Overview
Before submitting a manuscript to Medical Decision Making or MDM Policy & Practice, please review Manuscript Requirements and our Review Process.
The MDM journals are “format-free” for initial submissions. Authors may use any consistent academic formatting and style that incorporates the required manuscript elements (including a structured abstract where required). Revised manuscripts must conform to the journals’ formatting and style.
However, as of January 2021, the MDM journals are conducting double-anonymized review of manuscripts. This means that authors must submit both an anonymized main document and a title page document that includes authors’ names and affiliations, acknowledgements, and all other identifying information. See Manuscript Requirements for more information.
Duplicate publication review
A manuscript will be reviewed by editors for possible publication with the understanding that it is being submitted to one journal at a time and has not been published, simultaneously submitted, or already accepted for publication elsewhere. However, research often builds on past work, and sometimes multiple work products can result from the same data. In all of these cases, it is important that authors are transparent regarding how different papers are related to one another.
Both MDM and MDM P&P will consider papers that have been posted as preprints prior to submission.
If there is potential overlap with other publications, please follow the following procedures:
- In your cover letter, please reference all of your prior and/or ongoing research using the same dataset, no matter how small the overlap.
- To help the editors form a judgment about the degree of duplicate publication, please provide reprints of published articles and copies of other manuscripts in press containing data that also appear in the submitted manuscript.
- In order to not compromise the double anonymized process, cite your own work as “Anonymous”. For example, in the text write “We used the same measure as in our prior publication (Anonymous, 2020)” and in the reference list write “Anonymous (2020). Details omitted for double-anonymized reviewing”.
The editors will use this information to evaluate the scientific contribution provided by the manuscript. We also reserve the right to fully or partially de-anonymize the review if doing so is necessary for reviewers to fully evaluate the submission.
The restriction against duplicate publication does not preclude consideration of a complete report that follows publication of preliminary findings elsewhere, usually in the form of an abstract or report. Editors consider for publication manuscripts that are based on larger reports, such as technology assessments, cost-effectiveness analyses, comparative effectiveness reviews, or methodologic guidance prepared for government agencies or nongovernmental technology assessment organizations. Authors who intend to submit an article based on a larger report are encouraged to do so as early as possible—preferably before the larger report is published online or in print. Authors are responsible for coordinating with the organization that will publish the larger report to ensure that the timing of publication meets the journal’s needs. When submitting such a manuscript, submit a copy of the original research protocol, larger report, and/or other supplemental data as attachments if such materials would help the editors or reviewers better understand the work.
Online Submission Process
Editors consider only online submissions made through the MDM or MDM P&P ScholarOne Manuscripts Web sites; ScholarOne Manuscripts must be used for the submission of all new, revised, and resubmitted material. ScholarOne Manuscripts is a secure, cloud-based, third-party product. During manuscript submission, please give precedence to the instructions presented within these guidelines (or those sent to you from the editors via e-mail) rather than on-screen commands. The editorial office does not accept submissions by e-mail, mail, or fax. Any submission that comes to the editorial office by these methods will be returned with instructions on how to submit the manuscript online, as shown below. The MDM editorial office is not responsible for processing manuscripts and materials that have been submitted improperly. New manuscripts are generally processed weekly: Monday morning at 9:00 am US Eastern Time (ET). Manuscripts received after this time will be processed the following week.
In addition, all manuscript submissions require a cover letter. Authors are prompted to include a cover letter at the time of manuscript submission. This requirement applies to all resubmissions and revisions, both of which must also include a point-by-point response from the author to all reviewer and editor comments.
During the online submission process, the submitting author is asked to identify keywords from two lists: APPLICATION AREAS and DETAILED METHODOLOGY. The editors use these author-selected keywords to match the manuscript to reviewers who have pertinent expertise. Authors are encouraged to review these keyword lists carefully—and completely—before making selections to ensure that the best possible keywords are chosen for the manuscript.
ORCID IDs
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.
We require collection of ORCID IDs from corresponding authors as part of the submission process of the MDM journals. Furthermore, we strongly encourage all co-authors to link their ORCID ID to their accounts in our online peer review platform on manuscript submission. Note that ORCID IDs cannot be added to manuscripts after acceptance.
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.
General Information and Instructions
General inquiries for which the answer is available on this Web site will not be acknowledged by editorial staff. In addition, current circulation and bibliometric information for MDM and MDM P&P is best gathered using publicly available online indices and databases. During manuscript submission and review, please be aware of the following:
- It is not necessary to complete the submission in a single step. The submitting author can stop at any point, save, and continue the process again later.
- Subsequent to manuscript submission, all authors may track the status of the manuscript by logging in to the ScholarOne Manuscripts Author Center for MDM or MDM P&P. However, correspondence between the editorial office and the authorial team will be strictly limited to the designated contact author. Once a manuscript is accepted for review, any status inquiries must include a manuscript ID and should be received no sooner than 60 days after the formal submission date.
- (!) To ensure timely communication with the editorial office and SAGE production, please verify that all e-mails from *umich.edu, *manuscriptcentral.com, *amazonses.com, and *sagepub.com are permitted by your e-mail server(s) (i.e., safe senders list, whitelist). Please consult with your home institution’s information technology department for more information. (!)
To submit a new manuscript to MDM or MDM P&P, please complete the following steps:
- Access the appropriate Web site: MDM (http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/mdm) or MDM P&P (http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/mdm-pp)
- Notes: If you have not done so already, please create a ScholarOne Manuscripts account. Click the blue arrow button next to Create Account: New users click here. Then, follow the online prompts.
- If you had an account on the MDM ScholarOne site prior to the launch of MDM P&P (October 15, 2015), your ScholarOne Manuscripts account log-on information for MDM P&P is the same.
- On the Welcome page, enter the Author Center.
- Under Author Resources, click anywhere on the following line:
★ Click here to submit a new manuscript - Follow the online prompts to submit a manuscript.
Inquiries regarding the online submission process, including requests to “unsubmit” a manuscript prior to review, may be addressed to Stacy Wennstrom, MA, at the MDM editorial office.
Fees and Services
Medical Decision Making
There are no fees associated with the submission or publication of manuscripts at MDM. However, authors may opt to pay for either color printing or open access for accepted manuscripts.
MDM publishes figures in color online only. In print, all figures are published in black and white. Authors of accepted articles are responsible for ensuring that any color figures will also be legible in black-and-white format and in grayscale. Alternatively, the fee for publishing color images in print is $800 USD for the first image, $200 USD for each subsequent image. MDM authors who are willing to pay for the publication of color images in the print version of the article must notify the editorial office as soon as possible on article acceptance.
In addition, though MDM is subscription-based journal, authors may choose to ensure online, open access for all readers of their article. Additional information about the SAGE Choice option is available from our publisher, SAGE Publications. The current article processing fee for MDM’s SAGE Choice option USD$4200. This fee will increase to USD$4400 for articles accepted in January 1, 2025 or later.
MDM Policy & Practice
There are no fees associated with the submission of manuscripts at MDM P&P. However, authors of accepted manuscripts at MDM P&P pay an article processing charge (APC) to support open-access publication.
MDM P&P’s APC is $2,500 USD, payable on formal manuscript acceptance. A discounted rate of $2,000 USD is available for author teams with at least one author who is a current member of the Society for Medical Decision Making (SMDM).
Your institution may be able to help you to cover all or part of your article’s open access article processing charge (APC) if they have an Open Access agreement or open access prepaid account (OAPA) in place with SAGE. You may alternately be eligible for a discount due to your institutional affiliation. Please identify your affiliation after your paper is accepted for publication to check if any discounts of fee waivers are available to you.
As described in SAGE’s policy on Gold Open Access Article Processing Charge Waivers, SAGE provides partial and full waivers of the APC to authors who reside in the countries described by the Research4Life program. SAGE uses the corresponding author’s affiliation to automatically apply the R4L waivers in the SAGE Open Access Portal. The waiver will be automatically applied if the corresponding author is from an author on the current country list: https://www.research4life.org/access/eligibility/ . Authors do not need to apply for or request a waiver as long as they disclosed on submission that they are from a country on the list. If an author from a listed country does not receive a waiver for an accepted article and believes that they do qualify, they should contact openaccess@Sagepub.com to check and apply.