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Nurse Residents

Tutorial

Key Points

  •  Always access PubMed from a library website
  • Start your search using Keywords
  • Always check Search details box to see how PubMed interprets your search (be mindful of matched MeSH terms and use of ANDs and ORs)
  • Click on Temple's Find Full Text link to get to full-text of articles
  • Create a My NCBI account to save searches and citations

Limiting Your Search

  • You can narrow your results with filters for article types, ages, publication dates, etc.
  • A few filters are available to the left of your search results
  • For more filters click show additional filters or more
  • Click on filters you would like to activate
  • Filters remain in effect until you clear them
  • **Using filters will exclude current articles that are not fully indexed**

Keyword vs. MeSH Searching

 Keyword search

•Tries to automatically map to MeSH as well as searching terms in All Fields

•More comprehensive, will include more recent citations that haven’t been indexed yet

•Necessary for new and emerging topics and trademarked names

 

MeSH search

•Using MeSH subject headings is more focused and precise

•Can limit to major topic and use subheadings to focus on a specific aspect of a topic

•Use when automatic term mapping is not effective. See definitions of MeSH terms and choose the best one(s) for your concept.

•Will not find newest article citations that have yet to be indexed

MeSH Database

 Use the MeSH (Medical Subject Headings) Database to:

•Locate and select MeSH terms for use in PubMed searches

•See the definition and other helpful information for a MeSH term

•See the position of MeSH terms in the hierarchy and find narrower or broader terms if needed

•Select MeSH heading/subheading combinations to build a PubMed search