..."Rome wasn't build in a day...". Anyway, don't be eager to hit the most high yield Journals in few weeks. Please focus on a literature topic you will extensively study. You must know the current scenarios, the unmet needs, and the standard methods (including the flaws). Start with narrative descriptions of single cases or narrative reviews: these sort of papers are not that informative, neither the best quality of reporting... yet this approach would allow you to become familiar with concise scientific writing. Follow the leaders: there is ton of papers and resources, start by the most high-yield (reading). Attempt to collaborate with groups and other researchers with a solid reputation and publication rank in your field. Be patient, and ready to frustrations sometimes. As you will see in your career, sometimes the reviews you get are unfair, sometimes you do mistakes you are not aware. So the key is: "patience, immerse yourself in studying the literature and the methods to report in your field, and then start over again. Be humble and start with the very basic.". Good luck! Michele.

..."Rome wasn't build in a day...". Anyway, don't be eager to hit the most high yield Journals in few weeks. Please focus on a literature topic you will extensively study. You must know the current scenarios, the unmet needs, and the standard methods (including the flaws). Start with narrative descriptions of single cases or narrative reviews: these sort of papers are not that informative, neither the best quality of reporting... yet this approach would allow you to become familiar with concise scientific writing. Follow the leaders: there is ton of papers and resources, start by the most high-yield (reading). Attempt to collaborate with groups and other researchers with a solid reputation and publication rank in your field. Be patient, and ready to frustrations sometimes. As you will see in your career, sometimes the reviews you get are unfair, sometimes you do mistakes you are not aware. So the key is: "patience, immerse yourself in studying the literature and the methods to report in your field, and then start over again. Be humble and start with the very basic.". Good luck! Michele.

I am deeply grateful for your beneficial and academic feedback that enlightens my research publishing walk.

Dear follow author instructions of the journal.

My first real research was never published (antipsychotic prescribing trends in patients with dementia at a large academic center). While I had collaboration with a number of experiences authors, it still never even made it to the submission process. The reason for this may be that collaborators were remotely involved and/or I was not a reasonable author at that time in my life. In hindsight, lack of understanding of the importance of the research was superficial and I was not an expert in this area of medicine. I had not read enough. I did not have enough clinical experience. A few years after the research was performed, I later determined that the data was too old and not largely as important as I first thought.

Later, I had success in small journals in topics related to my areas of interest. Now I still make efforts toward case reports and review articles (as mentioned above). Sometimes I do real research. This has worked out well. I attempt to collaborate with students, residents, and other persons with larger research backgrounds. Persistence is key. Reading is key. I sometimes ask journal editors if my submission is appropriate for their journal prior to submission (even after reviewing scope of journal and reading their articles). I usually shoot for a low-medium impact journal and have a number of potential journal targets in mind if rejected.

1) Make sure you plan your research well.

2) Ensure your methods and data are coherent and able to stand criticism by editors and peer-reviewers. After all, journals want to publish solid research to build/maintain their reputation.

3) Get someone to review your English, if it's not your first language.

4) Follow the Instructions to Authors closely, and ensure your manuscript or research topic is aligned with the scope of the journal.

5) Do not include unnecessary sentences, descriptions...etc. Not because you know something everyone else (especially editors and peer reviewers) want to know it. Be very concise, so journals look at exactly the core of your research and not miss the point. If they find merit, they will probably accept it with minor/major changes, but this is part of the process and will make you a better writer.

I always found writing papers to be quite demanding. My advice to a new author would be to first get acquainted with the language of the scientific papers, for which the best method is to simply read similar papers (which you should anyway) and pay attention to how things are phrased.

My second advice would be to try to keep things simple and straightforward. I often read papers that over-complicate things, e.g.: "we have seen a lack of successful results regarding experiment X" -> "experiment did not work".

Third would be to make sure you take advantage of cool and free tools that are now available to scientists on this journey. Tools such as Grammarly.com are great to help with vocabulary and grammar, which make your paper more professional. There are also tools, dedicated for actual writting of papers, such as Authorea.com, which will do a better job then e.g. MS Word. We at SciNote are also trying to help scientists with our AI powered Manuscript Writer ( https://scinote.net/manuscript-writer), which helps you with literature research and can help you hit the ground running.