Online First

View the Online First articles

Online First allows publication of selected articles ~2 weeks after final acceptance, months ahead of its publication in a journal issue. Advanced publication establishes primacy for the work, with the initial online publication date included on the final version.

Articles are only available as unedited manuscripts* PDFs, together with an abstract/extract until the final version appears in the journal [Read our disclaimer]. The publication date, stated on the PDF, is the day the article became available online. The inital version is indexed by PubMed and the article is fully citable, [see how to cite].

* edited, typeset versions may be added as they become available

Articles are available from:

• the JECH homepage
• topic collections
• standard author and keyword searches on JECH
• standard searches on search engines including PubMed and Google

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How to cite online first articles

Each Online First article has a unique Digital Object Identifier (DOI). This should be included in all citations.

BEFORE the article has appeared in an issue
Use the citation format:

AFTER the article has appeared in an issue
Use the citation format:

Digital Object Identifiers

Digital Object Identifier (DOIs) are global and persistent values that are uniquely related to a single electronic entity.

Each Online First article has a unique DOI which is the permanent identifier of all versions (unedited manuscript, edited proof, published article). The DOI appears on every version and should always be included in the citation even if you want to cite a print version of an article.

The DOI can be found at the top of each article with the date of publication. For example:
J Epidemiol Community Health. Published Online First:10 January 2008. doi:10.1136/jech.2002.000414