Editorial Mission, Team, and Best Practices

Do not use a period in academic degrees. Use commas on either side within a sentence. Only use one degree after a person’s name and limit to either PhD or MD (whichever is most applicable to the content of the story).  

• Example: “The survival rate can be very poor, as it is often diagnosed at a late stage since there is no screening for early detection,” says Joellen M. Schildkraut, PhD, professor of epidemiology, who is nationally recognized for her ovarian cancer research, and is a member of the Cancer Prevention and Control Research Program at Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University.

Use serial commas.

• Example: The students, faculty, and staff 

Add spaces before and after ellipses.  

• Example: They were not sure where to begin ... so they started at the beginning.  

Use em dashes with no spaces in all instances.

• Example: Additionally, family history can be a big clue—if they have early onset cancer or breast cancer in their family.

Use the full name on first mention. Use the last name only in subsequent mentions. Do not use a person’s title or degree with their last name (i.e. Dr. Stephen Patrick). List only last name (Patrick). 

Spell out one through nine. Use numerals for 10 and greater.

Capitalize job titles when they directly precede a person’s name; otherwise for all other job titles, type name first, followed by comma with their title in lower case. For people with multiple job titles, just use the one most applicable to the story.  

• Example 1: “In some areas, such as Georgia, that difference is even greater,” says Lauren McCullough, PhD, associate professor of epidemiology, whose research group is currently working on 18 active breast cancer-related projects.
• Example 2: In this episode, Emory President Gregory L. Fenves talks with Young about his multifaceted career and the life-changing power of museums.