Medical Writing Essentials

This list of medical writing resources is updated as new resources become available or I become aware of them. If a link is no longer working or something is missing, I’d be happy to update the list. Just let me know.

Professional Associations and Certifications

Alliance for Continuing Education in the Health Professions (acehp.org)

American Medical Writers Association (amwa.org)

Board Editors in the Life Sciences (bels.org)

Council of Science Editors (councilscienceeditors.org)

Drug Information Association (diahome.org)

European Medical Writers Association (emwa.org)

International Society for Medical Publication Professionals (ismpp.org)

National Organization of Research Development Professionals (nordp.org)

Regulatory Affairs Professionals Society (raps.org)

Guidelines

AMWA-EMWA-ISMPP Joint Statement on the Role of Professional Medical Writers

COPE Guidelines – publication ethics guidelines including authorship, peer review, and retractions

EQUATOR Network – data reporting guidelines, summarized by study type

FDA reprint guidelines – distribution of medical publications on unapproved uses

GPP3 – publication guidelines for company sponsored research

ICH Guidelines – international guidelines for pharmaceutical regulatory documents

ICMJE Recommendations – authorship, editing, publishing, and peer review guidelines

National Guideline Clearinghouse – compilation of evidence-based clinical practice guidelines at AHRQ

PhRMA Principles – guidelines for conducting clinical trials and communicating results

Reference Library

Writing and Editing Guides

Greene AE. Writing Science in Plain English. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press; 2013.

Health Literacy – information and resources compiled by the University of Rochester Library

Higgins JPT, Green S, eds. Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions Version 5.1.0 [updated March 2011]. The Cochrane Collaboration, 2011. Available from www.cochrane-handbook.org.

Lang T, Secic M. How to Report Statistics in Medicine: Annotated Guidelines for Authors, Editors, and Reviewers. 2nd ed. Philadelphia: American College of Physicians; 2006.

Publications Primer. International Society for Medical Publication Professionals; 2016. [for ISMPP members]

Tufte ER. The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. 2nd ed. Cheshire, CT: Graphics Press; 2001.

Wager E, Smith R. Getting Research Published: An A-Z of Publication Strategy. 3rd ed. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press; 2015.

Zieger M. Essentials of Writing Biomedical Research Papers. 2nd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2000.

Style Manuals

Iverson C. American Medical Association Manual of Style: A Guide for Authors and Editors. 10th ed. New York: Oxford University Press; 2007.

Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association. 6th ed. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association; 2010.

Sabin W. The Gregg Reference Manual: A Manual of Style, Grammar, Usage, and Formatting. 11th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2010.

Scientific Style and Format: The CSE Manual for Authors, Editors, and Publishers. 7th ed. New York: The Rockefeller University Press; 2006.

Medicine and Science

Brunton L, Chabner B, Knollman B, eds. Goodman and Gilman’s The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics. 12th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2011.

Hall JE. Guyton and Hall Textbook of Medical Physiology. 13th ed. Philadelphia: WB Saunders; 2015

Porter RS, Kaplan JL, eds. The Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy. 19th ed. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley & Sons; 2011.

Stedman’s Medical Dictionary. 28th ed. Baltimore: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins; 2006.

Grant Writing

Kienholz ML, Berg JM. How the NIH Can Help You Get Funded. New York: Oxford University Press; 2014.

Morrison DC, Russell SW. The Grant Application Writer’s Workbook. Versions for NIH, NSF, USDA, and any agency.

National Institutes of Health – NIH RePORTER, CSR Applicant Resources, and a presentation on NIH Peer Review.

Continuing Medical Education

SACME Resources – ethics guidelines, toolkits, and information on gap analysis among other topics

CME Educational Resource Library – instructional design, regulations, and more from Jacob Coverstone

Literature Search

Biosis Previews

Embase

Google Scholar

PubMed

Ovid

Scopus

Web of Science

AMWA members can access my webinar “Publish that Paper Now: Successfully prepare manuscripts that get published” and a Pocket Training “How to Find the Best Journal for Your Scientific Manuscript.”