How do I add a reference to my paper (RefCheck) after it has been accepted?

If you need to revise your references post-acceptance, you may do so in two ways:

1. Before paying the APF/before copyediting: If copyediting has not yet started on your manuscript, you can upload a revised version with changes to your references. Please see the process here: My paper has been accepted, what are the next steps? As we send articles for copyediting soon after APF resolution post-acceptance, you will need to upload a revised version within 2-3 days of acceptance at the latest. Once your article has been sent for copyediting, the file or reference list cannot be switched out/changed. 

2. In copyediting: If your article is currently at the copyediting stage, your copyeditor can add a new reference to RefCheck for you. In your Step 2 Microsoft Word document, clearly specify where in your manuscript the reference needs to go and include all essential citation information (especially a PMID or DOI when available) using Word's Comment feature. In Step 3 of copyediting, your copyeditor will add the reference to RefCheck and its citation in the manuscript. 

The new reference will be added as the last reference in RefCheck (ie, if your paper currently has 50 references, the new reference will be 51 and will be cited in-text as such). References will be be renumbered during Step 3 of copyediting and typesetting, so that all references appear in the order of their citation in the main text.

Please note that you can only delete references by deleting their citation in the manuscript body (the subsequent references will be renumbered automatically) or by replacing a reference in the RefCheck database with another reference. References cannot be deleted from RefCheck itself at this time. If you require any assistance with adding, deleting, replacing, or saving references in RefCheck, please email your copyeditor or our internal Copyediting team at copyed-support@jmir.org. We will get back to you promptly.  

Once your article has completed copyediting and has moved into the typesetting/proofreading stage, we cannot add/delete references because they are already extracted from the manuscript and input into the "RefCheck" database. Further additions/deletions of references at this stage will be billable. See What are your fees for "additional editorial/production work" and when are they applied?

See also

• How should references be formatted?
• What is the RefCheck process?
• How do I delete a reference from RefCheck?
• How can I reorder references during copyediting?
• Why have my references been renumbered during typesetting?