Submission Guidelines

Please also see Editorial Policies for important additional information.

Applied Radiation Oncology is a peer-reviewed clinical-review journal published in March, June, September and December by Anderson Publishing, Ltd. Each issue is delivered in print and electronically to 4000+ practicing radiation oncologists worldwide.

Materials submitted to Applied Radiation Oncology must be original and novel work, and may not have been published elsewhere. We primarily publish review articles, case reports and research papers. Topics may pertain to clinical management; applications of a particular technology for cancer treatment or other relevant conditions; as well as administration, fiscal, technical, medico-legal and other issues relevant to the practice of radiation oncology.

As a general rule, Applied Radiation Oncology follows manuscript submission guidelines and requirements set forth by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) found at ICMJE | Recommendations | Preparing a Manuscript for Submission to a Medical Journal.

Review Article Guidelines

Submission

Please submit your review article to Applied Radiation Oncology via the Aries Editorial Manager automated submission system. There is no submission fee.

Title Page

The title page should include the full title of the article (limited to 128 characters) as well as the following information:

Author information—All authors should be listed, including full names, highest degrees, titles and current affiliations (department, institution/company, city and state). All authors must provide email addresses for submission and authorship confirmation purposes. Please include X and Instagram handles, if applicable, for all authors. Listing of authors’ Open Researcher and Contributor Identification (ORCID) is encouraged. Please also see Authorship/Contributorship Requirements, including information on the use of artificial intelligence (AI)-assisted technology, such as chatbots, etc.
Corresponding author—Please provide full contact information: mailing address, phone number, and e-mail address.
Conflict of interest/author disclaimer—Any actual, potential, or apparent conflicts of interest must be disclosed in a disclaimer statement. All authors must download the ICMJE Disclosure of Interest form and return it to ARO. If the article is an invited CME review article, please instead use the IAME Disclosure of Interest form.
Source(s) of support—Sources of support must be disclosed. These include grants, equipment, drugs, or other support used to aid the work in the article or the writing of the article.
Prior publication/presentation—ARO only accepts original manuscripts. However, If any part of the article has been published or presented in another form (eg, as an abstract or presented at a meeting), the original presentation must be identified with a complete citation. Manuscripts deposited in a preprint service will also be considered and must follow our preprint policy.
Peer reviewer recommendations—Please suggest 3 or more potential reviewers for this submission. Include names, departments, institutions, and an institutional email address. Please note that the editorial office may not use your suggestions, but your help is appreciated and may speed up the selection of appropriate reviewers. As submissions are double-anonymized, please do not alert those you are recommending.

Abstract

The abstract (no more than 300 words) should provide the context or background for the article and should state the objectives, methods and materials/basic procedures (analytical methods, etc.), results, principal conclusions, and keywords (10 or fewer). The abstract can be written in a structured or unstructured format. It should emphasize new and important aspects or observations, note important limitations, and not overinterpret findings. Funding sources should be listed separately after the abstract to facilitate proper display and indexing for search retrieval.

Manuscript

Word count: Manuscripts should be approximately 2000-3000 words, with a minimum of 2,000 words, not including references.
Article title: Maximum of 128 characters.
Anonymization: Please remove identifying information from the article for peer review purposes. Identifying information can later be added to the text in accepted submissions.
Line numbering: Please incorporate line numbers for peer review purposes.

Formatting your review article (example for a clinical review)

Introduction

Introduce the oncological condition/disease that will be discussed, and describe its impact is on patient populations; and
Introduce techniques and technology used to treat the disease.

Body

Technology: Describe the featured technology used for treatment.
Clinical Application: Describe the clinical utility of the technology with examples of a patient case or multiple patient cases.

Conclusion

Summary of key findings and efficacy of the technology in patient treatment (where applicable).

Figures

Key images: Provide 3 to 4 JPEG, PNG, or TIFF images (resolution: 300+ dpi). To help ensure image quality, please provide images in original form, not pasted into a Word document. It is acceptable to provide images that are technically adjusted for readability (eg, improved color balance, contrast or brightness only if applied to the entire digital image vs select parts). Unacceptable manipulation involves augmenting, obscuring, or omitting/adding elements to an image. If technical adjustments are made, the author should note this during the submission process.
Each figure should have a descriptive legend.
Each figure should be cited within the text.
Please review image submission guidelines.

Tables

All tables must be cited in the text and numbered in order of first appearance in the article (Table 1, Table 2, etc.). Indicate appropriate table title and define all abbreviations, symbols, and footnotes used.

References

Reference citations in the text must be numbered sequentially in order of first appearance in the text. Please do not list the references alphabetically. Reference numbers may be cited repeatedly in the text; however, all references must be cited at least once. Please use AMA format for references and overall style, and include a DOI where applicable. Whenever possible, references should be made to published articles rather than to abstracts.

Example

Rigaud B, Anderson BM, Yu ZH, et al. Automatic segmentation using deep learning to enable online dose optimization during adaptive radiation therapy of cervical cancer. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2021;109(4):1096-1110. doi:10.1016/j.ijrobp.2020.10.038.

Copyright Assignment

Once a manuscript is accepted for publication, it becomes the property of Anderson Publishing, Ltd., publisher of Applied Radiation Oncology and Applied Radiology. All authors must sign and return the copyright transfer agreement. The assignment of rights to Anderson Publishing, Ltd. includes, but is not limited to, rights to edit, publish, reproduce, distribute copies, and publish in electronic form or other media. Authors retain the right to revise, adapt, prepare derivative works, present orally, or distribute the article, provided permission to reprint is given.

Use of Copyrighted Materials: For any copyrighted materials used in your manuscript, such as Figures and Tables, the author must include written permission obtained from the Publisher (eg, Elsevier, McGraw-Hill) upon submitting the manuscript to Applied Radiation Oncology.

CME Information

Please note that review article submissions may be invited to offer CME credit. If invited, the following information will be required.

Instructions on Writing ABR CME Questions

Description: Practice Gaps and Learning Objectives

Please provide 2-3 Practice Gap bullet points or short statements that correlate with the learning objectives (ie, what gap in a reader’s practice knowledge may exist about this topic that then correlates with the learning objective that will close the loop on that potential gap).
Please provide 2-3 short Learning Objective bullet points that outline what readers are expected to achieve. Ideally, readers should be able to do something different (ie, have a change in practice behavior) based on reading the article, and objectives should reflect this accordingly (example verbs of high-outcome objectives include implement, adopt, enact, apply, put into practice, etc.). Objectives should be listed in the order of what level of learning each represents. Specifically, the order should represent a hierarchy of the outcomes that will happen (ie, they'll learn fact-->they'll use the facts-->they'll use the facts to improve patient care)

How Many Questions Do I Write?

Each CME question must have a minimum of five (5) multiple-choice questions, each having a stem (question or statement to be completed) and four answer options.
The stem is usually written first and is best written as a complete sentence or question.

What Specific Guidelines Should Be Followed?

Questions should:

Relate to the objectives of the article.
Be in a multiple-choice format with a stem, a correct answer and three detractors (four answer choices, total). A detractor is defined as the incorrect answer.
Be designed to produce only “one-best-answer.”
NOT be stated negatively, (e.g., “Each of the following is true EXCEPT” or “Which of the following statements is NOT correct?”). A question should ask for the correct answer, not the wrong answer.
Not include “none of the above” or “all of the above.”
Be clear and concise.

Example: “Which of the following presents as a chronic airspace disease on a chest radiograph?”

Streptococcal pneumonia
Adult respiratory distress syndrome
Pulmonary edema
Pulmonary alveolar proteinosis
COPD

Additional CME Requirements

Must include one or more specific references associated with each question, which should be in a standard citation format.
Please provide explanatory rationales (which may be brief) to inform participants as to why each answer option is correct or incorrect.
Educational links to key portions of the content materials may be supplied in addition to references.

Case Report Guidelines

Submission

Please submit your case report to Applied Radiation Oncology via the Aries Editorial Manager automated submission system.

Title Page

The title page should include the full title of the case report (limited to 128 characters) as well as the following information:

Author information—All authors should be listed, including full names, highest degrees, titles and current affiliations (department, institution/company, city and state). All authors must provide email addresses for submission and authorship confirmation purposes. Please include Twitter handles, if applicable, for all authors. Listing of authors’ Open Researcher and Contributor Identification (ORCID) is encouraged. Please also see Authorship/Contributorship Requirements, including information on the use of artificial intelligence (AI)-assisted technology, such as chatbots, etc.
Corresponding author—Please provide full contact information: mailing address, phone, and e-mail address.
Conflict of interest/author disclaimer—Any actual, potential, or apparent conflicts of interest must be disclosed in a disclaimer statement. All authors must download the ICMJE Disclosure of Interest form and return it to ARO.
Source(s) of support—Sources of support must be disclosed. These include grants, equipment, drugs, or other support used to aid the work in the article or the writing of the article.
Prior publication/presentation—ARO only accepts original manuscripts. However, if any part of the case report has been published or presented in another form (eg, published as an abstract or presented at a meeting), the original presentation must be identified with a complete citation. Manuscripts deposited in a preprint service will also be considered and must follow our preprint policy.
Informed consent: Please confirm that the patient involved in the case report provided informed written consent to publish their case information; submissions without this information will not be considered. Note: The signed consent form should not be provided, but confirmation that it is available if needed must be confirmed. Authors may use our informed consent form. If the patient or proxy has signed a form that differs from that provided by ARO, the authors should provide a blank copy of the form to ARO to ensure all the required elements were included. For additional informed consent details, please see Informed Consent and Patient Details in Editorial Policies.
Peer reviewer recommendations—Please suggest 3 or more potential reviewers for this submission. Include names, departments, institutions, and an institutional email address. Please note that the editorial office may not use your suggestions, but your help is appreciated and may speed up the selection of appropriate reviewers. As submissions are double-anonymized, please do not alert those you are recommending.

Manuscript

Word count: Cases should be approximately 750-1,500 words. Cases should incorporate CARE (CAse REport) guidelines https://www.care-statement.org/checklist.
Article title: Maximum of 128 characters.
Anonymization: Please remove identifying information from the article for peer review purposes. Identifying information can later be added to the text in accepted submissions.
Line numbering: Please incorporate line numbers for peer review purposes.

Formatting the case report

Abstract: The abstract should briefly provide background, key points, and main lessons to be learned from the case report in no more than 150 words. Keywords should also be listed (10 or fewer).
Case Summary: This should be a brief (<150 words) review of the patient’s history, physical examination, and laboratory data emphasizing important clinical features of the disease.
Imaging Findings: Briefly discuss the salient and important imaging findings of your case.
Diagnosis: State the diagnosis and any reasonable differential diagnostic considerations, if applicable.
Discussion: This should be a succinct, yet thorough, review of the pertinent historical, clinical, radiological, and pathological characteristics of the disease(s). Differentiation of your case from other diagnostic possibilities should be included if pertinent. Radiologic-pathologic correlation with gross and/or microscopic characteristics of the lesions(s) is encouraged. We encourage references to be less than ten.
Conclusion: This should consist of one or two brief paragraphs summarizing the key points of your case.

Figures

Key images: Please provide 2 to 3 JPEG, PNG, or TIFF images (resolution: 300+ dpi). To help ensure image quality, please provide images in original form, not pasted into a Word document.
Each figure should have a descriptive legend.
Each figure should be cited within the text.
Download Image Submission Guidelines

Tables

All tables must be cited in text, numbered in order of first appearance in the article (Table 1, Table 2, etc.). Indicate appropriate table title and define all abbreviations, symbols, and footnotes used.

References

Reference citations in the text must be numbered sequentially in order of first appearance in the text. Please do not list the references alphabetically. Reference numbers may be cited repeatedly in the text, and all references must be cited at least once. Please use AMA format for references and overall style. Whenever possible, references should be made to published articles rather than to abstracts.

Example:

Rigaud B, Anderson BM, Yu ZH, et al. Automatic segmentation using deep learning to enable online dose optimization during adaptive radiation therapy of cervical cancer. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2021;109(4):1096-1110. doi:10.1016/j.ijrobp.2020.10.038.

Copyright Assignment

Once a manuscript is accepted for publication, it becomes the property of Anderson Publishing, Ltd., publisher of Applied Radiation Oncology and Applied Radiology. All authors must sign and return the copyright transfer agreement. The assignment of rights to Anderson Publishing, Ltd. includes, but is not limited to, rights to edit, publish, reproduce, distribute copies, and publish in electronic form or other media. Authors retain the right to revise, adapt, prepare derivative works, present orally, or distribute the article, provided permission to reprint is given.

Research Article Guidelines

Submission

Please submit your research article to Applied Radiation Oncology via the Aries Editorial Manager automated submission system.

Title Page

The title page should include the full title of the article (limited to 128 characters) as well as the following information:

Author information—All authors should be listed, including full names, highest degrees, titles and current affiliations (department, institution/company, city and state). All authors must provide email addresses for submission and authorship confirmation purposes. Please include Twitter handles, if applicable, for all authors. Listing of authors’ Open Researcher and Contributor Identification (ORCID) is encouraged. Please also see Authorship/Contributorship Requirements, including information on the use of artificial intelligence (AI)-assisted technology, such as chatbots, etc.
Corresponding author—Please provide full contact information: mailing address, phone number, and e-mail address.
Conflict of interest/author disclaimer—Any actual, potential, or apparent conflicts of interest must be disclosed in a disclaimer statement. All authors must download the ICMJE Disclosure of Interest form and return it to ARO.
Source(s) of support—Sources of support must be disclosed. These include grants, equipment, drugs, or other support used to aid the work in the article or the writing of the article.
Prior publication/presentation—ARO only accepts original manuscripts. However, if any part of the article has been published or presented in another form (eg, published as an abstract or presented at a meeting), the original presentation must be identified with a complete citation. Manuscripts deposited in a preprint service will also be considered and must follow our preprint policy.
Peer reviewer recommendations—Please suggest 3 or more potential reviewers for this submission. Include names, departments, institutions, and an institutional email address. Please note that the editorial office may not use your suggestions, but your help is appreciated and may speed up the selection of appropriate reviewers. As submissions are double-anonymized, please do not alert those you are recommending.
Data availability statement—This statement will be published in the article and must state: 1) the type of data used, 2) whether data are being shared for reuse and/or any restrictions thereof, 3) the data location or repository used along with a persistent identifier link (eg, a digital object identifier [DOI]), 4) how to access the data, and 5) any relevant licensing information. If the data are not publicly available or accessible, this information should be indicated. Data noted in the data-sharing statement should be cited in the manuscript and included in the references. See the Data Sharing and Reproducibility policy for additional information. Please begin the statement with the following italicized language as it applies (or a combination thereof if applicable):
- Data are available in a public, open access repository.
  Please list repository name, the persistent URL (eg, DOI), and any reuse requirements (eg, licence, embargo).
- Data are available upon reasonable request.
  Please state what the data are (eg, deidentified participant data), who the data are available from, their publishable contact details (eg, email address or ORCID identifier – permission must be granted for their use) and under what conditions reuse is allowed. Please note whether additional information is available (eg, protocols, statistical analysis plans)?
- Data may be obtained from a third party and are not publicly available.
  Please state what the data are (eg, deidentified participant data), who the data are available from, their publishable contact details (eg, email address or ORCID identifier – permission must be granted for their use) and under what conditions reuse is permitted. Please note whether additional information is available (eg, protocols, statistical analysis plans)?
- All data relevant to the study are provided in the article or supplement.
- Data sharing is not applicable as no datasets were generated/analyzed for this study.
- No data are available.

Manuscript

Word count: Manuscripts should be approximately 1,500-3,000 words.
Article title: Maximum of 128 characters.
Anonymization: Please remove identifying information from the article for peer review purposes. Identifying information can later be added to the text in accepted submissions.
Line numbering: Please incorporate line numbers for peer review purposes.

Formatting your research article

Abstract

The abstract (no more than 300 words) should provide a short overview of the research, including the objective and hypothesis, methods and materials, results, conclusions, and keywords (10 or fewer). Funding sources should be listed separately after the abstract to facilitate proper display and indexing for search retrieval.

Introduction

State the objectives and provide background, including a brief review of the literature. Discuss what experimental question the study aims to answer and state the hypothesis. Briefly describe how the hypothesis was tested and how the results will contribute to radiation oncology.

Methods and Materials

Include a straightforward description of the methods used in the study, including enough detail so the work may be reproduced. References should be used for previously published methods, with relevant modifications described.

Results

Results should be concise, presenting the experimental data.

Discussion

Briefly provide an overview of the work. Summarize the most important findings and, if applicable, accept or reject the hypothesis. Identify the most interesting, significant findings and contrast them to other studies. Consider other works that address the topic and the how the work contributes to radiation oncology. Conclusions: State the primary conclusions of the study.

Figures

Key Images: Provide 3 to 4 JPEG, PNG, GIF, or TIFF images (resolution: 300+ dpi). To help ensure image quality, please provide images in original form, not pasted into a Word document.
Each figure should have a descriptive legend.
Each figure should be cited within the text.
Download Image Submission Guidelines

Tables

References

Reference citations in the text must be numbered sequentially in order of first appearance in the text. Please do not list the references alphabetically. Reference numbers may be cited repeatedly in the text; however, all references must be cited at least once. Please use AMA format for references and overall style. Whenever possible, references should be made to published articles rather than to abstracts.

Example

Rigaud B, Anderson BM, Yu ZH, et al. Automatic segmentation using deep learning to enable online dose optimization during adaptive radiation therapy of cervical cancer. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2021;109(4):1096-1110. doi:10.1016/j.ijrobp.2020.10.038.

Statistics

Where appropriate, peer review of research papers will include assessment by a statistics editor/expert. In accordance with recommendations from the ICJME, authors should provide enough detail of statistical methods so that readers with access to original data can assess its appropriateness and confirm reported results (eg, confidence intervals). Authors should quantify findings, when possible, and use appropriate uncertainty or measurement error indicators. Authors should not solely rely on statistical hypothesis testing (eg, P values). References for study design and statistical methods should relate to standard works when possible, and statistical terms, abbreviations and most symbols should be defined.

Copyright Assignment

Letter to Editor Guidelines

Please see Post-Publication Discussions for details.