For Authors

ARTICLE TYPES

CASE REPORTS / CASE SERIES

Case reports can be a method of educating the audience on the epidemiology, clinical features, diagnostic algorithm, evidence-based treatment, and natural history of entities seen in optometric practice. Case reports must be well documented with the appropriate results of diagnostic testing and follow-up duration adequate to support the stated conclusions.

Case reports must be original and not previously published. Case series must describe three or fewer patients and not be the product of a formal retrospective chart review that would require institutional review board approval.

Case reports can be a rare or unusual presentation, but manuscripts that you choose to submit do not have to describe an esoteric or exceedingly rare event. Your submission might describe a clinical entity that is seen periodically in most clinics, but the current understanding of the pathophysiology, the diagnostic thought process, the evidence-based treatment options and the clinical trials that help to define standards of care are not universally known in our community.

Case reports that characterize or describe the use of new diagnostic technologies, or that highlight the effects or complications of drugs or medical devices, are also encouraged.

CASE REPORT / CASE SERIES GUIDELINES SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

The title should include the keywords “Case Report” or “Case Series." The submission should be in the following format:

-The title page should include the following:
• Manuscript title, limited to 100 characters or less;
• The authors’ full names, including first name, middle initial(s) (if applicable), surname/family name, highest academic degrees (no more than two) plus, if appropriate, FAAO;
• Institutional affiliations for each author;
• The total number of words, tables and figures;
• The name and full mailing address and e-mail address for the corresponding author.

-The abstract should be < 250 words and include three parts: Introduction, Case Report(s), and Conclusion. Please do not cite references in the abstract and define any abbreviations. We recommend that the author(s) include at least three, and up to five keywords at the end of the abstract (in alphabetical order).

-The manuscript body should include four parts: Introduction, Case Report(s), Discussion, and Conclusion

-A patient consent statement should be the last sentence in the Conclusion section (See PATIENT CONSENT).

-A section titled, Take Home Points, should be after the conclusion section. It should include 3 to 4 bullet points summarizing the most important concepts/ideas that clinicians should be aware of after reading the article.

-Acknowledgments are optional, and used to recognize individuals who were involved in the preparation of the manuscript or the care of the patient, but who did not meet criteria to be considered authors. Acknowledgements should be placed after the Take Home Points section.

-The total number of figures and tables should be limited to a maximum of 6 items (example: 5 figures and 1 table, or 3 figures and 3 tables). These should be included after the manuscript Take Home Points or Acknowledgments (if applicable) and before the references. Figure and table legends should be placed below the corresponding figure or table. (See FIGURES AND TABLES)

-The references must comply with journal rules (See REFERENCES). There should be approximately 30 or fewer references.

-The submission text should be approximately 2500 words up to a maximum of 3000 words (including abstract and manuscript body).

-The use of abbreviations and acronyms is not permitted as these are not standarized in most instances.

-Please follow the guidelines carefully as failure to do so may result in the paper being returned to the author(s).

Patient consent must include one of the following statements:
• Written informed consent was obtained for identifiable health information included in this case report
• No identifiable health information was included in this case report

The consent statement should be the last sentence of the conclusion section.

ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS

Clinical Insights in Eyecare takes publication ethics very seriously and conforms to the recommended practices and guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics.

The entirety of the manuscript, including figures and tables, submitted to the Journal must be original contributions from the authors listed. They cannot contain previously published text, figures or other materials. The manuscript must not be currently under consideration for publication elsewhere, and if accepted, must not be published elsewhere in similar form, in any language, without the consent of the Editor-in-Chief (on behalf of the American Academy of Optometry). Also, the Journal reserves the right to inspect images and request original files at any time. If authors cannot provide original, unaltered files, their manuscript is subject to rejection or retraction.

Articles submitted to the Journal are screened to detect for similarities with existing publications. Submissions determined to be plagiarized or judged as having too much similarity to existing published content will be rejected with no right to appeal. Responsible authors may be subject to penalties laid out by the Ethics Committee of the American Academy of Optometry. Self-plagiarism should also be avoided as original published text from authors may be under copyright at previous journals.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI)

Manuscripts submitted using AI, chatbots, other types of machine learning, or similar tools should not be used. Additionally, an AI program cannot be an author of a manuscript. Use of any of the above is considered scientific misconduct.

AUTHORSHIP REQUIREMENTS

Clinical Insights in Eyecare uses the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors criteria to define the qualifications for authorship. All contributors designated as authors must meet specific qualifications. Likewise, all who qualify as authors should be included as authors. Individuals who contributed to the care of the patient or preparing the manuscript, but not meeting authorship qualifications may be listed in the acknowledgments.

Each author must meet all following criteria:
• Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; AND
• Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
• Final approval of the version to be published; AND
• Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Authorship requires that authors must be accountable for their own contributions as well as the specific contributions of their co-authors. During the submission process, the corresponding author will be required to designate an author to take responsibility for the integrity of the work as a whole, from inception to published article.

The Journal permits one corresponding author. The order of authors should be decided by the co-authors. Once a manuscript has been submitted, the order of authorship (including adding or removing authors) should not be changed. Any exceptions must be approved by the Editor-in-Chief and the Corresponding Author. The Corresponding Author is responsible for assuring that all other authors concur with any proposed change.

Clinical Insights in Eyecare uses the Contributor Roles Taxonomy (CRediT). CRediT, an American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and National Information Standards Organization (NISO) standard, consists of 14 research contributor roles that can be selected during the submission process. This allows the range and nature of author contributions to the Journal to be captured in a transparent, reliable, and organized format.

Case reports (1 patient) and case series reporting 3 or fewer patients do not require institutional review board approval. Submissions describing more than three patients, or that required a systematic retrospective chart review to identify patients must be reviewed by a research ethics panel, i.e. institutional review board.

Authors must ensure confidentiality for any patient information. Subject anonymity should be carefully protected and following all the guidelines for experimental investigation with human subjects required by the institution(s) with which all the authors are affiliated. Authors should mask any identifying features and remove participant names from images submitted for publication unless written consent permitting their use is provided along with their submission.

DIVERSITY, EQUITY, AND INCLUSION

As a journal of the American Academy of Optometry, Clinical Insights in Eyecare, recognizes the need to improve and enchance diversity, equity, and inclusion in the scholarly community. Authors can choose to answer questions pertaining to this initiative during the submission process. By collecting and analyzing these data, the journal can hold itself accountable and put in place measures of progress in hopes of increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion going forward.

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST AND FUNDING DISCLOSURE

All conflicts of interest for all authors must be clearly declared during the submission process or the manuscript should include a clear note that the authors are declaring no conflicts of interest (“The authors declare no conflicts of interest.”).

Please list anything that could be perceived as a conflict of interest. Examples include (but are not limited to) paid or unpaid positions with or stock or honoraria from corporations or political bodies, patents held in technology that is used in the study, and personal connections to others involved in the study. Any undisclosed conflicts of interest that are revealed later may subject your paper to publishing delays, corrections, or retraction.

GENERAL STYLE CONSIDERATIONS

Pattern manuscript style after the American Medical Association Manual of Style (10th edition). Stedman’s Medical Dictionary (27th edition) and Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (10th edition) should be used as standard references.

DOCUMENT LAYOUT

Submission to the Journal should be formatted as follows:

Microsoft Word document

8.5 inch x 11 inch page size with 1-inch top, bottom, and side margins.

American English

11-point San Serif font, e.g. Arial, Helvetica, Calibri, or Verdana.

Double-spaced with the lines in the manuscript text file numbered consecutively. If unsure how to do this, consult the Help menu in Microsoft Word. The manuscript text file line numbering should stop at the references. Line numbers are not required for the title page, abstract, references, tables or figure legends.

Response to Reviews should use colored text (red or blue) to differentiate reviewer comments from author responses. Author responses should follow each comment from the reviewer in a point-by-point manner and indicate where any revisions were made referencing line numbers in the revised version.

Submitted revisions should include a Response to Reviews document and a single copy of the revised manuscript clearly indicating where any changes were made using colored text or highlighting. Do not provide documents formatted showing track-changes in the margin.

LANGUAGE EDITING SERVICES

It is an author’s responsibility to ensure that their manuscript is up to the journal’s language and grammar standards. If you have difficulty with the English language or grammar, please consider seeking assistance to avoid rejection on this basis. Professional assistance with grammar and English language editing services can be obtained from a number of commercial services. Some reputable services are Origin Editorial, J&J Editorial, and Technica Editorial. It is the responsibility of the authors, at their own expense, to seek out these services. The American Academy of Optometry, Scholastica, and members of the journal’s editorial office receive no financial benefit when authors use any of the services listed.

ABBREVIATIONS

Jargon, acronyms and non-standard abbreviations are a barrier to clearly communicating your ideas and discoveries. Moreover, archival publications will persist beyond the life of the authors and current expressions in the field. Published articles must also be accessible to readers from a wide range of disciplines outside of optometry (some that may not even currently exist). For these reasons, the manuscript body usually should not contain any abbreviations or acronyms. Careful consideration should be given to any abbreviations or acronyms thought to be standard terms that are widely accepted in the field, e.g. HIV, MRI, OCT etc.

When writing for Clinical Insights in Eyecare, most abbreviations are unnecessary and standard English is always preferred. Proper nouns such as names of companies, products, or units of measure, are not acronyms and may be used, e.g. MNREAD Acuity Chart, logMAR, mm, etc.

Almost all clinical abbreviations are non-standard and therefore unsuitable for an archival publication. Examples of clinical abbreviations that are not permitted include: OD, OS, OU, CI, CSF, PAL, PROSE, BF, BFS, BSCVA, VA, CL, CYL, VT, SPH, CF, BRAO, BRVO, ERM, ERG, SLE, XT, etc. Abbreviations and practices vary widely between clinics and across the globe. It is common that readers outside of clinical disciplines may use the same abbreviations to mean different things. The use of abbreviations and acronyms is therefore strongly discouraged and rarely permitted

Limited use is permitted in the abstract, figure legends, and tables, provided they are necessary and explicitly declared where they are used. If used at all, they must be declared separately in each element, e.g. the abstract, each figure legend, and each table so that every element can be fully understood independently form the remainder of the manuscript.

DRUGS AND THERAPEUTIC AGENTS

Refer to drugs and therapeutic agents by their accepted generic or chemical names, and do not abbreviate them. Use code numbers only when a generic name is not yet available. Copyright or trade names of drugs should be capitalized and placed in parentheses after the name of the drug only the first time the drug is mentioned in the text. Names and locations (city and state in USA; city and country outside USA) of manufacturers of drugs, supplies, or equipment cited in a manuscript are required to comply with trademark law and should be provided in parentheses.

LENS PRESCRIPTIONS OR REFRACTIVE ERRORS

Lens prescriptions or refractive errors should be expressed in minus cylinder: Right eye –2.25 – 1.00 x 95.

UNITS OF MEASURE

The units for measurements should be separated from the value, e.g. 12 mmHg and not 12mmHg.

VISUAL ACUITIES

Because measured visual acuity differs by the method of measurement, Clinical Insights in Eyecare encourages authors to report visual acuities as they were measured, i.e. Snellen fractions, logMAR, etc. While reporting Snellen equivalent acuities can help readers interpret results, such conversions are problematic and should only be used to supplement primary data reported in the original measured format.

FIGURES AND TABLES

Articles should contain only essential figures and/or tables limited to a combined total of six. Figures should be concise and prepared with consideration for the page layout. Clinical images/figures, especially for ocular disease cases, are essential for the journal readership base. Lack of clinical imaging may be a reason for manuscript rejection.

FILE FORMATS AND RESOLUTION

Clinical images embedded in the manuscript can be in any file format that is compatible with MS Word documents . This includes GIF, JPG, PNG, BMP, and TIF image file types. Clinical images such as photographs, radiographs, OCT, CT scans, etc., must have a resolution of at least 350 dpi at final width. Images should have a minimum width of 1080 pixels

FIGURE LEGENDS

Figure legends are a required element; figures should be understandable apart from the text. Legends must accompany each figure. Each figure legend must contain a title. Tables may additionally contain an explanation of symbols.

Title: The title should be a concise summary for the whole figure, including any panels. The figure title should be placed in the figure legend. Titles could be descriptive, stating the type of experiment that produced the results, or declarative, summarizing the overall result. Titles above figures are discouraged. However, if a title above the figure is necessary, it must be in 10-point Arial Bold Title Case, centered over the plot box.

Explanation of Symbols: Explain all symbols, colors, non-standard abbreviations, lines, scale bars, and error bars (e.g., standard deviation vs. standard error) included in the figure.

EXAMPLE FIGURE LEGENDS
FIGURE 1: Slit-lamp photograph demonstrating accumulation of homogenous milky fluid entrapped within the capsule posterior to the intraocular lens.

FIGURE 2: Fundus photograph of the right eye (A) with modest optic nerve head cupping, fundus photograph of the left eye (B) showing marked glaucomatous cupping, and peripapillary retinal nerve fiber layer optical coherence tomography (C) with corresponding thinning in the left eye.

TABLE 1: Optical coherence tomography findings in paracentral acute middle maculopathy (PAMM) and acute middle maculopathy (AMN); Ganglion cell layer (GCL), Inner Plexiform Layer (INL), Inner Nuclear Layer (OPL), Outer Plexiform Layer (OPL), Outer Nuclear Layer (ONL), Outer Limiting Membrane (OLM), Retinal Pigment Epithelium (RPE).

TABLES

Tables should include a legend (title) above the table, appropriate column headings (with units), and explanatory captions (footnotes) that define any abbreviations used. Tables should be self-explanatory and should supplement, rather than duplicate, information presented in the text. Information that can be described in two or three sentences should be provided in the text and should not be presented as a table. Tables can be formatted as long or wide as necessary; however, care should be taken by the authors to carefully consider the best way to present their information. Narrow tables can be formatted to fit a single text-column in width (3.5 inches), while wide tables can be formatted to span the full-page width (7.5 inches). Whenever possible, tables must be limited to just one page of text.

Create tables using the table creating and editing feature of your word processing software (e.g., Word).

Use tables for data only; graphs and other illustrations should be submitted as figures. Use only separate cells, ordered lists, or unordered lists, or to separate content within the same cell into individual lines; do NOT use spaces, tabs, html tags, or line breaks inside a table. Symbols indicating statistical significance should appear in the same cell as the value and should not have their own column.

To highlight individual values in tables, you may use boldface type, italic type, or a single color of shading (note: the shading color is standardized so will not exactly match what you provide). Do not use multiple colors of shading, underline, or font size to highlight values in tables. Do not use color to indicate meaning. Text color is limited to black. Images or figures cannot be placed inside of tables—they must be formatted separately

REUSE PERMISSIONS AND COPYRIGHT

Authors must submit written permission from the copyright owner to use direct quotations, tables, or illustrations previously published and copyrighted. Complete source details and citation information must be included. Any permissions fees that might be required by the copyright owner are the responsibility of the authors requesting reuse and are not the responsibility of Scholastica or the American Academy of Optometry.

REFERENCES

Authors are responsible for making sure that each reference is cited correctly with respect to content and the Journal’s style. Clinical Insights in Eyecare requires authors to submit references based on the AMA reference style. Number references consecutively, ordered by their first appearance in the text. Citations should be formatted as superscript numerals following the nearest punctuation mark (e.g. period, comma, or semicolon). Do not insert references as footnotes. It is strongly recommended that authors use a reference management system such as Endnote.

MANUSCRIPT SUBMISSION PROCESS

Manuscripts are submitted online through the Journal website. Authors should follow the protocols outlined during the submission process. A publication fee is required if the manuscript is accepted for publication. American Academy of Optometry Fellows, candidates for Fellowship, resident members, and student members are required to submit a $50.00 publication fee. Nonmembers of the American Academy of Optometry are required to submit a $200.00 publication fee.

EDITORIAL AND PEER REVIEW PROCESS

Submissions received online will be evaluated by the Editor-in-Chief and the Associate Editor to ensure compliance with the journal’s formatting and structural guidelines (e.g. length). Any submissions not conforming with these Instructions for Authors will be returned to the authors without further review. Manuscripts that meet the journal’s submission guidelines will be assigned to a Topical Editor who will determine the relevance and suitability for peer review.

Unsuitable manuscripts (inappropriate topic, incorrect diagnosis/treatment, excessive grammatical errors, etc) will be reviewed by the Topical Editor and only cursory review comments will be provided to the authors. Manuscripts judged suitable for review will be assigned to two reviewers in a single blind format. Comments from the reviewers and editors will be provided to the authors at the conclusion of peer review.

Clinical Insights in Eyecare discourages more than two revisions during peer-review. Those that are not in final form early, risk rejection. Therefore, it is important to be attentive to the recommendations of the reviewers and the editorial staff. To reduce the time under review and minimize the number of revisions required before a submission is accepted, authors should avoid these common oversights:
• Carefully proofread the text for correct grammar and English language usage.
• Use American English spelling.
• Consider engaging colleagues to assist with writing.

Revisions require thorough and thoughtful responses to all reviewers’ comments in a separate document—the Response to Reviews. The author’s response to reviews should clearly and explicitly address every point raised by the reviewers. If authors choose not to accept a reviewer’s recommendation, then they must defend this decision by providing compelling arguments that include suitable evidence (e.g. data, references, etc.) for any recommended changes that are not made.

Revisions to the manuscript should be clearly noted in the response to reviews by indicating the page and line number for any changes made. Changes should also be highlighted using Word in the revised manuscript. When reviewers identify questions, concerns, or opportunities to improve a manuscript, it is not enough for authors to provide clarifications only in the Response to Reviews; authors must also make modifications and improvements to the manuscript text so that the final article is clear and convincing for the Journal’s readers.

All manuscripts must be submitted on-line through the Journal’s website. All published articles will be subjected to peer review.

ARTICLE EVALUATION CRITERIA

The following criteria are to be used to evaluate each submitted article:
• Interest to practitioners and clinical value
• Novelty and innovation
• Quality of content
• Clarity and conciseness of writing
• Compliance with instructions for authors

PUBLICATION DETAILS

After a manuscript has gone through peer review and been accepted for publication, authors will be provided a general timeframe before publication. Manuscript proofs will be provided to authors to check copyediting and typesetting. The contributing author is responsible for ensuring that the proof contains no errors. Proofs must be checked and returned in a timely manner.

COPYRIGHT

Copyright (required): All authors must accept authorship and complete the Journal’s copyright transfer agreement during the submisison process.

Authors retain their copyright for all articles they opt to publish open access with the Journal. Authors grant Scholastica an exclusive license to publish the article and the article is made available under the terms of a Creative Commons user license. The specific license is a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial No Derivative (CC BY-NC-ND) license that states:
• Use of the article requires credit to be given to the creator (The author and journal).
• The article cannot be used for commercial purposes.
• The article, and all of its elements, cannot be adapted, reused, or modified. Only the full article in its entirety (not derivatives) can be used elsewhere.

Submissions for the journal are open