Abstract submission

Welcome at the abstract submission site of the IEA EEF European Congress of Epidemiology 2006. The congress will be held from 28th June- 1st July 2006, Utrecht, The Netherlands.

Please read the abstract instructions below, before you submit an abstract.

After submitting an abstract you will receive a letter of confirmation by e-mail.

The deadline for receipt of abstracts is January 15, 2006 . Letters of acceptance will be sent by March 2006 and the final programme will be available in April 2006.

Deadline for electronic abstract submission: January 15, 2006

Please click here to submit an abstract

Abstract submission
The scientific programme committee of the European Congress of Epidemiology invites interested persons to submit abstracts for oral and poster presentations.

Abstract guidelines
Please read these instructions thoroughly before preparing your abstract:

1. You may submit more than one abstract.
   
2. All abstracts must be submitted online in the English language through the congress website. The instructions applying to abstracts and abstract submission must be followed carefully.
   
3. For an abstract you are allowed to use 200 words. Abstracts should be structured: background (and relevance), objectives (and question), design and methods, results, conclusion and discussion.
   
4. Abstracts should not include any references or any graphical work.
   
5. The abstract should be prepared as follows:
• Font: Arial, at 10 pitch.
• Do not insert blank lines between the title and text, or between paragraphs.
• Only standard abbreviations may be used in the text. The first time that an abbreviation is used, first the full word or phrase must be mentioned and this is followed by the abbreviation which is placed in parentheses.
• Numbers should be used except at the beginning a sentence, then the number is spelled out.
  
6. The deadline for receipt of abstracts is January 15, 2006.
• Abstracts submitted later than January 15, 2006 will be not be considered for peer review.
• Submitted abstracts are posted to a secured Web site for peer review.
• A team of peers, selected by the Scientific Programme Committee will review abstracts.
  
7. The reviewers will use the following evaluation criteria:
• ABSTRACT: Abstract well structured and clearly written: criterion weight=1
• BACKGROUND : Clear and brief outline of importance or relevance of the topic: criterion weight=1
• OBJECTIVES: Clearly specified question and attainable objectives: criterion weight=1
• DESIGN & METHODS: Adequate and well described design and methodology according to the objectives: criterion weight=3
• RESULTS: Clear presentation of results: criterion weight=2
• ORIGINALITY: Originality: criterion weight=2
  
  Rating scale for the above evaluation criteria are: Poor (=1) adequate (=2) good (=3). Evaluation criteria are summed according to their weight. The reviewers will also give a final rating for your abstract on a 0-10 scale.
  
8. All abstracts should be electronically submitted online at the congress website before the January 15, 2006. Only electronically submitted abstracts will be processed.
   
9. It is possible to propose for a mini-symposium. A min- symposium must be submitted via an e-mail address and not via de submission website. Below you will find extra submission guidelines a specially for mini-symposia.
   
10. Presenters (oral, poster and mini-symposia) are supposed to register and pay conference fee for the IEA EEF European Congress of Epidemiology 2006.

Further information

Once all the abstracts are graded, the Scientific Program Committee assembles the abstracts with the highest overall ratings and acceptable sum scores into sessions, based on the category keywords chosen.

The corresponding author will be informed via the Congress Office by March 1 2006 whether the abstract has been accepted for a poster or oral presentation or not at all. The Scientific Programme Committee will decide on acceptance of your abstract. Correspondence on this decision is not possible. 

Avoid the following errors in writing abstracts

• A descriptive rather than a conclusive abstract title; for example, "Statins prevent heart failure in a randomised trial with patients after myocardial infarction” is preferable to "The effect of statins on heart failure in patients after myocardial infarction; results of a randomised trial".
• Failure to state the research question. We advise formal statement such as, "Our research question was..." or “We studied ….”
• Failure to describe the design and methods. The reviewers want to assess the validity of you data.
• Failure to state sample size or precision of study results. The reviewers want to assess the accuracy of the data they need a mean, standard deviation and a sample size.
• Failure to state a conclusion. The use of a final sentence that starts with: "In conclusion, ..." is encouraged.
• Excessive use of abbreviations. All but the most standard abbreviations should be defined and most abstracts should have < 3 abbreviations.

Presentation preferences

Oral Only
If you choose this option, you only want to give an oral presentation. Under no circumstances you do want to present a poster.

If the programme committee decides that your abstract must be scheduled as an poster, you are automatically withdrawn from the programme.

Poster only
If you choose this option, you only want to give a poster presentation. Under no circumstances you want to give an oral presentation.

If the programme committee decides that you abstract must be scheduled as an oral, you automatically withdrawn from the programme.

Poster size: 0,90 meter wide and 1.50 meter high

Preference for oral
If you choose this option, you are fine with both options. You let the programme committee decide what kind of presentation you will give during the conference.