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Loay Kassem’s Guide to Writing a Strong Manuscript

Loay Kassem/X

Aug 9, 2025, 09:08

Loay Kassem’s Guide to Writing a Strong Manuscript

Loay Kassem, Assistant Professor of Clinical Oncology at Kasr AlAiny School of Medicine, shared a post on LinkedIn:

“90% of researchers write scientific papers in the wrong order.

That is why it takes them forever to finish writing one manuscript. I used to make the same mistake which is writing the paper in the same order they find in the journal:

Abstract, Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion.

The surprise is that this is wrong. The introduction should be the last thing to be written.

First, I start by the tables and figures. These are the main events of my story.

Second, I complete the results section. I just describe the main findings of my tables and figures. It can take few minutes this way (GenAI can help with this).

Third, I write the methods section. Here I describe how we reached the results. The methods and results sections should be an easy part to write.

A nice tip: Try to have a similar article as a guide so that you don’t miss an important section to point to cover.

Fourth, I write the discussion section. Here I explain what is the meaning, consequences and limitations of my results.

Finally, I finish with the introduction section. Here I cover why was it important to do our study.

Share this method with your colleagues if you think this is of benefit.

Final point. The abstract could be the first part written (I do this for papers which the abstract was presented in conference). Or the last part written (I base it on final take home messages from the paper).”

Loay Kassem's Guide to Writing a Strong Manuscript