NIH Public Access Policy

Courtesy of  Weill Cornell Medical College.

Method A Journals - journals that make the final published version of all NIH-funded articles available in PubMed Central (PMC) no later than 12 months after publication without author involvement.

Method B Publishers - publishers who do listed not automatically deposit every NIH-funded paper in PMC but you can choose to arrange with the journal for the deposit of a specific article.

Method C Self-Submission - submit final peer-reviewed manuscript via the NIH Manuscript Submission (NIHMS) system.  Simplest way to proceed is to set up an NCBI (National Center for Biotechnology Information) account to access the NIHMS.  You will need to register to obtain a login and password.

Method D Publishers - publishers who have volunteered to deposit a final peer-reviewed manuscript to NIHMS when they determine that it falls under the NIH Public Access Policy. Authors are responsible for ensuring that the manuscript is deposited into the NIHMS upon acceptance for publication. The author must complete all remaining steps in the NIHMS in order for the submission to be accepted.

For Method A and Method B:

• From acceptance for publication to 3 months post-publication, use PMCID or "PMC Journal - In Process." 
• To cite papers, 3 months post-publication and beyond, use the PMCID. 

For Method C and Method D:

• From acceptance for publication to 3 months post-publication, use PMCID or NIHMSID. 
• For papers 3 months post-publication and beyond, use the PMCID.

Additional requirements for citing papers are provided on the NIH site.