Research notes

Research Notes are peer-reviewed publications of clinical or laboratory observations, in abbreviated form . Citation research shows that Research Notes are peer-reviewed, accessible to literature searches, and cited.

Key message
Write the key message of your paper in max 50 words. Please do not include any citations in the key message. Avoid specialist abbreviations if possible

Key words: Provide up to 5 key words using Mesh terms for indexing purposes

Text Max. 900 words including the key message, exclusive of figure legends and references (please supply a word count). Up to 15 references in the Journal's style. All relevant figures and tables.

Background The Background section should explain the background to the study, its aims, a summary of the existing literature and why this study was necessary or its contribution to the field..

Methods
The methods section should include:

• the aim, design and setting of the study
• the characteristics of participants or description of materials
• a clear description of all processes, interventions and comparisons. Generic drug names should generally be used. When proprietary brands are used in research, include the brand names in parentheses
• the type of statistical analysis used, including a power calculation if appropriate

Results
Present the findings of the study including, if appropriate, results of statistical analysis which must be included either in the text or as tables and figures.

Discussion
Discuss the implications of the findings in context of existing research and highlight limitations of the study.

List of abbreviations If abbreviations are used in the text they should be defined in the text at first use, and a list of abbreviations should be provided.