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Literature Searching for Research

Literature Searching for Research. Catherine Ebenezer Library and Information Service October 2011. Purposes of literature searching. Identify extent and quality of work already carried out in the subject area Identify key contacts Avoid duplication!. Planning your search: PICO.

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Literature Searching for Research

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  1. Literature Searching for Research Catherine EbenezerLibrary and Information ServiceOctober 2011

  2. Purposes of literature searching • Identify extent and quality of work already carried out in the subject area • Identify key contacts • Avoid duplication!

  3. Planning your search: PICO • Patient/population/problem • Intervention/exposure • Comparison/control (may be implicit) • Outcomes

  4. Try it for yourselves! • Effect of different types of flooring on incidence of falls in frail elderly people • Are ACE inhibitors effective in delaying admission to nursing/residential care for people with Alzheimer’s disease? • What interventions can reduce challenging behaviour in dementia?

  5. A search framework: 1 • Identify synonyms for each search concept as identified in your PICO framework • Use Boolean OR to combine synonyms for each PICO component • Use Boolean AND to combine the grouped PICO components to execute your search

  6. A search framework: 2

  7. Search techniques: 1 To increase the number of results you retrieve: • Combine free text with subject headings using OR • Truncate • Stem: e.g. psychiatr* retrieves psychiatrist, psychiatric • Internal / wildcard: Schultz or Schulz? Schul?z will find both • Explode • Expands database subject headings to include narrower terms • e.g. exp Dementia/ will include Alzheimer’s disease, vascular dementia, Lewy body dementia etc.

  8. Search techniques: 2 To increase the number of results you retrieve: • Related articles – from any relevant article • Cited by – for key papers • Reference lists in CINAHL

  9. Search techniques: 3 To restrict / decrease the number of results you retrieve: • Use ‘restrict to focus’ / ‘major descriptors’ • Add more subject terms to your search strategy • Select subheadings (only if you are really swamped!) • Use limit features • Language - English • Age group – your target population • Publication type – consider searching for reviews only • Date range – most recent • Use clinical filters

  10. Types of literature: 1 Primary literature • Journal articles • Preprints • Conference proceedings • Informally published reports – (“grey literature”) • Theses

  11. Types of literature: 2 Secondary literature • Reviews • Books: edited collections • Books: monographs / surveys • Official publications • CATs, POEMs etc.

  12. Sources for literature searching: 1 • Databases of articles and books • Bibliographic e.g. MEDLINE, PsycINFO • Full text e.g. PsycArticles, Cochrane Database • Library cataloguese.g. COPAC, British Library, LIBERO • Research databasese.g. NIHR Portfolio Database / NIHR Research Portal, Virginia Henderson International Nursing Library (USA), Research Register for Social Care

  13. Sources for literature searching: 2 • … not forgetting … • Hand searching of core journals • Reference lists / footnote chasing • Printed bibliographies (older material) • Search engines (NB Google Scholar, Google Books) • Specialised Web portals • Picking colleagues’ brains / contacting key researchers – can yield unpublished material • Social networking with other researchers

  14. Characteristics of the literature Mental health literature is problematic • multidisciplinary • “poorly controlled” in some areas • scattered across many different databases: • none is comprehensive • all need to be looked at in a thorough searchBrettle A J and Long A F (2001) Comparison of bibliographic databases for information on the rehabilitation of people with severe mental illness. Bull Med Libr Assoc 89(4) 353-361

  15. Bibliographic databases: 1 MEDLINE ATHENS • 4000+ journals indexed; 1948- • Produced by National Library of Medicine (USA) • Available free at www.pubmed.gov and via NHS Evidence • European journals not particularly well covered • Mental health coverage reasonable • Strong on acute medical specialities • PubMed version has useful ‘related articles’ feature

  16. Bibliographic databases: 2 Psychological Abstracts(PsycINFO, PsycLIT, ClinPsyc) ATHENS • Produced by American Psychological Association: 1806- • Not available anywhere free, but short-term access via web can be purchased • Covers all aspects of psychology • Comprehensive but some US bias

  17. Bibliographic databases: 3 EMBASE ATHENS • European commercial product: 1980- • Comprehensive psychiatry coverage • Strong on pharmacology and drug therapy issues • Thesaurus terms very “old-fashioned” • First resort!N.B. OVID EMBASE now includes non-overlapping MEDLINE records

  18. Bibliographic databases: 4 CINAHL ATHENS • Covers nursing, allied health professions, health management, health librarianship; 1982- • Recent records include references – can search – good for tracking down older material • US bias but increasingly strong coverage of UK and Australasian literature • Good for psychiatric nursing • Includes detailed abstracts of US / Canadian nursing theses • Some journals very obscure

  19. Bibliographic databases: 5 Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection ATHENS • 575 full text publications • nearly 550 peer-reviewed titles • covers emotional and behavioural characteristics, psychiatry and psychology, mental processes, anthropology, and observational and experimental methods

  20. Bibliographic databases: 6 AMED ATHENS • Produced in UK by British Library: 1985- • Allied and Complementary Medicine • Aims to complement MEDLINE • Best source of UK allied health literature

  21. Bibliographic databases: 7 Cochrane Library • Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews • NHS Economic Evaluations Database (EED) • NHS CRD Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effectiveness (DARE) • HTA Database • Cochrane Methodology Register • Central Register of Controlled Trials

  22. Bibliographic databases: 8 Citation indexes • Identify a significant piece of published research in your field • Find out who has cited it in later work • Web of Science citation indexes(available in university libraries) • OVID databases – ‘ find citing articles’ feature • Google Scholar • BMJ Journals

  23. Bibliographic databases: 9 Others … • ChildData (child health and welfare) • ASSIA (applied social sciences) • Social Care Online (social work) • OTSeeker (occupational therapy) • PEDRO (physiotherapy) • HMIC (health management) ATHENS • Dissertation Abstracts

  24. BiblioSleep: sleep Autism Data autism /ASD Aegis: AIDS-HIV NARIC: disability CIRRIE: rehabilitation PIE: mental health policy Campbell Collaboration: social policy reviews CAMEOL: complementary therapies speechBITE – speech pathology BEI:education (UK) ERIC:education (US) Alcohol Concern Knowledge Base: alcohol DrugData: substance misuse PEP-WEB: psychoanalysis Health Systems Evidence: health management Dementia Catalogue PsycBITE – psychological effects of ABI Bibliographic databases: 10lots of web-accessible databases on specialist areas:

  25. Bibliographic databases: 11 Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com • Incorporates results from • bibliographic databases (e.g. MEDLINE) • preprint servers and institutional repositories • library catalogues • publishers’ catalogues • Ranks results by relevance (how?) • Links to: • full text where available (NB links to content of TEWV e-journals on site) • references citing the work • ‘related articles’ • Can use limits and Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT)BUT – what does it contain? And not contain? Inconsistent!

  26. Specialist search engines • Scirus: scientific content - includes scientists' homepages, courseware, pre-print server material, institutional repository and website information • OAIster: institutional repository content • SHERPA Search: full-text search of UK repositories • OpenDOAR: world-wide directory of open access institutional repositories • EThOs – BL electronic theses online

  27. Specialist portals Useful for background information, contacts • NHS Evidence • National Institute for Mental Health in England • Centre for Mental Health • PsychNet-UK • Psychology Wiki • PsychCentral • BrainSource.com

  28. Current awareness bulletins Electronic tables of contents Subject-based alerting RSS feeds Monitoring changes in web pages Health news services Saved searches in health databases Netvibes portal: www.netvibes.com/tewv.lis Current awareness services

  29. Managing your references • Many bibliographic databases will allow you to export and save your search results in different formats (e.g. XML, WebCharts, HTML, PDF, tagged text) and / or email them to yourself or to other people • Bibliographic management applications can be used to manage references. These let you: • collect and organise references from many different resources into your own personal, searchable database • create formatted bibliographies and reading lists • develop lists of cited articles as footnotes or as endnotes at the conclusion of papers

  30. Installed on your PC EndNote Reference Manager ProCite JabRef (free!) Web-based RefWorks Connotea (free!) CiteULike (free!) Mendeley (free!) Managing your references Wikipedia article: Comparison of reference management software

  31. Research information: 1 Current / ongoing research • NIHR portal and National Research Register archive: ongoing and recently-completed research projects funded by or of interest to the NHS • Research Register for Social Care: current and completed UK social care research • NIH RePORTER (USA): federally-funded biomedical research • Current Controlled Trials: information about RCTs • Database of Uncertainties about the Effects of Treatment: publishes uncertainties about the effects of treatment which cannot currently be answered via systematic reviews

  32. Research information: 2 Current / ongoing research • Mental Health Research Network • Dementias and Neurodegenerative Diseases Research Network • RCN Research and Development Co-ordinating Centre

  33. Research information: 3 Guidance and funding for researchers: national • Association of Medical Research Charities: good practice in research • RDInfo / RDFunding: training, funding opportunities, advice • Research Councils UK

  34. Research information: 4 Guidance and funding for researchers: local • Mental Health Research Centreat Durham University • SPIRE seminars • Involvement in MHRN studies • Research clinics • Research training: modules in research methods up to master’s level

  35. Catherine EbenezerLibrary and Information Services Manager catherine.ebenezer@tewv.nhs.uk01642 838380 / 838112

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