Unfortunately, writing a manuscript, correcting its grammar and flow and then printing what you believe are finished copies is not an acceptable way to complete a book and have it printed. This is an amateurish technique that some authors use and it is often perceived by the readership as just that; this may diminish the number of copies that sell and the readership reads. If your book has grammatical problems, and does not flow successfully to allow the intended reader to grasp and understand the entire process that develops, the author will look like an incompetent creator rather than a professional. This is bad for the skilled physician, as his hard word will be judged poorly and his reputation often is diminished. When someone creates a “flowing masterpiece”, it is difficult to see little errors in the final result and they often are too close to the “writing” to pick up on these errors – that is, in one’s own mind, the flow pattern and grammar seem normal. As mentioned by Jennifer Dorsey in her book, ‘Start your own self-publishing business’, “if your book looks amateurish – if the artwork is clumsy, the layout is awkward, and the  text is riddled with typos and grammatical glitches, nobody is going to buy it”.

What are the necessary components required to turn a manuscript into a printable book? The most common and important are:

• The details before allowing the manuscript is printed are so important. In order to make the end-product professional, it might be necessary to make sure that the cover art is well done; this is the first thing that your readership will see and you do not want to generate a negative feeling of the book before they have had a chance to read it and understand the “great” content that is within. There are certain things that make the cover design flow and a professional designer that has talent in cover design can help the process. But, of course, one pays for and receives what one has paid for. Using free-lance designers may be fine and work out well, but if one needs a design for the cover that is unique and eye-catching, or a distinctive approach to designing the cover, and bringing in ideas alluding to the content of the book, one might need a more skilled designer than originally thought. The cost for such an artist will be more expensive than finding a theme and doing it yourself; but the result may help the book’s popularity and patients purchasing the book.

• Copy editing is very important because the job of the copy editor is to make sure that the manuscript is flowing, not jumbled, confusing or has inconsistencies. The copy editor looks at the entire picture from outside – in and makes sure that grammar is consistent throughout. As stated well by Jennifer Dorsey, “When you’re writing a manuscript, it’s hard to see the forest through the trees, but a good copy editor can do just that”; “all authors, including medical personnel,  need at least some type of editor. Not having someone edit is like not testing a medicine prior to it going out into the marketplace. An editor will evaluate and critique your manuscript, suggest and provide revisions, and shape it into a smooth, workable piece. They’ll look at the big picture and make sure everything flows and is consistent.”

• A proofreader does detailed analysis of the manuscript, looking for typographical errors, grammar and punctuation problems, spelling problems, etc.

• The difference between copy editors and proofreaders is that the copy editor will look at the big picture (style, contradictions, and other major source problems), while the proofreader concentrates on grammar related areas such as punctuation and spelling. Charges by good copy editors can range up to $3 per manuscript page and those of a good proofreader may be as high as $2.50 per page.

The difference between Medical Book Publishers and many of the other publishers is two-fold. First, MBP deals almost exclusively with books authored by medical and scientific writers and second, our process for editing the book is slightly different and produces a top-notch medical volume with fewer errors (which is corrected and reprinted as soon as it becomes known).

This process involves a multi-stage editing procedure that is performed for medical and scientific type books. The first thing done in this process involves reading the entire manuscript through and changing the obvious grammatical and flow errors which can distort the vision of the author.  The manuscript is then set up in a publishing format according to the size of the volume.  It is then divided into chapters and the chapters can further be divided into headings and topics. A proof of this stage is then looked at by both the publishers and the authors to see if there are any major areas of concern and all the obvious problems are processed and corrected. The proof is then looked at by the person in charge of copy editing and the stream of thought and words can be altered to be more fluent without being jumbled, confusing or having inconsistencies.  The words are altered to make a meaningful flow and simple grammatical errors are corrected.  At the same time, the author makes sure he encapsulates his ideas within the theme of the manuscript. After this proof has been determined to be satisfactory, a new proof is printed with the corrections and is examined by both the copy editor and the proofreader.  With all mistakes corrected, the finished proof can be printed.