Writing in the Health Sciences: A resource for faculty and students

Focuses on resources for master's and professional doctorate students and their teachers.

Audience

Resources for health sciences master's & professional doctorate students and instructors.

HSL Key Writing Picks

Plagiarism & Citing Sources (Health Affairs)
This guide explains what plagiarism is and provides a short quiz to help you test your knowledge. Includes link to printable .pdf handout summarizing this tutorial.

Plagiarism Handout
Summary handout for Plagiarism & Citing Sources Tutorial
2 page pdf

Compare EndNote, Sciwheel, Zotero
Compare citation managers.
Copyright Basics Tutorial
Provides a basic explanation of how US Copyright law impacts reuse of published resources. Includes a brief quiz to test your knowledge.
Identifying Plagiarism Tutorial (Multidisciplinary)
Through this tutorial, you will become more familiar with the issues surrounding plagiarism and will receive instruction on how to address this academic issue.
'Patchworking' is more common than plagiarsm, just as dishonest (by Kelly McBride, September 18, 2012, in Poynter)
What it is and how to avoid it.
Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Sources in the Health Sciences
From the University of Minnesota Health Sciences Libraries (Bio-Medical Library). Sources are considered primary, secondary, or tertiary depending on the originality of the information presented and their proximity or how close they are to the source of information.
Structure of Scholarly Articles & Peer Review
• Explains the standard parts of a medical research article
• Compares scholarly journals, professional trade journals, and magazines
• Explains peer review and how to find peer reviewed articles and journals
Evaluating Sources tutorial from Johns Hopkins University
Learn about topics such as accuracy, currency, point of view bias that are important for evaluating sources of information, including internet and social media sources.

You can also use these resources as you do research:

Clinical Chemistry Guide to Scientific Writing
From the AACC (American Association for Clinical Chemistry). A series of educational articles on how to design and write scientific research papers for publication. These articles will help users write more clearly and effectively, improving their chances for success. Easy to read and humorous at times, yet are full of useful information and examples to illustrate important points. The articles will benefit anyone interested in scientific writing.

Key UNC Writing Center Handouts (Tips & Tools)

These HSL top pick "handouts" from the UNC Writing Center are specifically chosen for master's and professional doctoral students in the health sciences.

UNC Writing Center Video Demo: Understanding Assignments
Video demo version of Understanding Assignments Handout.
The first step in any successful academic writing venture is reading the assignment. While this sounds like a simple task, it can be a tough one. This handout will help you unravel your assignment and begin to craft an effective response. Much of the following advice will involve translating typical assignment terms and practices into meaningful clues to the type of writing your instructor expects. See our short video for more tips.
UNC Writing Center Online Handout: Understanding Assignments
The first step in any successful academic writing venture is reading the assignment. While this sounds like a simple task, it can be a tough one. This handout will help you unravel your assignment and begin to craft an effective response. Much of the following advice will involve translating typical assignment terms and practices into meaningful clues to the type of writing your instructor expects. See our short video for more tips.
UNC Writing Center video: How We Cite (2:06 min)
In much of your academic writing, you will use outside sources of information. How can you integrate sources into your papers? And how should you cite them?
UNC Writing Center video: Why We Cite (2:20 minutes)
You know that instructors want you to cite your sources, but do you know why citations are so important?
UNC Writing Center Online Handout: Writing for the Sciences
The major difference between science writing and writing in other academic fields is the relative importance placed on certain stylistic elements. This handout details the most critical aspects of scientific writing and provides some strategies for evaluating and improving your scientific prose.
UNC Writing Center Online Handout: Argument
This handout will define what an argument is and explain why you need one in most of your academic writing.
UNC Writing Center Online Handout: Audience
This handout will help you understand and write for the appropriate audience when you write an academic paper.
UNC Writing Center Online Handout: Evidence
This handout will provide a broad overview of gathering and using evidence. It will help you decide what counts as evidence, put evidence to work in your writing, and determine whether you have enough evidence.
UNC Writing Center Handout: Plagiarism
This handout explains what plagiarism is and outlines steps students can follow to avoid plagiarizing. It also references UNC Honor System information and resources.
ALL UNC Writing Center Tips & Tools (Online Handouts & Videos)
Collection of handouts and multimedia demos for all aspects of academic writing, including Writing for the Sciences, Annotated Bibliographies, Literature Reviews, and much more.

Top Picks: Duke Scientific Writing Guide (Medical Center)

Duke Scientific Writing Interactive Resource
The Scientific Writing Resource is course material that teaches how to write effectively. The material is not about correctness (grammar, punctuation, etc), but about communicating what you intend to the reader. It is intended for science students at the graduate level.

Additional suggestions selected from the Scientific Writing guide from Duke University Medical Center

Scientific Writing Resources
From the Duke Graduate School
The Science of Scientific Writing
George Gopen, Judith Swan
American Scientist, Vol. 78 (Nov-Dec 1990), pp. 550-558.
Marc E. Tischler's Scientific Writing Booklet
.pdf booklet compiled by Marc E. Tischler, PhD, University of Arizona. Includes good material on developing an outline; word usage; grammar; writing the introduction, methods, results, and discussion sections; and more.
Writing up research: The Guidebook
From the Language Center @ The Asian Institute of Technology

Books

Here are some books on writing in the health sciences that you may find useful in writing class papers or theses. UNC owns ebook versions of these titles.

How to Write a Thesis by Umberto Eco; Caterina Mongiat Farina; Geoff Farina; Francesco Erspamer
ISBN: 9780262328753
Publication Date: 2015-02-27
This book has some particularly useful sections on how to choose and narrow a research question.
Mastering Scientific and Medical Writing by Silvia M. Rogers
ISBN: 9783642394461
Publication Date: 2014-01-04
Chapters 9 (on plagiarism) and 10 (on writing different kinds of abstracts) may be useful to students.
Scientific Writing = Thinking in Words (Online) by D. R. Lindsay
ISBN: 9780643101579
Publication Date: 2012-02-01
This book includes good guides on the different sections of a scientific paper and how to put them together. It's also a good all-around source for students who want to work on their paper-writing skills.