I am dominated by one thing, an irresistible, burning attraction towards the abstract. - -Gustave Moreau1 (1826-1898)

While the words of Monsieur Moreau (19th-century French symbolist painter) are completely misrepresented in this context, the spirit is true; there is something that draws us to the abstract. To be less abstract, it is usually an online indexing service. If one were to conduct a literature search in PubMed, it would generate a list of articles, the majority of which would be linked to an abstract. In the present day, these abstracts serve a very valuable purpose and that is to convey in a short number of words the content of the journal article to which they belong. A well-written abstract can draw readers to the main text; a poorly written abstract can lead to one clicking the back button and perusing other such documents. There are numerous schools of thought on how much information an abstract should contain and the format this information should take. Historically, it has been the policy of the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice to take a less rigid approach than many journals and allow the authors of the manuscripts submitted to decide the best format for their abstract to take. Unfortunately, this lack of specificity in the instructions to authors has led to the submission of an eclectic collection of abstracts that vary in their success in relaying their content of the article. This variation has necessitated considerable input from the editors, reviewers, and production staff to ready them for publication. In the interest of increased efficiency in the production process and expanded readership of our published articles, the policy of the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice is being revised to bring it more into alignment with the American Medical Association's Manual of Style (10th edition).2 All new submission to the journal should follow the guidelines presented in Section 2.5 of the manual.2 Since the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice publishes a different range of articles than other journals that follow these guidelines (eg, JAMA), a simplified set of categories for articles will be employed. Specifically, and consistent with previous practices, editorials, commentaries, letters to the editor, management moments, and other short topics will not require an abstract. Articles that report original data will be required to utilize the structured abstract format. The structured abstract format will contain no more than 300 words and contain the following headings: Context (if necessary), Objective, Design, Setting, Participants, Intervention (if applicable), Main Outcome Measure(s), Results, and Conclusions. A detailed explanation of these sections can be found in our Instructions to Authors. All other submissions, including systematic reviews, meta-analyses, case reports, and other major manuscripts, should employ an unstructured format. These unstructured abstracts should contain no more than 150 words and attempt to convey as much of the information requested in the structured abstract format as is applicable.

Although this change may seem drastic to our regular contributors, it should be noted that this is not a significant departure from the information that has previously been requested. There are a number of examples from past issues that could easily be modified through the addition of headings or a minimal amount of added information.3-7 Finally, it should be noted that it is not the intention of the editors to force a one-size-fits-all approach on our authors. The field of public health is diverse, and the breadth of articles published by the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice reflects this diversity. As always, the editors and staff of this journal are committed to presenting information in a manner that is most consistent with the diffusion of information to the broadest possible audience. We feel that this more structured format will enhance accessibility of our content to our readership and facilitate the dissemination of evidence-based public health practice and research.

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