1. After this course you will be able to:
PubMed and the Cochrane Library
After this course you will be able to:
Describe what makes PubMed different from other databases
Use filters to refine a basic search on PubMed
Use the advanced search feature on PubMed
Use the Clinical Queries feature on PubMed
Use the browse function on the Cochrane Library
Use the basic search function on the Cochrane Library

2. Pubmed.gov Main search box is at the top of the screen
You will get suggestions for your search based on the records on the database
Either press Return or click on Search to carry out your search

3. Using filters
Once you’ve done your search you can use the filters on the left-hand side of the screen to reduce the number of your search results.
You can filter by:
Type of study
Date of study
Language of study
Age groups
as well as lots of other ways!

4. Using filters - II
Here I’ve used the filters to limit my search on “Insomnia Therapy” to:
Clinical Trials
With full-text freely available
Published in the last five years
On adults aged between 19 and 44

5. Using Advanced Search
You can find Advanced Search underneath the main search box
Advanced Search allows you to:
Be more specific and narrow down your results
Be more flexible by building up a search strategy and combining it in different ways
Look for articles in particular journals or by particular authors

6. Using Advanced Search - II
Using Add to history to build a search
Using Add to history to build your search will allow you to combine searches together to get the best results
Type your search here
To build a search click here NOT on the Search button!

7. Using Advanced Search - III
You can use OR to search different terms at the same time

8. Using Advanced Search - IV
You can use # to combine different lines from your search strategy

9. Click here and select ‘MeSH terms’ from the drop-down men
Using MeSH terms
MESH – Medical Subject Headings is the way PubMed indexes its articles
You can search them by selecting them from the smaller, left-hand drop-down box
Click here and select ‘MeSH terms’ from the drop-down men
You can also use the drop-down boxes to search for articles from a particular journal or by a particular author

10. Downloading results from PubMed
Downloading results is PubMed’s Achilles heel – you don’t get a nice PDF or Word document like you do with some other databases. But it IS possible
2. Click on Send To
3. Choose which option you prefer. File or are best
1. Use the tick boxes to select which articles you want to download

11. My NCBI
You can register yourself for a My NCBI account. This allows you to:
Set up alerts
Add records to your bibliography
See what full-text articles you can get from the JET Library

12. My NCBI - II
You can register by clicking on the link on the log-in screen

13. My NCBI - III Once you have done your search you can:
3. Use Send to to create a bibliography of articles
1. Create an alert for new articles based on your search
2. See what articles are available to you locally
… and if you stay logged in as yourself you can also see searches you have done previously and re-run them

14. The Cochrane Library - I
Best place to look for systematic reviews
Also contains clinical trials
Compiled by volunteers from all over the world
Completely free – no user-name of password needed

15. The Cochrane Library - II
You can search using the search box in the top right-hand corner of the screen or use the Browse button to search through the different topics

16. The Cochrane Library - III
Your results are broken down into systematic reviews done by the Cochrane group; reviews done by other groups and clinical trials – you can read the full text of all the Cochrane reviews

17. The Cochrane Library - IV
You can also browse through the topics by subject area until you find what you are interested in

18. The Cochrane Library - V
Downloading results from the Cochrane Library
You can either click on the title of the reviews and download either the whole review or a summary - or download a list of reviews and trials to look at later
To download a list:
2. Click on Export selected
3. Leave the Export type as PC and click on Export Citation
1. Select the reviews you want using the tick boxes