Authors' Guidelines

Dear author,

Welcome to Thieme! We are delighted that you want to publish in a Thieme journal.

Thieme is an international publisher of medical and science books, journals, electronic products and services, with a long-standing reputation for consistent quality and integrity. On publication, you will have benefited from peer review at the highest level and you will reach a broad professional audience.

To make submission of your article as efficient as possible, see the information below.
We look forward to receiving your manuscript!

Please note: We only accept manuscripts that have not yet been published or submitted elsewhere. If the content of your article has already been presented orally at a conference, please note this with details of the conference type, place, and date.

The corresponding author must ensure that all the other authors agree with the publication of the article in the version presented.

With acceptance of the manuscript, the publisher acquires rights of use for the duration of the legal protection term.

Publication language is English or German

This following section does inform you about:

• Thieme’s Journal Policies
• Artificial Intelligence and Authorship
• General Information for Authors
• Special Authors' guidelines for ZGN
• Submission – online submission system

Thieme's Journal Policies

For the Thieme Group, the integrity of our content and publishing process is of the utmost importance. When preparing your manuscript for submission, please ensure that you have read and understood Thieme's  Journal Policies in all its parts. Our specific guidelines and policies for authors on research integrity and ethics are based on the recommendations of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and, where appropriate, the International Council of Medical Journal Editors (ICJME) and other relevant industry agencies.

Artificial Intelligence and Authorship

Thieme aligns itself with the COPE Position Statement on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Authorship.

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools must not be listed as authors, as they do not fulfil all criteria for authorship. They cannot take responsibility for the integrity and the content of paper, and they cannot take on legal responsibility. Instead, GenAI use must be transparently documented in the Acknowledgements or Material and Methods sections.

General Information for Authors

In addition to the specific author guidelines for Journal for Obstetrics and Neonatology, ZGN (Zeitschrift für Geburtshilfe und Neonatologie) (see below), please note the following general author information.

Journal Authors Lounge

Our Author Lounge will provide you with all the useful information you’ll need- from finding a journal to publishing and promoting your article.

In the author's lounge, we have summarized all the information step by step on the following aspects:

1. Find a journal
2. Prepare your manuscript
3. Open Access
4. Submission
5. Peer Review
6. Publication
7. Promotion

Please follow the Link Author Lounge.

General author guidelines (pdf-file for download)

The formal requirements your manuscript has to meet, are explained in our general author guidelines for original contributions, review articles or scientific case reports. You can download our general author guidelines as a PDF document Please, follow the link ARL_Wiss_Publikation_engl.pdf

In this document, we have compiled the formal requirements for the following points:

• Figures: rights of use / copyright / personal rights
• Scientific vocabulary
• Code names / fake names / fictional personal data
• Bibliography (If you are working with citation management software (Endnote, Zotero, Mendeley), please use the output style "Thieme-English". It is available in the relevant software or can be downloaded here.)
• Open Access
• Legal aspects
• Ethical aspects
• Financial support
• Submitting your manuscript
• Peer review of your manuscript
• Author’s proofs and approval
• Electronic reprint for personal use
• Check List — Structure of your article

Special Authors' guidelines for Journal for Obstetrics and Neonatology, ZGN (Zeitschrift für Geburtshilfe und Neonatologie)

Aims and Scopes

Our journal ZGN aims to advance the field of Obstetrics and Neonatology by publishing original research that contributes to the understanding of the field.

ZGN is a journal tailored to gynecologists, obstetricians, neonatologists, pediatricians, midwives, and all medical professionals in clinical and private practice settings who are engaged in or interested in perinatal medicine.

It is the official publication of the German Society for Perinatal Medicine (DGPM).

ZGN publishes works on all topics related to obstetrics, neonatology, and perinatal medicine in the broadest sense (e.g., human genetics, intrauterine surgery, peripartal psychiatry and psychotherapy, midwifery).

ZGN publishes Original Papers, Review Articles, Guidelines, Letters to the Editor, Case Reports, Perinatal medicine in pictures (Perinatalmedizin in Bildern), sonographic visual diagnoses (Sonografische Blickdiagnosen).

Original Paper

Original papers present novel findings, are well-structured, and include comprehensive data and analysis. They follow a format that includes an abstract, introduction, materials and methods, results, discussion, and references (for details on structure see section Special Authors' guidelines for ZGN below). Our Focus Midwives section publishes original articles from the field of midwifery science.

Letters to the Editor

Letters to the Editor or Comments are short communications on articles recently published in ZGN.

Review Article

Review articles provide comprehensive, critical assessments of existing literature in the field of nuclear medicine. They aim to summarize current knowledge, identify gaps, and propose future research directions. These articles are valuable for synthesizing information and guiding both clinical practice and further research. Our Focus Midwives section publishes review articles from the field of midwifery science.

Case Report

Case reports will be published as short communications. Therefore, strict guidelines and limitations are necessary. The case should be presented in a manner that clearly highlights its uniqueness. Extensive introductions and discussions should be avoided.

Perinatal Medicine in Pictures (Perinatalmedizin in Bildern)

In this section authors describe memorable findings that go beyond routine perinatal medicine. Supported by illustrations or photos - important: one large main image or a pair of main images and up to two secondary images - the medical history, diagnosis, and treatment of rare disease cases are presented. The findings are classified in a commentary, also with the help of a brief discussion of the literature, and the significance and conclusions for practice are summarized in a short conclusion.

Sonographic visual diagnoses (Sonografische Blickdiagnosen)

This section presents typical ultrasound findings which, when specifically considered, allow for a spot diagnosis. Supported by illustrations - important: one large main image or a pair of main images and up to two secondary images - the medical history, diagnosis, and therapy are presented. The findings are classified in a commentary, also with the help of a brief discussion of the literature, and the significance and conclusions for practice are summarized in a short conclusion.

Special Authors' guidelines for ZGN

You can download the ZGN-specific guidelines as a PDF document Please, follow the link Table_Instructions_ZGN.pdf 

In this document, we have compiled the specific requirements for “Original Papers”, “Review Articles”, “Editorials” and “Case Reports” which cover the following points:

• Authors and Institutions
• Abstract
• Keywords
• Text size
• Text Structure
• References for cited literature
• Figures Limitations
• Tables

Formal requirements for all types of manuscripts

This section briefly summarizes the formal requirements for all types of manuscripts. It corresponds to the General Author Guidelines described above.

Authors and Institutions

Full name, academic degree(s), institutional affiliation for all authors; email address of the corresponding author.

Names, addresses or any information which may indicate the identity of the author(s) may not be included in the manuscript. A divided first authorship is allowed. All institutional listings in English. Within the manuscript names and address must not be used as well as any information that conclude towards the authors.

Authorship Change

Any authorship changes must adhere to Thieme’s policy on authorship criteria and must be approved by all authors. If any authors are removed or added during revision, all authors will be notified via email and must approve or deny the change before the submission can proceed further. Any changes will be subject to a final approval by the Publisher.

Author Contributions

CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) must be used to describe each author's contribution to the paper. During the submission process, authors will be asked to provide their CRediT roles via a dedicated section in the submission form. The corresponding author is responsible for accurately assigning contributions to each listed author. The assigned CRediT roles will be automatically combined and published as part of the manuscript.

Title

Short, concise, a maximum of 50 words

Main text manuscript¹

The manuscript must be organized according to the type. Manuscript main text in Word format. References to figures and tables: should appear chronologically in the manuscript main text. Abbreviate using “Fig.”; and “Tab.”. Literature references: all literature in the bibliography is to be cited in the manuscript main text using Arabic numerals surrounded by square brackets. The bibliography appears after the manuscript main text and lists all literature. See “Citation Format” in this table for examples.

¹ Values quoted here include blank spaces and refer to the length of the manuscripts including the bibliography. The number of characters can easily be found in Microsoft Word using “Tools” → “Word Count”.

References for cited literature

Listed in the order of appearance in the manuscript.

Reference style

According to Index Medicus and Vancouver style:

Journals:

1. Kagan K-O, Tost F, Heling K-S. et al. Fetal eye ultrasound: Normal anatomy, abnormal findings, and clinical impact. Ultraschall Med 2024; 45: 450-474.

Books:

1. Hosmer Jr DW, Lemeshow S, Sturdivant RX. Applied Logistic Regression. 3rd Edition. Hoboken NJ: John Wiley & Sons; 2013.

References for tables and figures

Figures and tables must be cited in parentheses in the text in numerical order, e. g. (Fig. 1, Tab. 1).

Legends for tables should appear at the end of the manuscript.

Figures Preparation

• Figure quality: 1000 pixel width (300 dpi with a width of 8.5 cm)
• File formats: JPG or TIFF for images
• Figures with multiple sub-elements: please use small letters to classify each (a, b, c, d, etc.). Do not import figures in the text.
• Symbols, lettering, and numbering should be clear and large enough to remain legible after the figure has been reduced to fit the width of a column.
• Use only one type-size.
• Image files accompanying a manuscript must be supplied electronically in separate files to the main text.

Tables

Each table is a formatted table in word with designated rows and columns. Each table must have a table legend. Either you choose one table header over all columns or a header for each column. The editors and the publisher reserve the right to publish some of the tables online only especially large ones, if their size exceed the provided space.

Code names / fake names / fictional personal data

According to Thieme guidelines, data about actual persons must be systematically alienated to protect personal rights and to make code names always recognizable as such.

If one or several persons are provided with code names in pictures or texts, the following options are to be used:

• Individual persons (English):
  • male: Mr. D., J. Doe, Jon Doe
  • female: Ms. D., J. Doe, Jane Doe
• Several persons (English):
  • male: Andrew, Charles, David, George, James, Michael, Matthew, Robert, Thomas, William
  • female: Anne, Bridget, Catherine, Emily, Elizabeth, Jane, Melissa, Sarah, Susan, Victoria
• If absolutely necessary in an individual case, the following written-out English surnames are also valid: Brown, Jones, Smith, Taylor, Williams.
• If names from further language areas are required (for example Turkish, Russian, Spanish names), they must be un- ambiguously labeled as editorially changed names in the text as well as in the caption of figures (for example within a footnote or with the phrase “editorially changed names“ in parentheses).
• Further fictional data is combined with the word “sample” in English (for example Sample Company, Sample Institute). Furthermore, the following applies:
  • addresses: 123 Sampe Street, Sampletown 1234
  • date of birth without numbers
  • phone number: 123.555-1234
  • medication: Sample Drug
  • result: Sample Diagnosis

Videos

Labelling according to appearance within the main part of the manuscript (video 1, video 2,…)

Submission – online submission system

Please submit your manuscript exclusively online at https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/zgn

For questions regarding manuscript submission or technical inquiries, for example regarding the use of figures, please contact ZGN Editorial Office at ZGN.EditorialOffice@thieme.de.

During submission 

In case of submitting a revision of your manuscript

Save your peer-reviewed word-file on your local hard drive. Make your changes transparent by using “Track Changes” in MS Word. (To activate the “Track Changes” function in Word, go to “Tools” → “Track Changes” → “Highlight Changes”. Activate all check boxes in the “Highlight Changes” window.)

Authors and Institutions

Entry only in specified input fields during submission - do not include in main text document.

CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) should be used to describe each author's contribution to the paper. During the submission process, authors will be asked to provide their CRediT roles via a dedicated section in the submission form. The corresponding author is responsible for accurately assigning contributions to each listed author. The assigned CRediT roles will be automatically combined and published as part of the manuscript.

Title

Entry only in specified input fields during submission - do not include in main text document.

Abstract

Entry only in the specified input field during submission in Scholar One - do not include in main text document. Please do not upload it as a separate file during the file upload, except for corrections in revisions

Keywords

Entry only in specified input fields during submission in Scholar One. You can choose from the key words in the list or enter your own key words in the input fields.

Main text manuscript

Upload a docx-file of the manuscript with reference list (without summary, figures and tables). The File Designation is 1. Main Document

Figures

Upload in Scholar One individually.

The File Designation is: 2. Image

Figure legends including figure number should be entered in the appropriate field during the file upload – look for “Caption/ Legend” during file upload. (Do not submit figure legends via Word file.)

Tables

Upload in Scholar One individually.

The File Designation is 3. Table

Videos

The File Designation is: supplementary file

After submission, manuscripts undergo a double-blind peer review process.