Submitting a KJM Journal Club Article

Goal: To educate authors to critically appraise evidence from a peer-reviewed article.

KJM Journal Club articles aim to educate authors to:

       1. Summarize article content
       2. Evaluate the written literature
       3. Utilize standard instruments to appraise the quality of evidence, including statistical aspects
       4. Identify both strengths and weaknesses in the science
       5. Develop scientific writing skills
       6. Experience the process of authorship and review
       7. Demonstrate skills for writing, reading, and fully understanding medical research with a first author publication

Each KJM Journal Club article will be written by a trainee as first-author with at least one mentor as a senior author and highlight a practice-relevant study in medicine that was published during the previous year.

Specifications: Articles consist of a formal description of the study, a short comment on the clinical implications of the study, and an Evidence-Based Medicine lesson. This lesson will include utilization of an instrument aimed at evaluating the quality of evidence. For example, instruments such as PROBAST (Prediction model Risk Of Bias Assessment Tool),1 CASP (Critical Appraisal Skills Programme),2 Critical Appraisal tools from Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine,3 RELEVANT Checklist,4 TRIPOD Adherence Assessment checklist,5 GradePro,6 or other checklists available from EQUATOR Network.7

Manuscript Requirements: Manuscripts should not exceed 1,500 words (excluding title page, references, and figure legend/table) with a suggested limit of 1 figure and 1 table and a maximum of 15 references. Examples may be found here. All submissions require pre-approval. Please submit the article to be critiqued, along with the planned appraisal instrument, to kjm@kumc.edu. After pre-approval, you will be invited to submit the manuscript for full review through the journal's online submission system. 

Note: The objective of KJM journal club articles is to develop critical appraisal skills by systematically evaluating the validity, relevance, and applicability of research findings. It is not intended as a way to harshly criticize published work or disparage authors, editors, or journals. Submissions should follow the approved appraisal instruments and adhere to provided guidelines and instructions.

Links for instruments:

  1. Wolff RF, Moons KGM, Riley RD, Whiting PF, Westwood M, Collins GS, Reitsma JB, Kleijnen J, Mallett S; PROBAST Group†. PROBAST: A Tool to Assess the Risk of Bias and Applicability of Prediction Model Studies. Ann Intern Med. 2019 Jan 1;170(1):51-58. doi: 10.7326/M18-1376. PMID: 30596875.
  2. https://casp-uk.net/casp-tools-checklists/
  3. https://www.cebm.ox.ac.uk/resources/ebm-tools/critical-appraisal-tools
  4. Campbell JD, Perry R, Papadopoulos NG, Krishnan J, Brusselle G, Chisholm A, Bjermer L, Thomas M, van Ganse E, van den Berge M, Quint J, Price D, Roche N. The REal Life EVidence AssessmeNt Tool (RELEVANT): development of a novel quality assurance asset to rate observational comparative effectiveness research studies. Clin Transl Allergy. 2019 Mar 27;9:21. doi: 10.1186/s13601-019-0256-9. PMID: 30962876; PMCID: PMC6436213.
  5. Moons KG, Altman DG, Reitsma JB, Ioannidis JP, Macaskill P, Steyerberg EW, Vickers AJ, Ransohoff DF, Collins GS. Transparent Reporting of a multivariable prediction model for Individual Prognosis or Diagnosis (TRIPOD): explanation and elaboration. Ann Intern Med. 2015 Jan 6;162(1):W1-73. doi: 10.7326/M14-0698. PMID: 25560730.
  6. https://gdt.gradepro.org/app/
  7. https://www.equator-network.org/