Writing a scientific paper

There are many varieties of medical writing. This paper suggests a sound, practical approach for writing up a research project in the conventional format for a medical or scientific journal. The structure of a scientific paper is well established, to accommodate the "Why" of the project (the Introduction), the "Who, when, where and how" (the Methods) and the "What" (the Results). The Discussion (the "So what") should be in three parts--discussion and explanation of results, disputation, and disquisition (implications for practice and for future work). Guidelines are given for getting started and for producing a paper that will, hopefully, be published and read.