Barbara Resnick, PhD, APRN, BC, FAANP
Donna Fick, PhD, RN
Pamela Cacchione, PhD,CRNP
Christine Kovach, PhD, RN
Kitty Buckwalter, PhD,RN
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The purpose of the Discussion is to state your
interpretations and opinions, explain the
implications of your findings, and make
suggestions for future research.
Its main function is to answer the questions
posed in the Introduction, explain how the
results support the answers and how the answers
fit in with existing knowledge on the topic.
The Discussion is considered the heart of the
paper and usually requires several writing
attempts.
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The organization of the Discussion is
important.
Make it short and sweet-clearly and fully
stating, supporting, explaining, and
defending your take home points.
Care must be taken to provide a commentary
and not a reiteration of the results.
Side issues should not be included.
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Organize from specific to the general: your
findings to the literature, to theory, to practice.
Use the same key terms and the same point of
view as the introduction.
Begin by re-stating your hypothesis-then
summarize whether this was supported or not.
Explain how your results relate to expectations
and the literature.
Address all the results relating to the
hypotheses/questions, whether or not the
findings were statistically significant.
 Describe the patterns, principles, and
relationships shown by each major finding
and put them in perspective.
 Discuss and evaluate conflicting explanations
of the results.
 Discuss any unexpected findings.
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Identify potential limitations and
weaknesses and comment on importance of
these to your interpretation of the results.
 Summarize concisely the principal implications
of the findings.
 Provide recommendations (no more than two)
for further research.
 Explain how the results and conclusions of
this study are important and how they
influence our knowledge or understanding of
the problem being examined.
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Professionally acknowledge individuals and
organizations that were important in making
your study possible. Avoid being "gushy" or
overly flip.
Feel free to acknowledge the help of this
project: The University of Maryland Online
Dissemination and Implementation Institute
funded by the University of Maryland and the
John A. Hartford Foundation.
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2012 NAHRS Selected List of Nursing Journals
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www.nurseauthorandeditor.com
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Beall’s List of Predatory Open-Access
Publishers
Hartford list of geriatric focused nursing
journals
 JAMDA
 JAGS
 JAPA
 Annals
of Behavioral Medicine
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Journal of Nursing Administration
Journal of Professional Nursing
Medical Care
Medical Ethics
Translational Behavioral Medicine
Journals focused on cardiology; acute care;
oncology; dermatology; orthopedics etc.
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4.
5.
Clinical issues for all types of nurses
Research/scholarship for all nursing or
health care topics
Specialty focus-clinical and/or research
Education
Management
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Measure of citations
Total number of citations received by a
journal in a given year to articles published in
the previous two years divided by total
number of citable items in that two year
period
Many journals are not included in ISI database
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Right
Right
Right
Right
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May want to pick 2-3 journals and rank
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audience
level
time-special issue or topic overdone?
style-word limits, journal guidelines
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Stick to format type of manuscript that
journal publishes
Read the guidelines
◦ Ask the managing editor….particularly if
something does not make sense
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Look for ‘lengthy words’ & replace with
simpler words/phases.
Simplify sentences of more than 20 words
Shorten paragraphs of more than 8 sentences
Delete unnecessary punctuation
Use consistent terms
Minimize abbreviations
Run spell/grammar check
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Write in active voice where the subject comes
before the verb. Example:
“The nurse injected the patient”,
rather than
“The injection was given by the nurse”
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Past tense for events of the past (e.g.,
previous research)
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Present tense when giving instruction
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Future tense for events yet to occur
 Copyright
 Authorship
 Plagarism
The author(s) or author’s employer is usually
copyright holder, unless and until you
transfer the copyright to someone else in a
signed agreement (e.g. publisher)
Assigning your rights matters: An author who
has transferred copyright w/o retaining these
rights must ask permission
The copyright holder controls the work
Transferring copyright doesn’t have to be all
or nothing
Types of copyright agreements, licenses vs transfer:
Varies between journals—CHECK POLICY
 Enables owners of intellectual property to retain
copyright in journal article, but publisher retains
commercial publishing and journal compilation
rights
 Allows articles to be published and made freely
available for online access, enables owners of
intellectual property to retain copyright
 Authors relinquish copyright
 Open Access Journals—may not require copyright
transfer
Authorship=responsibility for published
article
 Reflects significant contribution in 2 or
more areas
• Conception/design
• Execution
• Data analysis & interpretation
• Manuscript preparation and revision
PI=overall responsibility for all pubs from a
project, but ALL authors review final ms &
accept responsibility for the work
ALL 3 Must Be Present:
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Substantial contributions to conception and
design, or acquisition of data, or analysis and
interpretation of data
Drafting the article or revising it critically for
important intellectual content
Final approval of the version to be published
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Acquisition of funding
The collection of data
Supervision of the research group
Financial or technical assistance
Site acquisition
◦ Acknowledgement of the above is appropriate
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Standards
vary by field/discipline
(author order conventions)
Open discussion—all authors—written
agreement
Weigh contributions. If equal across
multiple papers may rotate authorship
Each author provides written statement
of contributions
As
appropriate and consistent with
guidelines for authorship:
Include
students as authors
Students can/should include dissertation
committee members
 Discuss
authorship/expectations at project
beginning.
 Determine authorship & order at onset of paper
development
 Discussion should include what to do if an
author “drops out”
 Evaluate performance prior to submission
 Deceased authors should be listed with
footnote
 If authorship dispute emerges after publication
(e.g. name added or withdrawn), editor
contacts corresponding author to establish
veracity
 It
is UNETHICAL to submit the same or similar
material in different journals
 The principle is distributive justice
 Most journals consider only work not
published elsewhere
 For some journals authors must provide
copies of all related materials/publications
“Is
there anything…that would embarrass you
if it were to emerge after publication and you
had not declared it?” Lancet, 1998
That is, by not disclosing interests the validity
of the results would be undermined as well as
the integrity of the author(s).
 Evidence of “competing interests/loyalties”
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Be prepared…if you are not familiar with the
webpage or the journal and the electronic
submission process it may take an hour or
two.
After submission be prepared to wait for a
few months!
“Not our Cup
of Tea”
“Not Even
Close”
“Fatally
Flawed”
“So What?”
• Consistent with journal mission,
content
• Consistent with science and level of
discourse
• Consistent with methodological
sophistication
• Clearly state contribution (e.g. gap
filled, contribution to science/practice)
 Consider
yourself lucky if you are
invited to revise and resubmit!
◦ Expect to make revisions
 Follow
ALL reviewers’ suggestions
 Provide a cover letter with each of
your responses
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Receive feedback from the editor
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Summarize how reviewers’ comments were
addressed
Justify suggestions not followed
Contact editor with questions
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Copy the review and respond to each item
directly in paragraph form
Do not simply indicate in a one sentence
letter that all reviewer comments have been
addressed.
Do not try and skip any comment
You may disagree with comments – just
provide a rational for why you disagree and
what you are doing instead.
 Carefully
read the entire
manuscript
 Answer author queries
 Meet the return deadline
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Submit your full manuscript for review by
October 31st (yes, Halloween!) and let us
know if you want to get your manuscript into
the Geriatric Nursing Supplement or where
you plan to submit.
Feedback will be provided in terms of
reviewer comments on the paper and further
information/recommendations on the
submission process.