The structure of a scientific article

Clinical research makes a decisive contribution to advancing health care, improving patient care systems, and increasing the health of the population.1 As we have seen through the COVID pandemic, clinical research is primarily disseminated through scientific articles.

It is important to remember that a major part of the process of publishing a scientific article begins with the habit of reading scientific articles, which should continue throughout one’s professional career. There is no doubt that published articles are the main means of scientific knowledge transmission in our profession. At the individual level, therefore, it is highly advisable to include in time in our schedule for scientific reading once a week. There is also no doubt that holding literature sessions, also called "journal clubs" in medical and surgical departments should be part of the teaching trajectory of MIR residents and in general mandatory for all teams.1 This is how we become familiar with the structure and language used in scientific articles. A good way to get started in writing a scientific article could or even should be to publish papers that have been presented at specialty congresses. Of these, 30% should be published according to experts.2

The first step in writing a scientific article is to choose the type of article you want to write (clinical case, review article, original article, etc.). Good advice would be to start with simple publications (e.g., a clinical case) and increase in difficulty, the "original article" will be the ultimate goal of our curricular trajectory. Next, it is essential to choose the most appropriate journal for submission of the article. This choice will be based on several aspects. The first, although it may seem obvious, is that the journal should cover the subject information we wish to publish. There are General and Digestive Surgery journals and super-specialty journals (for example, colorectal surgery or hepatobiliopancreatic surgery) that cover our specialty. While the former have more competition but are very appropriate for articles on more general aspects, those specific to subject areas have the advantage of having, in general, less competition. The other aspect to consider is the quality of the journal, which generally now depends on the Journal Impact Factor.3 The impact factor of the journal to which the manuscript is to be submitted should be as high as possible, not only because of the curricular benefit for the authors if the article is published, but also because it is an indicator (even assuming some criticism3) that the article will reach a larger number of readers. This element will also determine the journal quartile (ranking list of journals according to their impact factor) of the specialty in which the article is published and can therefore have many consequences when planning an academic career.

Before outlining some of the keys to writing a scientific article, we should stress that authors should carefully read the Authors' Guide of the selected journal. It details the publication rules point by point. It is surprising how many of the instructions authors do not follow, in either length or in form; this is one of the main reasons that articles are rejected or criticised by reviewers.

Once the journal for submission of the article has been selected, it is particularly important to read similar articles in that journal to ensure that the editorial style of the article reflects the line of the journal.

We outline below some more specific formal aspects to consider when writing a scientific article, following the acronym IMRaD (Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion)4 which should correlate with the questions that the article should answer: Why was this study conducted (Introduction); How was the study conducted (Methods); What was observed (Results), and What is the importance of the information presented (Discussion).5 Table 1 summarises the structural aspects of a scientific article and some considerations to ensure it is drafted correctly.