Database Links - Appropriate Library Databases for a Literature Review
When searching for individual research studies in healthcare, CINAHL and PubMed should be used. CINAHL is the major database for nursing and allied health literature. PubMed is a way to search MEDLINE, the major database of literature in the biomedical sciences.
Google and Google Scholar are NOT sufficient for doing a good literature search in health care, although you can use Google Scholar to supplement your searches in subject specific databases.
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CINAHL This link opens in a new windowSearch journal literature related to nursing and the allied health disciplines. Also contains early-release citations for pre-published journal articles.
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PubMed This link opens in a new windowPubMed provides free access to the National Library of Medicine’s (NLM) premier database – MEDLINE. Content is citations and abstracts from national and international journals covering all aspects of biomedicine including allied health and other fields as they relate to medicine or healthcare.
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APA PsycINFO This link opens in a new windowIndexes psychology literature and related disciplines including psychiatry, medicine, nursing, pharmacology, cognitive science, and linguistics. Includes journals and book chapters. Use Historic PsycINFO to identify literature published as early as the 1920s. Links occur to full-text when available.
The Right Tools for the Job - Literature Searching for Evidence-Based Practice
Google Scholar alone is not sufficient for identifying evidence.
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More about Google Scholar and LibrariesComparison of Google Scholar and library databases and how to access library subscription content through Google Scholar.
Asking the Clinical Question
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Evidence-Based Practice for Nursing: Asking the Clinical QuestionExplains the difference between a background question and a foreground question and also differentiates between the types of clinical questions. From East Carolina University.
Strategies for Effective Searching, Part 1 (length: 4:37)
Strategies for Effective Searching, Part 2 (length: 6:08)
CINAHL: Keyword Searching Using PICO (length: 2:43)
CINAHL: Broadening Your Search (length: 3:05)
OPTIONAL - CINAHL - MeSH/Subject Heading Searching from EBSCO Support (length: 3:32)
This video from EBSCO shows how to start searching CINAHL Subject Headings from scratch. It does not use a PICO question example, but you can use the same process to identify subject headings for any of the keyword elements of your PICO(T) question.
Training Course (from the NLM): Using PubMed in Evidence-Based Practice
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Using PubMed in Evidence-Based Practice (NLM Training Course)When conducting research, evidence-based practice is a method for framing clinical questions that will help yield optimal search results. PubMed is a free research tool from the National Library of Medicine®. This course will show you how to use evidence-based practice when searching clinical questions using PubMed®.
Note: To search PubMed®, please use Wright State's link for PubMed rather than the PubMed.gov® URL. This will ensure that you can access WSU and OhioLINK subscriptions to full text articles.
The scenarios used in this tutorial are geared toward nurses, but the tips for how to develop search strategies can transfer to any clinical scenario.
NLM PubMed Interactive Tutorial: Find Articles on a Topic (approximate length: 1:00)
Tutorial credit: U.S. National Library of Medicine
NLM PubMed Interactive Tutorial: PubMed Subject Search: How It Works (approximate length: 4:00)
Tutorial credit: U.S. National Library of Medicine
OPTIONAL - Use MeSH to Build a Better PubMed Query (from NCBI)
This National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) video demonstrates how to build a search from scratch using MeSH. Although it is not a search on a PICO(T) question, the same process can be used to determine if there are relevant Medical Subject Headings for your population, intervention, comparison, and/or outcome.
For mental health topics-APA PsycINFO: Searching with the Thesaurus and Index Terms on EBSCOHost (by APA Publishing Training)
Mental health-related topics only - Using the Methodology Limiter in PsycINFO on EBSCOHost
Demonstrates ways to limit to specific types of research methodologies in PsycINFO.
Search Outcome - Tracking & Documenting Your Search Results
Ask A Librarian
Questions?
Ask your librarian!
Evidence Evaluation Table - Template and Sample
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Evidence Evaluation Table TemplateCopy and paste from this template to create the columns for your own Evidence Evaluation Table. [Online-only content for “Critical Appraisal of the Evidence: Part I,” by Fineout-Overholt and colleagues in the American Journal
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Sample Evidence Evaluation Table - CompletedThis is an example of an Evidence Evaluation with all of the elements filled in. [Online-only content for “Critical Appraisal of the Evidence: Part III,” by Fineout-Overholt and colleagues in the American Journal of Nursing,
November 2010, p. 43-51.] -
More EBP Resources for Nursing"How to" links, tutorials, articles, and videos covering all aspects of the process of Evidence-Based Practice.
AJN Series: Evidence-Based Practice: Step by Step
These persistent links allow Wright State University users to access these articles through WSU's subscription to AJN. Note: If off campus, you will be prompted for your campus w number and password before being taken to the article.
This collection of articles was authored by faculty from the Arizona State University College of Nursing and Health Innovation's Center for the Advancement of Evidence-Based Practice and published in the American Journal of Nursing (AJN)
APA Style
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Citing Your Sources-APASeveral good sources to help you with APA style. The Purdue OWL is particularly recommended for easy to understand examples.
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Annotated Student Sample APA PaperFrom apastyle.org .