Submissions

Author Guidelines

All submissions will be evaluated by an editor to determine if they meet the objectives and scope of this journal. Those deemed appropriate will be sent for peer review before determining if they will be accepted or rejected.

General Considerations

In all cases, you must submit 2 documents in Word format:

- The main text of the article with the title but WITHOUT the name of any author or affiliations.
- A separate document with only the title of the article and the names of all authors and their affiliations.

This journal adopts a strict anti-plagiarism policy for all received articles. You can consult it in the Journal Information section.
Any research involving human subjects must include the following statement in the Methods section of the manuscript: This research was reviewed by an independent Ethics Committee and complies with the applicable principles and guidelines for the protection of human subjects in biomedical research.

Conflict of Interest Statement: The corresponding author is responsible for identifying and clearly disclosing any financial relationships that may exist between all co-authors that could influence the research results. After the text of the manuscript, and just before the references, the section "Conflict of Interest" must be included, describing how a company or sponsor has contributed to any aspect of the research (e.g., translation, study design, data collection, analysis, administration, etc.). If there is no funding or conflict of interest, this should also be clearly specified in this section. A conflict of interest statement lacking clarity will result in the rejection of the work.

All opticians-optometrists residing in Spain must be registered with their corresponding College in order to publish in this journal.

TYPES OF SUBMISSIONS

    ORIGINAL INVESTIGATIONS

Unpublished manuscripts on new discoveries in Vision Sciences, and they include a wide range of topics in clinical and/or laboratory research. They must meet the following criteria:

- The content is presented clearly and concisely (e.g., maximum 4000 words and 35 references).
- The research topic must be novel, interesting, and make a valuable contribution to the field.
- The motivation and justification of the study must be clearly stated and well justified.
- The methodology must be clear, rigorous, and reproducible.
- The results must focus on the study's objectives and show original observations.
- The results should include measures of central tendency (e.g., mean or median) with estimates of variability (e.g., standard deviation, confidence intervals, quartiles, etc.).
- Any conclusion must be supported by the data.

 

    SYSTEMATIC REVIEWS

They represent high-level evidence in clinical research through the composition of numerous scientific bibliographic sources related to a specific topic. They can provide a summary, a perspective, or a synthesis useful to the scientific community.

Literature Reviews must adhere to the following guidelines:

- The title must include the keywords Literature Review.
- Abstract (≤ 250 words), without specific sections (DO NOT include purpose, material, and methods, etc.), but must include the relevance of the study (≤ 50 words).
- The manuscript text must not exceed 4000 words and 80 references.

 

    CLINICAL CASES AND CASE SERIES

Case reports can be a source of new ideas and observations that stimulate future clinical or laboratory studies. Case reports and case series are brief discussions that highlight relevant clinical findings, complicated diagnoses, interesting treatment techniques, clinical technologies, etc., which would be of interest to the scientific community.

Cases must be well-documented with an adequate duration of follow-up to support the conclusions made.

Case reports/case series must adhere to the following guidelines:

- The title should include the keywords Case Report or Case Series, as appropriate.
- The abstract must include 4 parts: Explanation of the importance of the Case Report (≤ 50 words), Purpose, Case Report(s), and Conclusions.
- The manuscript text (excluding title and authors) must not exceed 2500 words and 20 references.
- The total number of figures and tables should be limited to a maximum of 5 items.
- Patient consent must include one of the following statements:
  - Written informed consent was obtained from the patient(s) for this Case Report/Case Series work.
  - No identifiable clinical information is included in this work.
- Acknowledgments: Recognition of individuals involved in the preparation of the manuscript or patient care, but who did not meet the criteria to be considered authors.

 

    CLINICAL TRIALS

Clinical trials are defined as prospective studies in which subjects are assigned to an intervention to study the cause-effect relationships between the intervention and a specific health outcome.

Transparency, rigor, and reproducibility are essential for clinical trials. Well-designed, well-conducted, and clearly reported clinical trials are the foundation for evidence-based clinical practice. To ensure rigor and transparency in reporting clinical trial results, the following are required:

- Authors must register clinical trials in ClinicalTrials.gov or an affiliate of the World Health Organization's International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP) primary registry.
- According to the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), this Journal will only publish clinical trial results from studies that were registered before the first subject was enrolled. The database, registration date, and registration number must be provided on the title page when submitting the manuscript.
- Authors reporting clinical trial results to this Journal must comply with the CONSORT guidelines. Authors should use the recommended checklist and subject accountability figures available on the organization's website (www.consort-statement.org).

 

    LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

They are brief letters to the Editorial Committee on a specific topic. They should make an academic and useful contribution to the debates within the scientific community. Letters may address recently published articles, interesting scientific reflections, views on recent advances of importance to the field, etc.

The text of the Letter to the Editor must not exceed 500 words.

 

WRITING AND FORMATTING STANDARDS

Documents:

- Microsoft Word documents (.doc / .docx).
- A4 page size (21.0 x 21.7 cm), with top, bottom, and side margins of 2.54 cm.
- Arial font size 11 points.
- Line spacing of 2 points, with lines consecutively numbered (Page Layout/Line Numbers). The numbering of the lines in the text file of the manuscript should stop at the references. Do not add line numbers on the title page, abstract, references, tables, and figures.

Abbreviations and Symbols:

- When one or more words are to be summarized in an abbreviation, the full word or words should be defined the first time they appear in the text followed by the abbreviation in parentheses. E.g., Uncorrected Visual Acuity (UVA). Subsequent appearances in the text should be in abbreviation form only. This will apply separately to the Abstract and the main body of the research. Do not include abbreviations in the title.
- Add a section at the end of the text (after the References) with a list of all abbreviations used and their explanations.
- When using instruments, materials, medications, etc., manufactured by commercial companies, the product's trade name should be written followed by the registered trademark symbol ®, and followed by the commercial company and country of production in parentheses. This is only necessary the first time they appear in the text; subsequent appearances should include the product's trade name followed by the registered trademark symbol ®.

Expressing Values:

- Units of measurement should be expressed using the International Metric System. Graduations should be expressed as: -1.00 D sph -1.00 D cyl x 90º. Units of measurement should be spaced from the numerical value (e.g., 22.31 mm).
- Decimals should be written with commas in Spanish and points in English. The number of decimals should be consistent within the same group of measures. If the value is much smaller than zero, consider scientific notation (e.g., 3·10^-6).
- Statistical significance values using the P value should be written with an uppercase, italicized P, followed by the exact numerical value with two decimals if it is greater than or equal to 0.05 or the less than symbol if it is less than 0.05 or 0.01, as appropriate. E.g., P = 0.33; P < 0.05; P < 0.01. Do not write P = 0.02; P = 0.001; P < 0.05.

Tables, Graphs, Figures, Photographs:

- If your work includes data tables, use unformatted Microsoft Word tables, and insert them where you would like them published in the text, followed by the caption at the bottom of the table.
- If your work includes graphs, figures, or photographs, the format should be .TIFF, with a minimum resolution of 300 dpi. Submit the figures, graphs, or photographs separately and compressed together in a single .zip or .rar file. Maximum of 6 in total.
- In the text of the work, write [Insert Figure X] / [Insert Graph X] / [Insert Photograph X] where you would like them published, followed by the caption. The name should be the same as the file sent.
- If your graph, figure, or photograph includes text and/or numbers, it is recommended to use Arial font.
- All tables, figures, graphs, or photographs must include a caption at the bottom, separated and centered. The caption should include: table, figure, graph, or photograph number in bold, title, subtitle (if necessary), explanation of all abbreviations appearing in the table, figure, graph, or photograph on a new line, in italics, and separated by semicolons. E.g.:

Figure 1: Visual Field.
    
DM: Mean Deviation; DSM: Model Standard Deviation; VFI: Visual Field Index.

References:

- We recommend using a bibliographic reference management program (Mendeley, RefWorks, EndNote, etc.).
- Bibliographic references cited in the main body of the research should be written using numbers in parentheses at the end of the referenced text, in order of appearance. E.g., (1); (3-5); (4,6-8)
- The last section of the manuscript should be References, where the cited numbers are listed followed by the corresponding bibliographic reference in Vancouver format.
- Limit authors to three. If the reference has more than three authors, write the first three and et al. Do not include web links in any bibliography. Examples:
    - Craig JP, Nichols KK, Akpek EK, et al. TFOS DEWS II Definition and Classification Report. Ocul Surf. 2017;15(3):276–83.
    - Abelson MB, Udell IJ, Weston JH. Normal human tear pH by direct measurement. Arch Ophthalmol [Internet]. 1 Feb 1981 [cited 9 Jul 2019];99(2):301.
    - Simmons PA, Vehige JG. Clinical performance of a mid-viscosity artificial tear for dry eye treatment. Cornea. Apr 2007;26(3):294–302.
    - Rowe RC, Sheskey PJ, Quinn ME. Handbook of pharmaceutical excipients. 6th ed. Handbook of pharmaceutical excipients, Sixth edition. London; 2009. 706-714.