AMA

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We use the AMA Manual of Style, 11th edition (2020) when creating educational and research materials in CPD. Particularly pay attention to references and citations for articles, books, and websites. You may also need to refresh your knowledge on tables, figures, multimedia, grammar, units of measure, and numbers.

AMA guide

Test your knowledge

AMA Manual of Style

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in-text citation rules are:

Question 1/5

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Citation numbers for references in text are in superscript1 and occur at the end of the clause in which you used the information. They occur outside “quotation marks,”2 commas,3 (parentheses)4 and full stops.5 However, they occur inside semicolons6,7; and colons8-13:

in-text citations — also note:

Next Question

True

Separate numbers by commas. Do not use spaces. Use hyphens to denote ranges for three or more contiguous numbers1,2-4,6

Question 1/5

website reference format is:

Author AA, Author BB. Title of webpage or object. Website or Publisher Name. Month DD, YYYY. Updated Month DD, YYYY. Accessed Month DD, YYYY. URL.

Question 2/5

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True

Correct format: Author AA, Author BB. Title of webpage or object. Website or Publisher Name. Month DD, YYYY. Updated Month DD, YYYY. Accessed Month DD, YYYY. URL Example: Sample size calculation. Grapentine Co Inc. May 12, 2005. Accessed December 6, 2005. http://www.grapentine.com/calculator.htm Minimum information needed in bold:

• Author(s) (if given, for more than 6-> list the first 3 names + “et al”) or Name of Group
• Title of webpage or object (eg, YouTube video) (sentence case)
• Name of the website (if different from the page - Title Case)
• Published date (at least year, if available)
• Updated date (if different to published date, at least year, if available)
• Accessed date (verify that the link still works as close as possible to publication)
• URL

False

Web reference - be careful

Next Question

URLs are always the last element in a reference. Do not end with a period.

Question 2/5

this reference for a journal article is correct:

Question 3/5

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True

Weinstein JN, Tosteson TD, Lurie JD, et al. Surgical versus nonsurgical therapy for lumbar spinal stenosis. The New England Journal of Medicine. 2008;358(8):794-810. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa0707136

Other tips:

• Journal name abbreviations can be found on the NLM website: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/journals
• Journal article titles are sentence-case. Do not capitalize subtitles.
• Non-journal articles retain the original case/styling.
• Date and article info use the following format: Year;Volume(Issue):Page-Page.
• Don't include spaces.
• Write out the entire page numbers for start and end.
• Example: 2013;35(6):727-734.

Example: Thiele EA, Marsh ED, French JA, et al. Cannabidiol in patients with seizures associated with Lennox-Gastaut syndrome (GWPCARE4): a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase 3 trial. Lancet. 2018;391(10125):1085-1096. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(18)30136-3

False

careful with journal titles

Next Question

Journal titles are abbreviated and italicized. The New England Journal of Medicine should be N Engl J Med

Question 3/5

this Book reference is correct:

Patterson JW. Weedon’s Skin Pathology. 4th ed. Churchill Livingstone; 2016.

Question 4/5

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True

book reference - also note:

Next Question

True

AMA no longer recommends including the publisher’s location.

Question 4/5

great resources

Question 5/5

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UBC Library has a cite tool with AMA style but it is not currently abbreviating journal names (you can use it but make sure to fix the journal name)

reference tools

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Do not rely on automatic reference generators. They can be unreliable. Always double-check them. Zotero is the preferred ref tool.

Question 5/5

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