LibGuides: Nursing & Midwifery: Databases

Databases for Nursing and Midwifery

Below are some key databases most relevant to nurses and midwives.

CINAHL Complete This link opens in a new window Covers nursing and allied health literature from 1982 to the present. Includes abstracts of journal articles, books, dissertations, and proceedings. Full text is included for selected state nursing journals and some newsletters, standards of practice, practice acts, government publications, research instruments and patient education material.
Medline ALL This link opens in a new window Ovid MEDLINE covers the international literature on biomedicine, including the allied health fields and the biological and physical sciences, humanities, and information science as they relate to medicine and health care. Information is indexed from approximately 5,400 journals published world-wide.
Embase This link opens in a new window Ovid database, covering biomedical and extensive amounts of pharmacological research dating back to 1974.
APA PsycINFO (1806 - present) This link opens in a new window APA PsycINFO is an electronic bibliographic database providing abstracts and citations to the scholarly literature in the psychological, social, behavioral, and health sciences. The database includes material of relevance to psychologists and professionals in related fields such as psychiatry, management, business, education, social science, neuroscience, law, medicine, and social work. Updated weekly, PsycINFO provides access to journal articles, books, chapters, and dissertations.
Maternity & Infant Care This link opens in a new window Maternity and Infant Care is an important essential resource for academics and healthcare professionals involved in the care of women and infants. This unique database contains over 120,000 references with abstracts to journal articles from over 550 international English language journals, books, and grey literature relating to pregnancy, labor, birth, postnatal care, and neonatal care and the first year of an infant's life. Database coverage is from the mid-1980s and approximately 1000 records are added to the database per month. The database also includes correspondence and commentary written in response to an article. Many of the records are assigned to one or more of 475 standard searches on key topics in order to provide fast retrieval, using either a code or a browsable index of topics.
Web of Science Core Collection This link opens in a new window Access to citation databases, journals and conference proceedings with current and retrospective coverage in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities. Includes Science Citation Index Expanded, Social Sciences Citation Index, Arts & Humanities Citation Index, Conference Proceedings Citation Index and Emerging Sources Citation Index.
Scopus This link opens in a new window SCOPUS is the world's largest bibliographic and citation database. It covers nearly 20,000 academic journals from a wide range of subjects and dates from 1996 to the present. SCOPUS will also be the source of the citation data which will be used by some of the Research Excellence Framework (REF) assessment panels. As well as carrying out literature searches, you can set up current awareness alerts, view citation counts, determine your h-index and assess the quality of journal titles. SCOPUS is part of the SciVerse suite of resources which is produced by Elsevier and includes the ScienceDirect electronic journals service.
Cochrane Library This link opens in a new window The Cochrane Library is a collection of six databases that contain different types of high-quality, independent evidence to inform healthcare decision-making: Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (CDSR); Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL); Cochrane Methodology Register (CMR); Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects (DARE); Health Technology Assessment Database (HTA); NHS Economic Evaluation Database (EED).

Grey Literature

Grey literature is material that is created outside of academic or commercial channels . Some useful sources of grey literature are listed below, although this is not an exhaustive list.

Quick Guide to Using Databases

Before you begin to search the databases, it is important that you develop a well-planned comprehensive search strategy.

Break your search/topic into 2 or 3 key concepts.

Think of alternative keywords and synonyms for each concept including spelling variations.

For databases such as CINAHL and Medline, enter each search term one at a time. If the term is available as a subject heading (blue, highlighted and underlined) select it. If not, select the term as a keyword found at the bottom of the page.

Use Boolean operators (AND & OR) to connect search terms together.

OR is used to combine the similar terms. It tells the database that any one of the search terms can be present in the results. It broadens your results.

AND is used to combine the key concepts. It tells the database to retrieve results that contain all the search terms. It narrows your results.

Example:

What are nurse's experiences of providing end of life care to children?

Concept 1		Concept 2		Concept 3
Nurses		End of life		Children
OR		OR		OR
Nursing staff		Terminal care		Child
OR	*AND*	OR	*AND*	OR
Paediatric nurses		Palliative care		Paediatric
OR		OR		OR
Pediatric nurses		Hospice care		Pediatric

Limits such as date range and English language can be used to narrow your results. Searches can be saved, you just need to set up an account within the database.

To watch a short video on how to use CINAHL and Medline click on the database videos tab on top of this page. If you require further help on using the databases or carrying out a literature search please get in touch.