MASTERING PUBMED: BASICS

Learn what PubMed exactly is - and importantly what it is not. Understand how computers and humans "think" differently when searching. And that there are different "tags" in databases. Both these facts are very important for doing a good search.

Learn to create an "NCBI" account for yourself, in PubMed. With this, you create "your personal space" in PubMed, to save your search efforts. You can also customize your search efforts, by some features like highlighting your search terms in results.

There are four principles of searching that are applicable to searching PubMed and many other databases. For some resources only three or less of these principles may be applicable. The first principle is based on the fact that computers and humans "think" differently. The second and third principle are based on tagging search terms, and how tagging helps do a better search. The fourth principle is about correctly combining two or more search terms.

Having learned the four principles - you now learn to apply them while searching... from simple searches to slightly complex searches. Learn how to apply tags and operators correctly and about the importance of the correct order of search terms and tags.

Learn how to use the MeSH database correctly, in order to use descriptive tags while searching PubMed. You will learn all the elements of MeSH Terms, and how to run a search from the MeSH database itself. MeSH being the most important element in PubMed - one that helps us reduce trash in our search results, this lesson is the longest, and most important to learn.

An online demo of searching simple to slightly complex topics, specially to explain how all features in the MeSH database have to be used in varied contexts.

PubMed has three different sets of display formats for search results - i) Number of results, ii) Order of display of results and iii) Different formats of displaying results. Each format has a specific use. Different permutations and combinations from the three sets are possible, based on your need. Experiment with some, and be ready to use the best when your individual need arises.

Filters are options to narrow down your search results in a number of ways. Filters are like the options you have in online shopping - brand / price etc. In this lesson, you learn about all filter options available in PubMed and more importantly how they work, and how you can combine filters in several ways.

The steps that you take to do a search - may be simply typing in the search box, or going to the MeSH database and adding terms and searching. You may apply one or more filters. Searching may be one or several steps. You don't want to repeat the entire operation if you wish to search on the topic again. If you have created your My NCBI account and are logged, you can easily save the strategy and re-run it any time. Then when you wish to save all or selected result items, there are several ways in which you can do this too. Some require you to login, some can be done without being logged in. Some methods help you save results offline and some, online. Learn about all these methods and use the best ones in your own context.

Have you noted down a reference at a conference / CME or just when your friend told you about it? And wanted to read the whole paper, but realized that you did not have all details needed to find the article? Introducing the "Single Citation Matcher"- a feature in PubMed by which you can locate any item in PubMed in just around 15 seconds!