1. E
ffective search of bibliographic
. databases
Dr Tarek Amin
Professor of Public Health
Cairo University
amin55@myway.com

2. Objectives
Orienting the audience of the model for- 1
information searching using medical
. bibliographic databases
Identify the appropriateness of different- 2
medical databases
Orienting the audience about the effective- 3
. strategy for searching bibliographic databases

3. Introduction/rationale
o
o
o
o
The rapid increase in medical information poses a challenge
for keeping up with the latest developments in the field.
Information searches can be difficult without a basic
knowledge of the way information is organized and indexed.
In preparing scientific studies and in making clinical
decisions, the key issue is to effectively scrutinize previous
literature.
That is why familiarity with medical information sources and
the ability to use them effectively is important (1)
.Go re G. Se arching the me dical lite rature . I Pre v 20 0 3 Jun; 9 (2): 1 0 3– 1 0 4
nj

4. .(Introduction (cont
o Estimated that 20,000-30,000 journals
published on medicine and health.
o Printed journals are being increasingly
replaced by e-journals
o The amount of medical information is
doubling every 5 years
.M x D. We lco me to A
atto
rchive s CM A O to laryng o l He ad N ck Surg 20 0 0 ; 1 29 (7 ): 9 1 4
E. rch
e

5. The information search process
o
o
o
o
Medicine is now a multidisciplinary
Overwhelming bibliographic databases with
advanced technology.
Hard to find the specific and relevant
information
Information search is seldom a simple one-way
process.
Lِo hِne n J e tal. Ag uide fo r me dical se arch. I J Circumpo lar He alth 20 0 9 ; 6 8 (4): 39 4-40 4
nt

6. Effective and relevant information
The experience of the
: searcher
, Knowledge of sources, SystemsSearch language andUse of key words-
: Databases
.No. of journalsQuality of indexingLimitations in content.description

7. .Information search model
Definition of research problem and question formulation
Choice of databases: Factors affecting the choice:
- Databases available
- Up-to-date information on the database
- Coverage in terms of time and content- Database’ s indexing practices
Medline (Ovid), PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, PsycINFO and EMBASE
F
ormulation of search strategy
- Key concepts, relationships between concepts
- Free word searches and thesaurus
- Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT)
- Search limits (e.g. ,year, publication type)
Conducting the search and E
valuation
- Search terms are entered
- Assessing relevance of the search and the results
- Possible decision-making in case of clinical problem-solving
- A reformulation of a search when needed
M nald S, Taylo r L, A
cDo
dams C. Se arching the rig ht database : a co mpariso n o f fo ur database s fo r psychiatry
jo urnals. He alth Libr Re v 1 9 9 9 ; 1 6 (1 3): 1 51 – 1 56

8. Defining the research problem and- 1
.formulating the questions





What is the exact topic?
What purpose will the information play?
Which issues are included and/or excluded?
What is essential information and what is
already known on the topic?
Is the needed information general or scientific?

9. Defining the research problem and- 1
.formulating the questions




Background reading is essential
Make a plan
Quick search is important to explore:
– terms, - concepts – keywords
The PICO model:
P patient
I Intervention
C control
O outcome

10. Choice of databases- 2


Bibliographic databases are extensive
compilations of references and documents.
Re fe re nce is the information included in the
document, such as information on authors,
abstract, journal title and year of publication
Many bibliographic databases include a link to
the full text.
(7).

Corrall C, Wyer P, Zick L, Bockrath C. How to find evidence when you need it, part 1: databases, search programs, and
strategies. Ann Emerg Med 2002;39 (3):302 –306.

11. :In searching medical bibliography
Multiple (more than one databases should be considered)
The extent of database coverage should be considered.
 Different databases use different keyword systems and
different levels when indexing material.
 A thesaurus is affected when there is rapid
development in a field and recently introduced terms
and concepts in the literature are not included in the
vocabulary quickly enough (nanotech.).
Indexing refers to a description of documents using certain rules, vocabularies and key
words.
Thesaurus is a special vocabulary where the relations between terms are expressed in a
standardized manner.

12. Key medical bibliographic databases for search
CINAH
L
E
lsevier
ScienceDirect
E B
M ASE
(Excerpta
medica)
L ACS
IL
M
edline (Ovid)
Nursing and allied
health sciences
- About 1.5 million
references to
articles, congress
publications and
academic
dissertations since
1982.
- About half of the
references are
found in the
PubMed database.
Maintained by
Elsevier B.V.
containing
bibliographic data
and full texts.
- About 6.75 million
articles up to 1995
and 2.75 million
articles from 1994
onwards.
- Covers 25% of full
texts and
bibliographic data in
science, technology
and medicine in the
world
Biomedical and
pharmacological
Database produced
by Elsevier B.V.
- Over 11 million
records from 5,000
journals from 1974
onwards.
- More than
500,000 references
and abstracts are
added to the
database each year.
Open-access health
science database of
BIREME Systems
in Spanish,
Portuguese and
English.
- About150,000
records, such as
books, congress
and conference
publications, and
articles from 670
well-known
medical journals .
Bibliographic
database published
by Ovid
Technologies.
- About 13 million
references on
medicine and
related fields from
4,800 journals
since1966.
- An increasing
number of
references contain
a link to freely
available full text

13. Key medical bibliographic databases for search
PsycINF
O
P
SYNDE
X
P
ubM
ed
Scopus
W of
eb
Science
- A bibliographic
Psychological
database provided
by EBSCO
Publishing.
- 2.3 million
references and
abstracts from year
1887.
- References from
sources such as
articles, books and
academic
dissertations in all
fields related to
psychology.
- A bibliographic
psychological
database from the
German speaking
countries.
- All areas of
psychology and
related behavioral
and social sciences
from 1977,
audiovisual media
from 1932, and
tests from 1945.
- A free service of
the U.S. National
Library on
Medicine through
which also
Medline is
available.
- About 21 million
references from the
1950s onwards.
- Includes new
references that are
not yet indexed in
Medline.
- Links to full text
- Bibliographic
database of
Elsevier B.V.
- About 27 million
abstracts, 230
million references,
200 million
scientific wwwpages, over 12,850
journals, 535 of
which are OA
journals.
- Covers the
Medline (Ovid)
database, including
full text links when
applicable.
Bibliographic
database of
Thomson Reuters.
- Databases
accessible from
1986 on: Science
Citation Index
Expanded, Social
Science Citation
Index,
Arts & Humanities
- 850,000
references
including links to
full texts when
applicable.

14. Access to databases

Bibliographic databases are commercial
products, which is why not all databases are
licensed by individual research
organizations.

15. .Freely accessed bibliographic databases






PubMed www.pubmed.gov
Dire cto ry o f Ope n A ss J urnals www.doaj.org
cce
o
PubMed Central www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov .
The Public Library of Science (PLoS) www.plos.org
BioMed Central (BMC) www.biomedcentral.com
Different OA repositories, like the Directory of Open
Access Repositories
OpenDOAR www.opendoar.org and
CiteSeer (www.citeseer.ist.psu.edu).

16. Search engines and portals




The most popular Internet search engine, Google
www.google.com
Google Scholar www.scholar.google.com
Google books, to search only books
www.books.google.com
Google Scholar makes it possible to search for
essays, presentations, books, abstracts and articles
in various fields and from different sources, such
as academic publishers, associations and other
scientific organizations.

17. Search engines and portals



Other medical search engines and link
collections include:
Sum-Search www.sumsearch.uthscsa.edu ,
Scirus www.scirus.com , Medical-Matrix
www.medmatrix.org
The medical pages of Intute
www.intute.ac.uk/healthandlifesciences/medic
.

18. P
ractical steps for searching- 3
1. Get your search question clear
 The trickiest part of setting up a search, basically the
question is ‘ what am I actually looking for?’ . You
need to be clear about what search terms you are
going to use to ask your question.
Take the topic below as an example
Do e s pare ntal smo king is linke d to pe diatric e ar
infe ctio ns?

19. Consider
o
o
o
o
Not using natural language (verbs,
propositions)
Concentrate on nouns, keywords and
concepts
Take care of alternatives (synonymous)
Search engines can not recognize some
terms (computer, internet)

20. 2-P
utting your terms together

Start by considering possible term variations. Generally,
bibliographic databases will only locate exa what you
ctly
tell them to find.
Sources of term variation you should consider:
 P
lurals – searching for ‘ bacteria’ (plural) won’ t find ‘ bacterium’ (singular).
 UK US spellings – searching for ‘ analyze’ won’ t find ‘ analyse’ .
/
 Numbers –2 o r two o r II
 Synonyms – The same hormone may be known as adrenaline or
epinephrine.
 Abbreviations – PCR or Polymerase Chain Reaction

Some databases have built in thesauri which help them find some
term variations automatically.
For example, searching for ‘ Woman’ on PubMed will search for ‘ Women’ as
well.

21. *Using the wild card


In Pubmed the asterisk ‘ * ’ will truncate words:
B
acteri* Finds: B
acteria, bacterial, bacterium,
bactericidal etc.
In some databases like Scopus and Web of Science
you can allow substitution of single characters to help
deal with differences in spelling –
Analy?e Finds: Analyze and Analyse

22. Boolean operators
B
oolean logic operators are named after the
B
ritish mathematician George B
oole, they
are used to create relationship between
.search topics or keywords
T basic B
he
oolean logic operators are: AND,
.OR, and NOT
T
hese operators can be used to narrow
.or broaden the searches

23. Boolean operators
OR:
T search will retrieve articles that are
his
about either “heart valve disease” or
“myocardial infarction” (similar terms).
OR
Heart valve
disease
OR AL AYS BROADENS A SE
W
ARCH
MI

24. Boolean operators
AND:
T search will retrieve articles that are
his
about “heart valve disease” and
“diabetes.”
AND
Heart valve
Diabetes
Disease
AND ALW S NARROW A SEARCH
AY
S

25. Boolean operators

NOT
:
T search excludes all records that have the term
his
“diabetes” in them. if an article compares heart
valve disease with diabetes you will lose it from
your search. therefore, use not with restraint and be
aware of the consequences.
NOT AL AYS NARROW A SE
W
S
ARCH

26. Set your limits-3
You can refine your results down further by
applying limits to your search.
 PubMed lets you limit your search by many
criteria including date of publication, document
type and language.
Example:
 Published in the last: 5 years.
 Type of Article: Clinical T
rial.
 Languages: E
nglish


27. T
hen ask the following questions to rate the quality other
websites/
engines not bibliographic databases (a yes implies better
(.quality
Questions
Is the site put together by a known institution or
organization? (clue from the last few letters e.g. gov.
.(edu
Are the objectives of the site clearly educational? (are
they advertising or selling products? P
atient education?
?(Information about services
Are there sections that explain the various goals? (e.g. a
(patient section, and a research section, for a hospital
Is there a search engine for the site itself, to locate
?information
Yes
No

28. T
hen rank the quality of the website (other than bibliographic
databases by giving a score form 1 to 5 (excellent) in the categories
.below
E
lements
1
(Responsive (quick connection
2
Goals are clear
3
Distinguishes fact form opinion
4
(Current (look for the date the site was last updated
5
Visual impact
6
E
asy to find information
7
Connects to useful sites
8
Addresses at least 50% of your learner’s needs
9
P
rovides justification for opinions or views (gives
(evidence
10
Allows for communication with a web master or a
.consultant
1 2 3
4 5

29. Searching for evidence
S pyramid 5
Birch D, Eady A, Robertson D, De Pauw S, Tandan V. Users’ guide to the surgical literature: how to perform a literature search. Can J Surg
2003;46(2):136–141

30. :Searching for evidence
Pubmed using clinical queries
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query/static/clinical.shtm
 This feature is also included in Medline (Ovid),
EMBASE, PsycINFO and CINAHL (Ebsco).
 The Cochrane Library: www.cochrane.org

31. Searching for evidence







Evidence-based information at Seek
www.shef.ac.uk/seek ,
EBM Guidelines ebmg.wiley.com/ebmg
The TRIP database (www.tripdatabase.com/index.html
),
SUMsearch: http://sumsearch.uthscsa.edu/
BMJ Clinical Evidence:
www.clinicalevidenceorg/ceweb/index.jsp
DynaMed
www.ebscohost.com/dynamed

32. Searching for evidence
UpTo Date
http://www.uptodate.com
is an evidence-based, peer-reviewed information
resource.
PIER: The Physicians’ Information and Education
Resource
http://pier.acponline.org/index.html?jhp
provides authoritative, evidence-based summaries.

33. .Useful Web Sites for Physicians
.E
vidence-based M
edicine
:Cochrane Library
www.cochrane.org
(:Clinical evidence (Free
www.clinicalevidence.com
:Journals
www.evidence-basedmedicine.com
(:Evidence based guidelines (Free access
.www.guideline.gov
: Best treatment
www.besttreatment.org
:DynaMed
www.dynamicmedical.com

34. .Useful Web Sites for Physicians
Data base other than Pubmed and
:free
www.pubmedcentral.com
www.biomedcentral.com
www.sumsearch.uthscsa.edu/

35. .Useful Web Sites for Physicians
http://emedicine.medscape.com
http://www.biomedcentral.com/

36. .Useful Web Sites for Physicians
General Web Sites for Clinical
Educators
www.acgme.org
www.helath.gov/healthypeople/
www.uchsc.edu/CIS
www.aamc.org
www.acog.org
www.cdc.gov

37. .Useful Web Sites for Physicians
General Web Sites for Clinical
Educators
www.acgme.org
www.helath.gov/healthypeople/
www.uchsc.edu/CIS
www.aamc.org
www.acog.org
www.cdc.gov

38. .Useful Web Sites for Physicians
Physicians Training Web Sites
www.APGO.ORG/MEMEBERSHIP/CURRICULUM
www.mcphu.edu/institutes/iwh/nawhme
/academy.html
www.mero.lib.wfubmc.edu/tfwhcepub/c
omparecenters.htm
www.aafp.com/edu/guide/rep282.html

39. .Useful Web Sites for Physicians
Sites For Clinical Information
www.ideallibrary.com/links/toc/ebog
www.nof.org
www.nams.org
www.nlm.nih.gov
www.cochrane.org
www.ahcpr.gov
www.fis.utoronto.ca/phd/marton/wome
nhl.htm

40. .Useful Web Sites for Physicians
Public Health
www.who.int
www.apha.com
www.cdc.gov
www.ginevafoundation.com
www.papha.org

41. .Useful Web Sites for Physicians
Clinical Teaching
www.aamc.org/meded/start.htm
http://futurehealth.ucsf.edu/hpsisn
.html
www.medinfo.ufl.edu/cme/inet
http://omie.med.jhmi.edu/lectureli
/nks

42. Thank you