What is grey literature and where can it be found What is grey literature and where can it be found? Alan Glasper and Colin Rees   Sam and Sue have been asked by their supervisors to ensure that all aspects of grey literature have been explored and reflected in their literature review. How to Write Your Nursing Dissertation, First Edition. Alan Glasper and Colin Rees. © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Published 2013 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Sue is not at all clear how to identify ‘grey literature’ and is concerned that she may miss a vital component to her literature search. Grey literature is mainly composed of any literature that is not formally published in usual publishing formats such as text books or journal articles. Alberani (1990)

grey literature is not grey! It comes in a variety of colours and sizes The term grey literature refers primarily to papers, reports, or other documents produced and published by, for example, Strategic Health Authorities, NHS Trusts, Governmental agencies, universities and other groups such as the NMC.

Grey literature Although the internet has made a huge difference to how grey literature is sourced many of these documents can be difficult to obtain. For example many PhD theses have to be borrowed from individual university libraries.

Where can grey literature be found ? The World Wide Web has become the portal for grey literature in the 21st century. The Health Management Information Consortium (HMIC) database brings together the bibliographic database of two UK health and social care management organizations: the Department of Health's Library and Information Services (DH-Data) and King’s Fund Information and Library Service. http://www.ovid.com/site/catalog/DataBase/99.jsp?top=2&mid=3&bottom=7&subsection=10

Important grey literature Websites Portals Quality sources of Internet resources, excellent starting points for web-based research. Intute - evaluated Internet resources in Nursing, Midwifery and Allied Health Professions. NHS Evidence -  comprehensive listing of all NHS websites including the latest guidance and specialist e-libraries.

What about Google scholar? Scholar is essentially a citation index, in other words papers have to be cited by other authors before they appear on the site, it is however a very a useful resource. http://scholar.google.co.uk/

References Alberani V., Pietrangeli P., Mazza M. R. (1990) The use of grey literature in health sciences: a preliminary survey. Bull Med Libr Assoc 78(4) pp. 358-362