LITERATURE SEARCHING

Lulu Eva Rakhmilla dr., M.KM

Epidemiology & Biostatistics Dept.
2012
 Quiz
There is a wide range of different sources of
healthcare information available. Please list
the range of information sources with their
advantages and disadvantages (minimum 5
sources)
 Purposes of literature searching
To find information for an essay / assignment /
dissertation / presentation / or an interview
To keep up to date with published literature in
your field of interest
To support continuing professional development
To find literature to support evidence-based
practice
To find information on specific conditions or new
ways to treat
To find outcome measures in a particular area to
use in clinical practice
Cont
To find out what research has been done which may
be similar to yours, which may feed into yours or to
learn from the research methodology used by others
To find an expert in a particular field
To find information and possible collaborators on
clinical improvement initiatives, audit etc.
To provide justification for services or clinical practice
To support clinical governance
To empower patients to make informed decisions
 Sources of information
Libraries - these can provide access to many types
of resources
Databases
Journals
Books
Newspapers
Government documents
Conference proceedings
Dissertations and theses
Internet
Discussion groups and newsgroups
 The traditional route
MEDLINE Search

1000s of 100s of full-text 100s of hours

references articles reading them

Need to make a Need to decide if

judgement on Need to
relevant for extract data
how well the individual patient
research is from the
carried out articles
 Clinical Scenario
Open this link
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B3WPrlTS
CHk8Yl8tM2ZNSldUZTg
Submit search strategy with 5 relevant
citations
Present the discussion each group
 When to search?
This will establish one of three things:
There is no literature on your subject so either you
change your topic or suggest research that should
be undertaken
There is an enormous amount of literature on
your question that you cannot possibly read so
you either need to rethink your topic or narrow
your question
There is a manageable amount of literature to
meet your requirements.
 How much time should be
allowed?
How long is a piece of string? You can expect a
comprehensive search to take hours rather than
minutes and you should remember that the
search is only the first stage.
 Grading Scale (100 points)
MeSH for 1st Concept 25 points
Explode a Concept 15 points
Combine: AND/OR 15 points
Subheading 10 points
Limit/Focus 10 points
5 Relevant Articles 25 points
 Percent Failure
13
14
12
10

Percent 8 2001
Failure 6 4.2 2002
3.5
2003
4
2
0
Medical School Year
 Average Scores

100

95 91.7
89.6
90 85.4
Average 2001
Score 2002
85
2003
80

75
Medical School Year
 Boolean Operator
Searching for information within a database requires a
process that has come to be known as Boolean searching or
Boolean logic .
Boolean logic refers to the logical relationship between the
search terms.
These are expressed using operators or logical operators.
The three main operators are: OR, AND and NOT.
Although the choice of which operator to use looks
straightforward, it is very easy to use the wrong one because
the operator may be the reverse of natural language.
e.g. I want everything on dogs and cats
does this mean: -I want everything that mentions dogs as
well as everything that mentions cats,
or does it mean: -I want everything that mentions dogs
together with cats in the same document or website
Boolean operators
 MeSH Concept
The use of physiotherapy in the care of disabled
children
Concept 1 Concept 2 Concept 3

Physical therapy Disabled persons Child

OR Physical therapy OR Mental disability OR Infant

techniques
OR Physiotherapy AND Physical disabilities AND Neonate
OR Physical therapists OR Developmental OR Adolescent
disabilities
OR Physiotherapists OR Acquired disabilities

OR Specific techniques e.g. OR Congenital disabilities

Exercise therapy
OR Specific conditions e.g.
Cerebral palsy
 The Perfect Search

Prevention of eye diseases in patients with diabetes.

 Common Problems
Basic instructions
Up to dozens of citations
Browser print vs. citation manager
Subheadings
Explode
Relevancy
Publication types, language
Answer question?
 A Very Bad Search

Patient education to prevent HIV infection

How It Happened
 Tips
Truncation
Truncation, also called a wildcard or a variable
character symbol, allows you to enter the first
part of a word (or stem) followed by a symbol,
(usually * but may be $ or ?).
wom?n or, in scientific databases, right hand
truncation may be possible.
physiot* will retrieve physiotherapy,
physiotherapist, physiotherapists, physiot
(German)
Cont
Stop words
Stop words are words of little subject
significance that occur very frequently. e.g.
and, in, the, of, with, that, might, become,
always, away, etc.
Ordinarily the search system will ignore stop
words.
 IMPORTANT ADDRESSES
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi/
http://www/proquest.com/pqdauto/
http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/crd/ehcb.htm
http://www.jr2.ox.ac.uk/bandolier/
http://hebw.uwcm.ac.uk/
http://www.jrf.org.uk/
http://www.nice.org.uk/
http://www.bham.ac.uk/
http://www.bmjpg.com/
http://www.ncchta.org/
 Online Journal
www.nejm.org
www.cmaj.org
www.aafp.org
Online Journal selected specialty
Obstetric and gynecology
www.ajog.org
Pediatrics
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org
 Journal Database
http://highwire.stanford.edu/cgi/search
 Organization
www.who.int
www.cdc.gov
National Center for Health Statistics
www.cdc.gov/nchs/
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
www.nhlbi.nih.gov
www.depkes.go.id
www.bps.go.id
 Specific Organization
Diabetes
American Diabetes Association
www.diabetes.org
European Association for the Study of
Diabetes
www.easd.org
 Specific Organization
Cardiovascular
American Heart Association
(www.heart.org)
European Society of Cardiology
(www.escardio.org)
 Specific Organization
Stroke
American Stroke Association
www.strokeassociation.org/STROKEORG/
European Stroke Organisation
www.eso-stroke.org
 Guidelines
Asthma
www.ginasthma.org
COPD
www.goldcopd.org
 Large cohort study
Nurses Health Study
www.channing.harvard.edu/nhs/
Framingham Heart Study
www.framinghamheartstudy.org/