So You Want to Provide Insights

Insight: (the ability to have) a clear, deep, and sometimes sudden understanding of a complicated problem or situation (Definition from the Cambridge Dictionary)

Here are some guidelines.

For starters read this: George Orwell on Effective Writing.

Commentaries provoke and enlighten. They can also provide an opportunity to come across as very serious or mischievous, to alert and inform readers and to provide some diversion from the day-to-day earnestness of healthcare policy and practice. Don’t forget to make a point. Use plain language, don’t use a long word when a short one will do. Catch the readers’ attention right from the start, if they aren’t hooked by the first sentence you just might lose them.

The writers we feature all do this well. Don’t polarize. Analyze. Here at Longwoods we might ask: is it timely, well argued, fresh, clear and newsworthy?

(This is the kind of language used by “op-ed” editors of the Globe and Mail. We’ve borrowed bits and pieces.)

Here are the rules:

Must be written in plain language, we are looking for your opinion / thoughts / insights. Your audience is people from all walks of life with a vested interest in healthcare policy, particularly decision makers.

Body of the submission should be 600 to 900 words or so. Include a title, a twitter length abstract and five keywords.

Accepted submissions go online in the Insights section of Longwoods.com, will be featured in the eLetter and shared via social media.

We reserve the right to re-print any accepted submissions in any journal, format or medium.

Longwoods Insights are published under the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial 4.0 International license and can be shared after publication.

Although we reserve the right to edit, submissions may not have the benefit of full review by copy editors. Please have a proofreader polish each submission.

All references should be in-text hyperlinks.  

Please declare any and all potential conflicts of interest.

Please include the full names, titles, any social media handles and a one-sentence bio for all authors.

We reserve the right not to publish any submission without explanation.

Submit your Insights to publisher@longwoods.com 

“Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof.” - John Kenneth Galbraith

“You will always have partial points of view, and you'll always have the story behind the story that hasn't come out yet. And any form of journalism you're involved with is going to be up against a biased viewpoint and partial knowledge.” - Margaret Atwood

“A powerful idea communicates some of its strength to him who challenges it.” - Marcel Proust