MEDLINE


    Table of Contents:

    MEDLINE is the National Library of Medicine's premier bibliographic database covering the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, the health care system, and the preclinical sciences.  MEDLINE contains bibliographic citations, author abstracts,and full text articles from more than 4,600 biomedical journals published in the United States and 70 other countries. The file contains over 11 million citations dating back to the mid-1960s.

    Getting Started 

    • Go to http://www.library.hunter.cuny.edu and select databases from the purple navigation side bar
    •  Find the MEDLINE (EBSCO) database from the database grid and choose either: 
      • Yellow Box (if working on a Hunter Computer or if you have the proxy server account at home)
      • Green House (if working on a Hunter Computer or if you are using your library barcode at home)
    If you wish to learn more about the database click Help at any time. 

    Planning Your Search
    Before beginning your search, be sure to develop a strategy. Try breaking your topic into separate concepts. Searches can be refined by connecting these concepts with Boolean operators:
     

    AND used when you want items containing all specified words narrows your search
    adolescents 
        AND
    Pregnancy
    OR used when you want items containing either term 
     (usually synonyms)    		 broadens your search 
    teenager
    OR
    adolescents
    NOT used to exclude a term use with caution!! 
        AIDS 
         NOT 
      hearing
    search terms can be truncated with an asterisk (*), e.g. adolescen* retrieves records which include the terms adolescents, adolescent, and adolescence.

    Searching in MEDLINE
    MEDLINE offers 2 different ways of searching for a topic: Keyword Search and MeSH which uses a thesaurus to build your search.

    Keyword Search 

    • Keyword or free-text searching is a good way to get started in MEDLINE. In order to execute a keyword search, go to the  tab (you should already be on it) and enter your keyword statement (e.g. breast cancer) in the textbox labeled Find. Then, click the Search button. 
    • If you are unsatisfied with your search you can refine your search by entering additional text into the textboxes at any time. Choose between the 3 boolean operators: AND, OR , and NOT mentioned above to refine your search. For example, breast cancer AND diagnosis. Click Search after each entry for new results.
    • Advanced Keyword Search: The 3 drop-down boxes on the right labeled Default Fields give further help in defining your search. Limit your search by opting to search  for terms in specific parts of records, e.g. author, title or publication year.


    Searching MeSH 
    Often more effective than keyword searching, using MEDLINE's thesaurus allows you to utilize the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH). This method of searching will retrieve articles whose primary focus is a particular topic, eliminating articles whose titles or abstracts merely mention that topic.

    The Basics

    •  To execute a thesaurus search click on the  tab from the Advanced Search page. Enter your search term, e.g. heart attack and click on the Browse button.
    • Make sure the Relevancy Ranked button is checked!
    • A list of ranked terms will appear. Select the most appropriate heading, e.g. myocardial infarction, by checking off the box. Add the term to your search by clicking Add. The term will appear in your Find box. Click Search to execute your search.
    • You can add additional MeSH terms to your search by using the Boolean operators AND, OR or NOT. 


    Expert
    For more information on a heading, e.g. myocardial infarction, click on the term itself. This will link to a page that displays the tree view, subheadings, and other options for searching your term. 
    You have the option to further define your search by selecting Explode, Major Concept or a Subheading.

    • Selecting Major Concepts will narrow your search. The database will retrieve articles in which myocardial infarction is the main focus.
    • Selecting Explode broadens your search. The database will include myocardial infarction and all narrower terms listed below the heading.
    • Subheadings: Select a subheading to include it in your search. Not choosing any subheadings will include all terms listed and broaden your search.
    • After selecting your heading click Add to add the term to your search.

      Tree Views: Shows the position of your term in the hierarchical order from broad to narrow.
      Clicking on a Subheading will bring up Scope Note - a pop-up window with a definition of your term. 
       

    Refine Search 
    You can narrow your search by clicking on the  tab and by limiting your search results in a number of ways including: publication year, journal subset, publication type, gender or age

    Search History 
    The  tab displays a history of the search you have done. You can merge different keywords of past and present search results by combining the search terms in your Find field.


     

    • Click in the Add to Search box to add a term to your  current search. Then click the add button.
    • The Search ID has been added to your Find field. Click Search to display new results.
    • You can also retrieve previous searches, save or print your search history, and create alerts from this screen.


    Results
    Search Results are posted on the results page. 

    FullText 

      Online Articles: Articles that display the Linked Full Text or Html Full Text  link have an online version of the article available. Click on these links to view the articles, which will be in either HTML or PDF format.
    Printing and Downloading Records 
    • To print, e-mail or save an article or citation save it to your folder.
    • To view the contents of your folder click View Folder  from the menu in the top right corner. Now you can print, e-mail or save your results. 
    Important: When viewing an article in PDF Full Text format always use the buttons provided by Adobe Acrobat to print or save a document. 
    Don't use the buttons of your browser!

    Exiting Medline 

    • To exit, click on the x in the upper right-hand corner of your browser or select the pull-down File menu and select Exit.


    Warning: If the database is idle for more than 10 minutes you may lose information that's in your folder!

    Search MEDLINE now!

    For help contact the Librarians.


                                                                                                   Created by Christine Dierk