searching to inform your decisions

Welcome!Searching

www.healthevidence.org to Inform Your Decisions

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• Use Q&A to post comments / questions during the webinar– ‘Send’ questions to All (not

privately to ‘Host’)

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Q&A

Participant Side Panel in WebExHousekeeping

Welcome!Searching

www.healthevidence.org to Inform Your Decisions

The Health Evidence Team

Maureen Dobbins

Scientific Director

Heather HussonManager

Susannah WatsonProject Coordinator

Robyn TraynorPublications Consultant

Research Assistants

Yaso Gowrinathan

Kelly Graham

Kristin Read

Emily Sully

Alice Wang

StudentsReza Yousefi Nooraie PhD candidate)

Jennifer YostAssistant Professor

What is www.healthevidence.org?

Evidence

Decision Making

inform

CommunityHealth Issues,Local Context

ResearchEvidence

Public HealthResources

Community and Political Preferences

and Actions

Public HealthExpertise

A Model for Evidence-Informed Decision Making

National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools. (revised 2012). A Model for Evidence-Informed Decision-Making in Public Health (Fact Sheet). [http://www.nccmt.ca/pubs/FactSheet_EIDM_EN_WEB.pdf]

Stages in the process of Evidence-Informed Public Health

National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools. Evidence-Informed Public Health. [http://www.nccmt.ca/eiph/index-eng.html]

6S Pyramid

National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools. Search Pyramid. [http://www.nccmt.ca/eiph/search-eng.html]

Sample Search #1

• Are community based ‘challenges or contests’ an effective way to create behaviour change in community members?

• Are school based ‘challenges or contests’ an effective way to create behaviour change in students?

• P• I challenges OR contests

• C• O behaviour change

Considerations

• Searching with term ‘challenge’ produces all abstracts containing the word ‘challenge’ (e.g., “... The challenge of this review is ....”)

– Will produce greater, less relevant results

• Identify synonym terms that may produce more precise results, e.g., competition

• Use ‘Advanced Search’ limits to narrow a large results set

– Setting = community– Setting = school

‘competition’ = 14 results

+ setting ‘community ‘= 7 results

+ setting ‘school’ = 6 results

Sample Search #2

• Are physical activity interventions effective for falls prevention in adults 55+

• Are home safety interventions effective for falls prevention in adults 55+

• P Adults 55+

• I

• C• O Decrease in falls

Considerations

• Health Evidence database population category is 60+ – Modify population in question to 60+, or search for BOTH adults

(20-59) AND senior (60+) age categories and screen more results to capture the 55-60 age range

• To capture variations of ‘falls prevention’, use wildcard– fall* prevent*– This will search (fall OR falls OR fallen OR falling) AND (prevent

OR preventing OR prevention) – all variants of each term

• Use ‘Advanced Search’ Limits to narrow large results sets

– Start with a broad search, and continue to apply additional limits to create a smaller, more relevant results set

– Prioritize strong quality reviews published within the last 5 years

‘fall* prevent*’ Limit ‘population > Senior 60+’ = 76 results

+ topic ‘physical activity’ = 26 resultsLimit ‘review quality > strong’Limit ‘publication date 2010-2014’ = 5 results

+ topic ‘injury prevention/safety’ = 63 results + setting ‘home’ = 41 results

Limit ‘review quality > strong’Limit ‘publication date 2010-2014’ = 10 results

Sample Search #3

• What types of interventions are effective in helping improve preconception health of women?

• P Reproductive-age women

• I

• C• O Improved preconception health

Considerations

• Identify synonym terms to capture all potentially relevant results, e.g., ‘pre-pregnancy’

• Use quotes for multiple-term phrases, e.g., “pre-pregnancy”

– Quotes return results that only contain the phrase within “”

• Use wildcard to capture variations of ‘preconception’– preconception*

– This will search (preconception OR preconceptional)

• Use ‘Advanced Search’ Limits to narrow a large results set

– Prioritize strong quality reviews published within the last 5 years

‘preconception* OR “pre-pregnancy”’ = 15 results

Limit ‘review quality > strong’Limit ‘publication date 2010-2014’ = 4 results

Beyond the ‘SEARCH’

Other resources on www.healthevidence.org• Upcoming & archived webinars

• EIDM support – Practice tools– Face-to-face knowledge broker consultation

Thank you!

Contact us: info@healthevidence.org