search the lit the beginning 2016
TRANSCRIPT
Searching the Literature:the Beginning
MARY SHAH, MLS, AHIPHORBLIT HEALTH SCIENCES LIBRARYDANBURY [email protected]
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Search StrategyPlan your search at first: the
process will be more effective. 1.Focus on what you seek & think about which resources would best have the answer.2.Break down the query in basic terms.3.Choose the research method.4.Search each point separately.5.Combine these subjects with AND, OR, NOT (these are Boolean Operators).6.Focus your search with limits.
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PICO
PICO can be used to help break down your question
• Patient or Population: How would I describe a group of patients similar to mine?
• Intervention: Which main intervention, prognosis, or exposure am I considering?
•Comparison: What is the main alternative to compare with the intervention?
•Outcome: What can I hope to accomplish, measure, improve or affect?
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Where to search?
• Basic Reference = Search engine like Google
• Background or Introduction = textbook• Research Article = database like
CINAHL or Pub Med• Practice = Cochrane, DynaMed,
Nursing Reference Center
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Choosing the Evidence
Meta‐analyses
Systematic reviews
Randomized controlled trials
Cohort studies
Case‐control studies
Case series and case reports
Animal and laboratory research
Higher Quality Percentage of the
literature
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What does this mean?Evidence-based practice is the
systemic application of scientific findings to clinical practice and
decision making.
Tools already exist to rate the quality of
study and its ability to inform the scientific
community.
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Boolean? Halloween meat?
George Boole brought together philosophy and math by inventing a logic that worked well with computers: the answer is either true or false.
For your search, this means you can combine two search terms using the connectors: AND, OR, NOT.
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Combining search termsAND
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Another possibilityOR
Fall*
Patientcancer
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Another possibilityNOT
Fall*
Patientcancer
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Truncation?! Are we going someplace w/ an elephant?
• Truncation is a short-cut to include all the possibilities:
fall*= fall, falls, falling, fallen, and so forth…
• Wildcards fill in for variations:
Reali?e = realize, realise
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Not just for dialogue any more
Quotation marks force the database to look for that specific combination of words.
In CINAHL:
• Practice Guideline without quotes: 90,812 results• Practice Guideline with quotes: 3,656 results
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10 Minutes
If you’re taking more than ten minutes to find what you need, stop and contact us. You are the health professional and we are the information specialists. Fax, phone or email—it’s not interrupting, it’s our job.
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Horblit Health Sciences Library
Amanda Pomeroy, [email protected]
Mary Shah, MLS, [email protected]