The MEDLINE database ( maintained by the National Library of Medicine in Bethesda, Maryland, USA at https://igm.nlm.nih.gov/ is the best way of retrieving medical information today. This database has over 10 million references, and indexes all articles published in reputed medical journals from all over the world. Today, doctors can do their own Medline searches, free of charge , through the internet, to find the latest information on any medical topic.
If you are looking for a general topic, then doing a Medline search is quite easy. However, finding specific information can be tricky. Also, many doctors complain that they end up retrieving articles which are of little clinical use. As with anything else, you need to practise till you learn how to do it well. The good news is that its quite easy to learn to do this well !
Creating a search phrase is the most important step in finding the documents that you want – remember – Garbage In, Garbage Out. If you do not look for the right terms and keywords, you may not find what you need, and this can be very frustrating ! Natural Language Searching (NLS) is the default method the search engine uses to find articles related to your query. Basically, the search engine will find all documents containing ANY of the words in your phrase. Fuzzy logic is then applied to rank the documents by number of matched words and number of times the words appear. Remember that you will achieve better results by using several relevant words or a phrase, rather than a single word, to conduct your search. Searches are conducted on all of the MEDLINE fields which include: author(s), article title, abstract, MeSH terms, journal abbreviation, and publication type.
Tips to refine Your Medline Search
You can use the following techniques to further narrow your search and achieve better results:
- Boolean operators: words such as AND, OR, and NOT may be used to specifically include or exclude words and topics in your search.
- Parentheses may be used to define logical expression order. The parentheses help to group words and/or commands that should be examined first.
- Quotes can be used to define a search phrase. For example, to search for lung cancer, you can enter "lung cancer" and it will find those words in sequence.
- Proximity: append words together with "w/x" to find words within x words of each other.
- Wildcards may be used in search words to fill in unknown or ambiguous sections of the word. This is most useful when you need to find related terms with varied endings. A wildcard is represented by the "*" character.
EXAMPLE: If you would like to find articles on pulmonary infections in immunocompromised hosts, but dont want articles on tuberculosis and viral pneumonia, use the search phrase: pulmonary infections w/5 immunocompromised-hosts NOT (tuberculo* OR viral pneumonia)
GO TO INDEX PAGE
canadian pharmacy reviews canadian online pharmacy online canadian pharmacy canadian pharmacy online canadian pharmacy online
gambling on internet online casino casino online games for money casino money real casino gambling
cialis buy in uk cialis cheap cialis black cialis online can you buy cialis online
safe place order cialis online cheapest generic cialis online real cialis pills can cut cialis pills half buycialis.eu