Sports Medicine: Manual Referencing

• The identification of references within the text of your assignment are identified by Arabic numerals in superscript.
• A number is assigned to each reference as it is cited. A number must be used even if an author was named in the sentence, eg. Smith¹² argued that.....
• Use double quotation marks to enclose a direct quotation. Type [sic] after a misspelled word or an incorrect or apparently absurd statement in quoted material to indicate that this is an accurate rendition of the original source. Use single quotation marks for quotations within quotations.
• The original number assigned to a reference is re-used every time the reference is cited in text, regardless of the previous position in text.

Example:

... as one author has put it "the darkest days were still ahead"¹: which is well documented in the literature.^2-3 This proves that "the darkest days were still ahead".¹

• When multiple references are cited at a given place in a text, use a hyphen to join the first and last numbers that are inclusive, eg. ^6-8
• Use commas (no spaces) to separate non-inclusive numbers eg. ^2,3,4,5,7,9 is abbreviated to ^2-5,7,9
• Placement of referencing numbers with a text should be carefully considered, eg. a particular reference may be relevant to only part of a sentence. However, as a general rule, reference numbers should be placed outside full stops and commas, inside colons and semi-colons.

Examples:

• • The coach can carry out his own assessment of the athlete^5,9 in relation to the agreed constructs and so pinpoint areas of agreementon the one hand, ^2-4 and differing perceptions on the other.
  • Butler and Hardy maintain "that people's intrinsic motivation could be weakened by the application of external controls".^,1

• The main advantage of the Vancouver style is that the text reads more easily, without the intrusion of in-text quotations which can be difficult to keep brief. Reader can also check the list of references as they read through the text, without having to search through the list of references alphabetically for the first author of a particular referenced publication.

• Your reference list should appear at the end of your assignment/report with the entries listed numerically and in the same order that they were given in the text.

Example:

It is very important that you use the right punctuation and that the order of details in the reference is also correct.

• 1. Baker PN, editor. Obstetrics by ten teachers. 18th ed. London: Hodder Arnold; 2006.
  2. Halpern SD, Ubel PA, Caplan AL. Solid-organ transplantation in HIV-infected patients. N Engl J Med. 2002;347(4):284-7.
• Book and journal titles are not italicised or placed in quotation marks.
• Only first words of the article title and words that normally begin with a capital letter are capitalised.
• Journal titles are abbreviated. A list of abbreviations for the titles is available online at either NLM Catalog: Journal abbreviation or Medical Journal Abbreviations (Internationally recognised abbreviations for journal titles)
• If the journal has continuous page numbering, you may omit month/issue number.
• Some commonly used abbreviations:
  • c. = circa (about, approximately in time)
  • ch. = chapter
  • ed. = edition
  • et al. = and others
  • fig; figs = figure(s)
  • ill; ills = illustrator(s)
  • p. = page(s)
  • para; paras = paragraph(s)
  • pt; pts = part(s)
  • rev = revised
  • suppl = Supplement