Interdisciplinary Journal of Virtual Learning in Medical Sciences

Article Types / Original Article

Research articles (original articles) are regarded as the primary mode of communication in most scholarly and scientific journals. They comprise the essential components of a comprehensive research project and are considered a suitable format for presenting many different kinds of study in a variety of fields.

The IJVLMS generally accepts full-text original articles of 3500-6000 words (including references), 5 Tables/Figures, and 30-50 references.

Title includes research question and study design. However, it should not reflect the results of the study.

Abstract should be structured with the following headings (200-330 words):

Background: State the limitations of previous research and the rationale for performing a new study. Briefly explain the purpose of the article in one sentence.
Methods: Provide an overview of the study design and setting, data collection methods, participants and sampling, tools/instruments, and data analysis procedures.
Results: Summarize the results or major findings, confidence intervals, and level of significance whenever appropriate.
Conclusion: State only those conclusions supported by the results. Conclusions may also include an evaluation of your study and areas for further research.
Keywords (4-7 keywords based on the MeSH Browser) should be provided for indexing purposes and online searches. Authors are encouraged to browse through articles on similar topics to find appropriate keywords.

Introduction provides a brief review of the relevant literature to clarify the rationale of the new study. Key publications should be cited, including relevant systematic reviews. The authors need to end this section with a clear statement of the objectives and highlight the significance of the study.

Methods should describe the research process in sufficient detail. Authors need to present a full description of the study design and setting, sampling method and sample size, location and timing of research, inclusion & exclusion criteria, data gathering tools, reliability and validity of the tools, descriptive and analytic statistical method, acceptable significance (p-value), and ethical considerations (informed consent from human participants). Authors are encouraged to use the following headings and also follow the standard Checklists for different study types to better organize their manuscripts.

Study Design and Setting

The type of the study (interventional, experimental, or semi-experimental) should be mentioned in the first lines of the method section. Describe the setting, locations, and relevant dates, including periods of recruitment, exposure or follow-ups.

Participants and Sampling

Clearly describe the selection of observational or experimental participants (healthy individuals or patients, including controls), including eligibility and exclusion criteria and a description of the source population. Explicitly mention the formula you have used and fully explain the inclusion and exclusion criteria.

Procedure(s) / Intervention

If you conducted an experiment or used a clinical or educational intervention, describe it. Were participants divided into groups? Was there a control group? How were participants sorted into groups? Where did the experiment/intervention take place? What was the duration of the experiment/intervention, and did it take place over multiple sessions? Who delivered the intervention/experiment, and how did they interact with participants? What instructions did participants receive? What mechanical apparatuses (e.g. heartrate monitors) were used, and what were their settings? What clinical treatment (e.g., a drug or therapy regimen) was used, and how was it administered? What was the nature of the educational intervention (e.g., online modules or a series of lectures)? What happened during the experiment/intervention?

Tools / Instruments

Clearly describe all tools, instruments, or measures used for data collection (e.g., questionnaires, standardized scales, interview guides, observation checklists, tests, or measurement devices). Explicitly state whether each instrument was researcher-developed, adapted, translated, or previously validated. For researcher-developed instruments, explain the development process, including the theoretical framework, item generation, expert review, and pilot testing, where applicable. For standardized instruments, provide the original source and relevant references, and describe any modifications made. Specify the number of items, dimensions or subscales, response formats (e.g., 5-point Likert scale), scoring procedures, total score ranges, and the interpretation of scores. Report any established cut-off points or classification criteria and explain their sources or justification. If instruments were translated or culturally adapted, describe the translation and adaptation procedures. For technical or clinical measurement devices, provide the manufacturer, model, relevant specifications, and calibration procedures, where applicable. Ensure that sufficient information is provided to allow readers to understand, evaluate, and replicate the measurement procedures.

Validity and Reliability - Clearly describe the procedures used to establish or assess the validity and reliability of the data collection instruments in the present study. For quantitative studies, report the types of validity evaluated (e.g., content, face, construct, criterion-related, or convergent validity), the methods used to assess them, and the corresponding results, where applicable. Explain how reliability was assessed, using appropriate measures such as Cronbach's alpha, McDonald's omega, test–retest reliability, inter-rater reliability, or intraclass correlation coefficients. Provide the actual statistical values, preferably for the current study sample, rather than merely stating that the instruments were valid and reliable. If previously validated instruments were used, cite the original validation studies and report relevant psychometric evidence, while indicating whether validity or reliability was reassessed in the current study. For qualitative studies, the terms rigor or trustworthiness are generally used instead of validity and reliability. Describe the strategies employed to establish credibility, transferability, dependability, and confirmability, such as triangulation, member checking, peer debriefing, audit trails, reflexivity, or detailed contextual descriptions, as applicable. Authors should clearly explain which procedures were implemented and how they contributed to the methodological quality and trustworthiness of the findings.

Data collection

Clearly describe how, when, where, and by whom the data were collected. Explicitly state whether data collection was conducted electronically (online), in person (face-to-face), or through a combination of both methods. For electronic data collection, specify the platforms or applications used (e.g., Google Forms, online survey platforms, email, or social media). For in-person data collection, describe the setting and method of administration (e.g., paper-based questionnaires, interviews, or direct observations). Explain how participants received and completed the data collection instruments, whether the process was supervised or self-administered, and what instructions or assistance were provided. Specify the sequence of data collection activities, including the number of phases or sessions, their duration, and the timing of measurements (e.g., pre-test, post-test, or follow-up), where applicable. Describe any measures taken to ensure the accuracy, completeness, consistency, and confidentiality of the collected data.

Data Analysis

Provide enough details on statistical methods and prepare original data to enable a knowledgeable reader to evaluate their relevance for the study and verify the results.
References for the design of the study and statistical methods should be to standard works when possible (with pages stated). Define statistical terms, abbreviations, and most symbols. Specify the statistical software package(s) and versions used. Distinguish pre-specified from exploratory analyses, including subgroup analyses.
If an organization was paid or otherwise contracted to help conduct the research (examples include data collection and management), then this should be detailed in the methods.

Ethics – Briefly talk about your informed consent and the university/institution where you have obtained your ethical agreements, but fully explain the ethical considerations, including the ethical code, at the end of your manuscript before the references list.

Results should be laid out in a coherent fashion and logical order. They must be based on research findings and must directly address the initial research questions or hypotheses. Interpretation of the results is not stated in this part of the manuscript.

Discussion should challenge the findings of the study with other available evidence in the format of arguments and counterarguments. It should emphasize the new and important aspects of the study and the conclusions that follow them. Possible mechanisms or explanations for these findings should be explored.

Limitations and Suggestions The limitations of the study and the implications of the findings for future research or clinical practice should be explored.

Conclusion should state the final result and recommendation the author(s) has (have) reached. Such results and recommendations should be derived from the researcher’s own study. The results of other studies should not be stated in this section.

Footnotes

Abbreviations: In articles where abbreviations are frequently used, it is better to provide an abbreviation list for readers to reference and understand the concepts more quickly.
Acknowledgments: Recognize the individuals, institutes, or organizations that have contributed to the preparation of the article but do not meet the criteria for authorship. Contributions may include academic, technical, financial, or personal assistance in preparing the articles. The authors must indicate the contributors' affiliations and their specific contributions. The use of AI for writing assistance should be reported in the acknowledgment section.
Authors’ Contribution: Authors specify their contributions to the research process and writing of the manuscript. They indicate their contributions to different aspects of a project such as conceptualization, study design, experimentation, data acquisition, statistical analysis, preparing the manuscript, etc. Please note that the authors’ initials, rather than full names, should be used for identification.
Conflict of Interest: Authors must disclose any financial and non-financial competing interests in advance of the review process. They need to declare if they received financial payment for the research, or if they have close relationships with people or entities that could inappropriately influence (bias) their study. Non-financial interests may include the disclosure of any personal, political, religious, ideological, academic, and intellectual interests that might bias a study. General institutional support for an author’s time on the work should be distinguished from direct overall funding of the work. An appropriate funding statement might be: “The study was funded by A; Dr. F’s time on the work was supported by B.” If there are no competing interests, add the following statement: “The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest regarding the publication of this paper”.
Ethical Considerations: If a study involves human participants/or animals, authors need to obtain approval from the ethics committee/Institutional Review Board of their institution and be prepared to provide documentation when requested by editors. They must provide the name of the committee/board along with the Ethical Approval Code/ID. Authors should also declare that they have obtained written informed consent from each potential research participant. It should be clearly stated that the researchers were properly introduced before the research, and the participants understood the objectives of the research. The authors also maintain that the consent was not obtained under coercion and that the participants had the choice to withdraw at any stage of the research. Finally, it should be indicated that the participants were assured of confidentiality regarding the information provided.
Funding/Support: All sources of financial and material support for the research work are acknowledged in this section. Authors should identify the roles of the sponsor(s) if any, in study design, collection, analysis, interpretation of data, and in preparing the manuscript. Please include the name(s) of the funding organization(s) along with the grant number(s). If no funding has been provided for the research, please add the following statement: "This research did not receive any outside funding or support".
Availability of Data and Materials: A Data Availability Statement should be included in all original manuscripts. Your data availability statement should describe how the data supporting the results reported in your paper can be accessed. With a data statement, an author can provide information about the data presented in an article and provide a reason if data is not available to access. Click HERE to see a template for different kinds of statements.

References conform to the style outlined by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), also referred to as the “Vancouver” style. References in the text should be numbered sequentially and placed in parentheses.

The following general instructions must be observed when citing references. Moreover, IJVLMS has its own EndNote style. Authors are advised to prepare their references based on this style and add the file to the style folder of their Endnote in program files. Following this, the IJVLMS style must be selected both from the “Output Style” option under the “Tools” menu in EndNote and from the “Style” section of the EndNote tab in Microsoft Word. This style is available HERE.

Referencing AI-generated material as the primary source is not acceptable.
References should be made to published articles rather than to abstracts whenever possible.

In-text citation:

References in the text should be numbered sequentially and placed in parentheses.
For in-text citation of a work with more than one author, use ‘et al.’ after the first author.
When citing several references for the same statement, use a hyphen to link the first and last numbers that are inclusive. For instance, (4, 5, 6, 7) must be abbreviated to (4-7). Use commas where the numbers are not consecutive in a multiple citation, e.g. (8, 13).

Reference List:

The reference list appears at the end of the paper and is titled ‘References’.
References are listed in numerical order, and in the same order, they are cited in the text.
The reference list should include all and only those references that appear in the text.
If a work has more than 6 authors, please list the first six authors, followed by ‘et al.’
The number of references from theses, conference papers, and websites should not exceed 5 percent of the total references.
Please note that the journal titles in the reference list should be abbreviated in the style used in the NLM Catalog.
At least 80% of the references must have article identifiers, such as digital object identifier (DOI) and PubMed PMID (or PubMed Central PMCID). Please add these identifiers at the end of your references when available. You can visit the following link to search for DOIs and PMIDs of articles: http://www.crossref.org/SimpleTextQuery. EndNote software is highly recommended for writing and managing references.

Listed below are sample references for different types of work. For further details and examples, authors may consult Citing Medicine: The NLM Style Guide for Authors, Editors, and Publishers (2nd edition).

Journal Article:

Almarzooq ZI, Lopes M, Kochar A. Virtual Learning During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Disruptive Technology in Graduate Medical Education. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2020;75(20):2635-8. doi: 10.1016/j.jacc.2020.04.015. PubMed PMID: 32304797; PubMed Central PMCID: PMCPMC7159871.

Complete Book:

Secker J. Electronic Resources in the Virtual Learning Environment: A Guide for Librarians. Edition (if not first) - ed. Oxford: Elsevier Science; 2004.

Chapter in an Edited Book:

Fournier H, Kop R, Molyneaux H. New personal learning ecosystems: a decade of research in review. In: Becnel K, editor. Emerging technologies in virtual learning environments. Harshey: IGI Global; 2019. p. 1-19.

Thesis:

Kaplan SJ. Postgraduate students’ professionalism [dissertation]. St. Louis (MO): Washington University; 2021. (DOI is required)

Conference Paper:

Kimura J, Shibasaki H, editors. Recent advances in clinical neurophysiology. Proceedings of the 10th International Congress of EMG and Clinical Neurophysiology; 1995 Oct 15‐19; Kyoto, Japan. Amsterdam (NL): Elsevier; 1996. (DOI is required)

Website:

Meyer D. Virtual learning is the way forward for educators. Elmhurst: Elmhurst University; 2020 Oct 8. [Cited 2021 Nov 10]. Available from: https://www.elmhurst.edu/blog/virtual-learning/.