How to format your references using the Health Information Science and Systems citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Health Information Science and Systems. 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	Find the style here: output styles overview
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. Garrett L. Global health hits crisis point. Nature. 2012;482:7.

A journal article with 2 authors

1. Gray GM, Cohen JT. Policy: Rethink chemical risk assessments. Nature. 2012;489:27–8.

A journal article with 3 authors

1. Lieberman E, Hauert C, Nowak MA. Evolutionary dynamics on graphs. Nature. 2005;433:312–6.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

1. Brown ME, Barkume KM, Ragozzine D, Schaller EL. A collisional family of icy objects in the Kuiper belt. Nature. 2007;446:294–6.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

1. Vignes A. Extractive Metallurgy 1. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2013.

An edited book

1. Rowiński P, Radecki-Pawlik A, editors. Rivers – Physical, Fluvial and Environmental Processes. Cham: Springer International Publishing; 2015.

A chapter in an edited book

1. Mühling A, Hubwieser P, Berges M. Dimensions of Programming Knowledge. In: Brodnik A, Vahrenhold J, editors. Informatics in Schools Curricula, Competences, and Competitions: 8th International Conference on Informatics in Schools: Situation, Evolution, and Perspectives, ISSEP 2015, Ljubljana, Slovenia, September 28 - October 1, 2015, Proceedings. Cham: Springer International Publishing; 2015. p. 32–44.

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 Health Information Science and Systems.

Blog post

1. Andrews R. America’s Cicadas Are Mysteriously Appearing Four Years Early [Internet]. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2017 [cited 2018 Oct 30]. https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/americas-cicadas-mysteriously-appearing-four-years-early/. 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. Drug Testing: Undercover Tests Reveal Significant Vulnerabilities in DOT’s Drug Testing Program. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 2007 Nov. Report No.: GAO-08-225T.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

1. Hamilton SM. An Investigation of the Mass Balance of Oil and Gas Produced Versus Estimated Reserves Remaining within the A.W.P. Field, McMullen County, Texas [Doctoral dissertation]. [ Lafayette, LA]: University of Louisiana; 2015.

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. Greenhouse L. Justices, 5 to 4, Overturn 3 Texas Death Sentences. New York Times. 2007 Apr 26;A22.

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	Health Information Science and Systems
Abbreviation	Health Inf. Sci. Syst.
ISSN (online)	2047-2501
Scope