Health Sciences Databases

and Searching Guide

Accessed via the Search the literature and Tutorials and guides tabs at
http://subjectguides.york.ac.uk/healthsciences

For students needing journal articles >>

The best sources for Health Sciences are bibliographic. CINAHL Plus is especially good
for nursing and allied health (i.e. complementary medicine) and MEDLINE for general
medicine and nursing-related topics. Other databases are also useful depending on the
specific area of research, such as PsycINFO (for mental health), Maternity and Infant
Care (for midwifery) or the British Nursing Index (nursing and midwifery).

For students needing systematic reviews >>

A systematic review is a literature review designed to appraise and synthesise evidence
to produce an answer to a specific clinical problem. The best source of systematic
reviews is the Cochrane Library. As well as Cochranes own systematic reviews, the
database contains other reviews and results from clinical trials. Reviews can also be
found in the main databases (CINAHL Plus, MEDLINE), or within synopses of reviews in
key journals e.g. Evidence-Based Nursing or Evidence-Based Medicine. NICE Evidence,
includes freely available evidence summaries. Students on placement or who work in a
hospital or community setting should also be able to access NHS e-resources via NICE
Evidence (using their NHS Athens credentials).

For students needing help with Boolean and search techniques >>

Guidance on searching is available on the Tutorials and guides tab in the subject guide,
including tutorials on Boolean and example of strategies to develop synonymous and
related terms. PICO or concept tables can be used to develop search terms, which can
be included within a dissertation or essay as evidence of the search strategy. Examples
are available on the Health Sciences subject guide.

For students needing help with saving searches and results >>

Health databases usually have facilities to export references (either via email or using
EndNote), as well as to save searches. This requires an individual account with each
database. More information on this can be found in each databases guide on the
Tutorials and guides tab.



Top tips for searching Health databases >>

Use the Advanced Search option wherever possible to show that the search was
rigorous and comprehensive, which is much easier to achieve using advanced
features.
Use a range of different databases although there will almost certainly be some
duplication, the range of databases available should be searched in order to show
that evidence is wide-ranging and fully inclusive.
Make use of search limits to refine results these vary depending on the
database, but usually include the option to limit by date or publication type.
CINAHL Plus also includes helpful options to limit by the age or gender of the
patients involved in a study. This can be achieved on MEDLINE by including a
subject heading in the search for the relevant gender or age group.
Include medical subject headings in searches and combine these with relevant
keywords. Subject heading searching enables the use of consistent terminology
and conducts a wider search. To conduct a subject heading search, enter
keywords then tick the box marked suggest or map subject terms. This will
suggest a range of possible headings to include in the search. Scope notes will
explain the databases definition of that heading and might suggest other useful
keywords. The subject search option is ticked by default on MEDLINE, but needs
to be selected on CINAHL Plus.








DB, July 2014