How to format your references using the BMC Medicine citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for BMC Medicine. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Download the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most reference managers.
BibTeX	BibTeX styles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author

1. Conley DJ. Ecology: save the Baltic Sea. Nature. 2012;486:463–4.

A journal article with 2 authors

1. Gurdon JB, Bourillot PY. Morphogen gradient interpretation. Nature. 2001;413:797–803.

A journal article with 3 authors

1. Travis DJ, Carleton AM, Lauritsen RG. Contrails reduce daily temperature range. Nature. 2002;418:601.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

1. Gallavotti A, Zhao Q, Kyozuka J, Meeley RB, Ritter MK, Doebley JF, et al. The role of barren stalk1 in the architecture of maize. Nature. 2004;432:630–5.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book

1. Maillard P. Competitive Quality Strategies. Hoboken, NJ USA: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2013.

An edited book

1. Jin D, Lin S, editors. Advances in Computer Science, Intelligent System and Environment. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2011.

A chapter in an edited book

1. Laird FN. Avoiding Transitions, Layering Change: The Evolution of American Energy Policy. In: Hager C, Stefes CH, editors. Germany’s Energy Transition: A Comparative Perspective. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan US; 2016. p. 111–31.

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for BMC Medicine.

Blog post

1. Andrew E. NASA observations put on hold while the moon photobombs the sun. IFLScience. 2014. https://www.iflscience.com/space/nasa-observations-put-hold-while-moon-photobombs-sun/. Accessed 30 Oct 2018.

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report

1. Government Accountability Office. Student Attrition at the Five Federal Service Academies. Enclosure B: Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 1976.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation

1. Davidson AR. Computerized physician order entry: An outlook on successful implementation among ambulatory care settings. Doctoral dissertation. California State University, Long Beach; 2013.

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article

1. MacFARQUHAR N. Russia Charges Minister in an Oil Bribery Scandal. New York Times. 2016;:A10.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in square brackets:

This sentence cites one reference [1].
This sentence cites two references [1, 2].
This sentence cites four references [1–4].

About the journal

Full journal title	BMC Medicine
Abbreviation	BMC Med.
ISSN (online)	1741-7015
Scope	General Medicine