Manuscripts submitted for publication in Cosmetic Dermatology will be reviewed with the understanding that they are original and have not been submitted elsewhere nor are being considered by other journals.

Articles are reviewed by 2 peer reviewers before a final decision is rendered. Reviewers may request revisions before a decision is made.

Cosmetic Dermatology only accepts electronic submissions. Send the manuscript, financial disclosures, permissions, figures, and tables as attachments via e-mail to msteiger@frontlinemedcom.com. The financial disclosure statement(s) may be submitted by fax.

The signed statement of financial disclosure from each author should state the following: “I certify that any affiliations with or financial involvement in any organization or entity with a direct financial interest in the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript (eg, employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, expert testimony) is disclosed below. Any financial project support of this work is identified in an acknowledgment in the manuscript.”

Include a cover letter with contact information (address, telephone, fax, and e-mail) for the corresponding author. The corresponding author is responsible for all revisions and final approval of the edited proofs.

Articles submitted to Cosmetic Dermatology may be categorized as one of the following:

Place all text in Times New Roman font, 12 point, double spaced, left aligned, and without bold/underline. Nothing should be centered. Do not insert page breaks between sections of the manuscript. Consult a recent issue of Cosmetic Dermatology for formatting of individual article types. Studies must contain an introduction that clearly describes the hypothesis or study questions; a Methods section that includes enough information to enable a reader to replicate the study; a Results section that describes the study population and findings for all analyses conducted; and a Comment section that interprets the results, implications, and limitations.

The first paragraph of the manuscript and the first paragraph under each subhead should be left aligned. Subsequent paragraphs should have the first line indented by one tab space. There should be no blank lines between paragraphs.
Abbreviations and Acronyms
Do not use periods after abbreviations, which includes MD, PhD, etc. Terms may be abbreviated if they appear at least 3 times within the text. Abbreviated terms must be spelled out at the first use with the abbreviation in parentheses. For example: Monopolar radiofrequency (RF) treatment has generated considerable interest among physicians and patients seeking nonsurgical skin tightening procedures. Although the efficacy of RF tightening has been established, widespread adoption of the technology has been limited by seemingly inconsistent results and pain associated with earlier-generation devices.

Treat the abstract separately. If an abbreviation or acronym is called out in the abstract, it also must be called out in the body text, and vice versa.

States should only be abbreviated in mailing addresses and in references when a city and state are needed with a publisher’s name. In all other cases, states should be spelled out.
Numbers
Do not spell out a number unless it is the start of a sentence. Use arabic numbers and the percent symbol (%) for percentages unless the number appears at the beginning of a sentence. Use a comma in numbers of 5 digits or more (52,980) but not in 4-digit numbers (5621).

When a range of numbers is given in text, use "to" instead of a hyphen (eg, 20 to 25 mg).

Note that the P in P values is capitalized and italicized. Do not use a zero before the decimal point in P values.

The order of an article's components should be Title, Author(s), Author Affiliation(s), Financial Disclosure, Correspondence, Unstructured Abstract, Text of Article, References, Acknowledgments, Tables, and Figure Captions. Do not use page breaks between sections of the manuscript.

Titles
Titles should be no longer than 95 characters, including spaces.

Authors
Authors should each be listed with his/her highest academic degree. US fellowship designations and honorary designations are not used in bylines.

Author Affiliations
Each author’s affiliation should be listed (without academic title) in the following format:
"Dr. X is from . . . Dr. Y is from . . ."

Correspondence
List “Correspondence:” followed by the corresponding author’s name, address, and e-mail as a run-in list without line breaks.

Abstract
Provide an unstructured abstract. Do not use headings (ie, objectives, methods, conclusion, etc) in the abstract. Note that abstracts should not contain references or material that needs to be referenced. Additionally, information that does not appear in the text of the article should not be included in the abstract; the abstract should reflect data and/or findings discussed in the article.

Regarding abbreviations and acronyms, treat the abstract separately. If an abbreviation or acronym is called out in the abstract, it also must be called out in the body text. If it is called out in the text and appears in the abstract, the callout should be included in the abstract.

Text of Article
Each portion (eg, introduction, methods, case report, results, comment, conclusion) should be clearly identified as well as any other subheadings.

Acknowledgments
Any individual listed in an acknowledgment must provide consent. Please supply this information when the article is submitted.

References
Authors are responsible for the accuracy and completeness of the references. Authors should not use secondary references. If you are citing an article from 1960, you should reference the original article, not a secondary reference that discusses the 1960 article. References should be numbered consecutively in the order in which they are first mentioned in the text. If there are references in the tables or figures, references should be numbered consecutively based on where the table/figure is cited in text.

Reference numbers in text should be superscripted and appear after periods and commas but before colons and semicolons. Do not put reference numbers in parentheses. Do not put spaces or a table before the reference number

Override the automatic numbering or footnote features in your word-processing software. Each reference number in the reference list should be followed with a period and one space. Do not place a tab after the reference number. Do not separate references with a blank line space.

Provide the full page range for book chapters and journal articles (eg, 526-528, not 526-8). List the first 3 authors in references followed by “et al.” Please submit sufficient information to enable the reader to gain access to the material cited.

The following are examples:



Material that has been accepted for publication but not published is included in the reference list. Do not include material that has been submitted for publication but has not yet been accepted in the reference list. This material should be noted in the text as “unpublished data” and should include the author and date. For example:

This therapy recently was used in patients with acne (J. Smith, unpublished data, March 2006).

Figures and Figure Captions
Cosmetic Dermatology allows submission of a maximum of 8 images per article. Before and after photographs (A and B) count as 2 images. Because the journal focuses on appearance-related dermatology, however, it is highly recommended that at least 2 to 4 figures accompany case reports and studies. Before and after photographs are strongly encouraged to better illustrate results.

Each figure file name should be labeled with the first author’s last name and numbered to correspond with the accompanying caption. Do not embed figures in the Word document.

Figures submitted electronically must meet the following criteria: When a photograph is submitted showing a face or identifiable body part (eg, tattoo, jewelry), authors must submit written permission from the identifiable subject or a legally authorized representative, even if a black bar is placed over the eyes. Based on an article’s content, it is sometimes necessary to show a patient’s eyes. Therefore, patient permission should not be worded in such a way that it ensures complete anonymity. Please ensure that permission extends to the print publication and electronic use (Web site). If the patient is deceased, provide permission from the next of kin.

Each figure should be called out in the text of the article. The style may be either of the following:
Figure 1 shows the results of treatment.
The patient experienced resolution of symptoms by 2 weeks of treatment (Figure 1).


In the Word document, write a caption for each figure using the following style:
Figure 1.
Severe scarring hair loss over the frontal and vertex areas of the scalp..
Provide the stain and magnification used for histologic photographs. For example: (H&E, original magnification ×40).

Tables
Tables should be created using the Table function in your word-processing software. Do not use tabs to create a table.

When any abbreviations are used in a table, they must be expanded in a line above any footnotes. For example:
Abbreviations: F, female; M, male; BCC, basal cell carcinoma.

Footnotes are indicated with superscript lowercase letters in alphabetical order (a–z). Footnote symbols appear after periods and commas but before colons and semicolons.

Each table should be called out in the text of the article. The style may be either of the following:
Table 1 provides the participant demographics.
The study population included 10 males and 10 females aged 15 to 25 years (Table 1).
If a table is reprinted or adapted from another source, submit a permission letter from the publisher of the original source. The source also should be credited below the table. Please ensure that permission extends to the print publication and electronic use (Web site).

Multimedia (ie, videos) may now accompany manuscript submissions to be posted online at www.cosderm.com with the full-text article. Videos must be submitted to the Editorial Office (after peer review is complete and the article has been accepted for publication) as .FLV, .MOV, .MP4, .RM, and .AVI files. All videos are subject to review by our Editorial Board. If the patient is identifiable, patient permission to post the video online must be supplied.

Accepted manuscripts are copyedited to conform with Cosmetic Dermatology style. Edited galley proofs will be sent to the corresponding author prior to publication. Please note that galley proofs are not the layout version of the article. Figures are not sent to the corresponding author with edited galleys.

Please be sure to notify the editorial staff with any changes to your contact information.

Authors are responsible for all statements made in their work, including changes made by the Cosmetic Dermatology staff and authorized by the corresponding author.

Authors may request order forms for reprints, which are available at a nominal cost.
Contact Sharon Finch with reprint inquiries at sfinch@frontlinemedcom.com.

For additional style information, consult the American Medical Association Manual of Style, 10th edition. New York, NY: Oxford University Press; 2007.