LibGuides: Nursing: Overview

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Introduction to Library Research in Nursing

Research in Nursing primarily means searching for journal articles, which you will mostly find in the databases CINAHL (the index for nursing and allied health professionals) and PubMed (the largest biomedical research database in the world). You will find links to these databases and other help with nursing research on this research guide.

Frequently Used Databases for Nursing

Start your search in the databases listed below. Other helpful databases may be found in the A to Z list in this Nursing guide.

AccessMedicine
Medical and health care books, including Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine. Updated daily.

Designed for direct access to the information necessary for evaluations, diagnoses, case management decisions, conducting research, medical education, or self-assessment and board review. To access the mobile version, optimized for viewing on iPhones and other PDAs, register for a My AccessMedicine profile from any on-site computer. Once you have done so, you can log on to the site using your My AccessMedicine username & password. [Mobile-friendly URL: http://go.umflint.edu/am]
CINAHL Complete
Primary journal index for nursing and allied health professions.

1937-present. Covers nursing, biomedicine, health sciences librarianship, alternative/complementary medicine, consumer health, and 17 allied health disciplines. Includes journal articles, evidence-based care sheets, health care books, nursing dissertations, selected conference proceedings, standards of practice, educational software, audiovisuals, and book chapters.
Cochrane Library
Evidence-based medicine. Systematic reviews of literature and other reviews of recent evidence in all areas of health care.

Includes these components:

The Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (CDSR) is the leading resource for systematic reviews in health care. Each Cochrane Review is a peer-reviewed systematic review that has been prepared and supervised by a Cochrane Review Group (editorial team) in The Cochrane Collaboration according to the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions or Cochrane Handbook for Diagnostic Test Accuracy Reviews. Currently there are over 5000 Cochrane Reviews including nearly 2,000 protocols providing an explicit description of the research methods and objectives for Cochrane Reviews in progress. Existing Reviews are updated as new information becomes available.

The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) includes details of published articles taken from bibliographic databases (notably MEDLINE and EMBASE), and other published and unpublished sources. CENTRAL records include the title of the article, information on where it was published (bibliographic details) and, in many cases, a summary of the article. They do not contain the full text of the article. About three-fifths of the records in CENTRAL are taken from MEDLINE. Also, each Cochrane Review Group maintains and updates a collection of controlled trials relevant to its own area of interest, these are called ‘Specialized Registers’. Each Cochrane Review Group may also collect items that are not relevant to its own field of interest; these are known as ‘Handsearch Results’.

Cochrane Clinical Answers (CCAs) provide a readable, digestible, clinically-focused entry point to rigorous research from Cochrane Reviews. They are designed to be actionable and to inform point-of-care decision-making. Each CCA contains a clinical question, a short answer, and data for the outcomes from the Cochrane Review deemed most relevant to practising healthcare professionals, our target audience. The evidence is displayed in a user-friendly tabulated format that includes narratives, data, and links to graphics. Cochrane Clinical Answers were developed by Cochrane Innovations and Wiley.
DynaMed Plus
Evidence-based point-of-care clinical reference tool for health care professionals. Clinically-organized summaries for more than 3,000 topics. Install on mobile device.
MEDLINE via FirstSearch
1965-present. Covers clinical medicine, nutrition, pathology, education, psychiatry, experimental medicine, toxicology, health services administration, nursing.
MEDLINE via Ovid
A different interface to Medline, the primary database offered by PubMed. This link is to the login page for Medline via UM-Medsearch. Use your uniqname and UMICH password to login to "Authenticated Sign-on."

1946-present. MEDLINE is widely recognized as the premier source for bibliographic and abstract coverage of biomedical literature. MEDLINE encompasses information from Index Medicus, Index to Dental Literature, and International Nursing, as well as other sources of coverage in the areas of allied health, biological and physical sciences, humanities and information science as they relate to medicine and health care, communication disorders, population biology, and reproductive biology.
PsycINFO
1887-present. Includes journals, books, book chapters, technical reports, & dissertations in psychology. Can be searched together with PsycARTICLES and PsycTESTS.
PubMed
Largest biomedical research database worldwide. Always start searches for Nursing literature here or in CINAHL. This interface to Medline is publicly available, and thus will be accessible to you after graduation from UM-Flint.

PubMed indexes over 4,000 biomedical, nursing, dentistry and related journals, with over 21 million citations in MEDLINE, PreMEDLINE and related databases. PubMed is produced by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) and provides links between article citations and relevant data in other NCBI ENTREZ databases, including Nucleotide and Protein Sequences, Protein Structures, Complete Genomes, Taxonomy, and others.

Includes journal literature, 1950-present; selected online books. This version uses Outside Tool to link to resources at U-M Flint.

CoCites, "a citation-based method for searching scientific literature," is a Chrome- and Firefox-compatible browser plugin you can use with PubMed.
UpToDate
Point-of-care database to support clinical decision making in patient care.Click here for directions for mobile download..

Covers 9,100+ topics in 20 specialties; graded treatment recommendations; links to referenced articles (when available); drug database & drug interactions program, including adult, pediatric, international, & natural drugs with drug-to-drug, drug-to-herb and herb-to-herb interactions; medical calculators.
Visible Body
Why choose this? Visible Body is an interactive visual database of the human body, with thousands of 3D models, animations, CTI & MRI scans, definitions, pronunciations, and more. Instructors can use Courseware for assignments and tracking students' progress.
Target audience: Students in the health sciences and biology.
What it covers: Five modules (with mobile apps) covering anatomy, physiology, muscles, and pathology.
Special instructions: You must create a user account with your umich.edu email. Please use an up-to-date version of Firefox, Chrome, or Safari.

Our subscription includes these modules:
• Anatomy & Physiology: Covers cells & tissues, as well as the major systems of the human body.
• Human Anatomy Atlas: Comprehensive 3D atlas of the human body.
• Muscle Premium: Detailed guide to understanding how muscles and bones interact, and how common injuries and conditions occur.
• Physiology & Pathology: Interactive guide to core processes and common diseases of the human body.
• Physiology Animations: Video reference atlas with 3D animations that communicate core physiology and common conditions.

Apps for these modules are available for iPhone/iPad and Android devices. Quizzes must be completed on a computer.

Additional help