be additional categories of article types with specific instructions beyond those presented here. (Schriger DL, Arora S, Altman DG. The content of medical journal Instructions for authors. Ann Emerg Med. 2006 Dec;48(6):743-9, 749.e1-4.)
   • Letter to the Editor: comments on a recently published article
   • Review article: systematic literature search and review of a topic
   • Original research: scientific reports of original research

• Resources consulted to create the stepwise instructions:
  • CONSORT guidelines will be summarized with brief explanations
  • Journal’s instructions to authors (NEJM, JAMA)
  • International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (http://www.icmje.org/)
  • Plus the resources mentioned below in "Additional Resources" 

Additional Resources
Links will be provided to the papers used to create the stepwise instructions (above) and the additional links below:

• CONSORT guidelines http://www.consort-statement.org
• American Society of Cytopathology http://www.cytopathology.org/website/article.asp?id=16
• Stengel D, Calori GM, Giannoudis PV. Graphical data presentation. Injury. 2008 Jun;39(6):659-65.
• Tompson A. How to write an English medical manuscript that will be published and have impact. Surg Today. 2006;36(5):407-9.
• Cetin S, Hackam DJ. An approach to the writing of a scientific manuscript. J Surg Res. 2005 Oct;128(2):165-7. Epub 2005 Sep 12.
• Kliewer MA. Writing it up: a step-by-step guide to publication for beginning investigators. AJR Am J Roentgenol. 2005 Sep;185(3):591-6.
• Grading the evidence:
  • Oxford Levels of Evidence
  • GRADE
• Siwek J, Gourlay ML, Slawson DC, Shaughnessy AF. How to write an evidence-based clinical review article. Am Fam Physician. 2002 Jan 15;65(2):251-8.
• How to conduct a systematic literature review
  • McGowan J, Sampson M. Systematic reviews need systematic searchers. J Med Libr Assoc. 2005 Jan;93(1):74-80
• “Ask a Librarian”
  • Members can access cited papers through WGO’s “Ask a Librarian”

CONSORT Checklist
List of items to include when reporting a randomized trial

Links to additional resources:

1. CONSORT statement
2. The Flow Diagram
   The flow diagram is intended to depict the passage of participants through an RCT. The revised flow diagram depicts information from four stages of a trial (enrollment, intervention allocation, follow-up, and analysis).
   
   The diagram explicitly shows the number of participants, for each intervention group, included in the primary data analysis. Inclusion of these numbers allows the reader to judge whether the authors have done an intention-to-treat analysis.
   • Templates of the CONSORT 2010 flow diagram are available to download in MS Word and in PDF.
3. Translations in Greek, French, and Chinese are available for the CONSORT statement available as either Word or PDF downloads at: http://www.consort-statement.org/downloads/translations