Physician Assistant

Title or Title /Abstract Searching:

• searches for your terms in the title field of the record only or title/abstract fields
• will help narrow or focus a search
• when Title and Abstract are selected from the drop menu, the code is applied to the whole search box
• spelling counts - not all databases will offer autocorrect options

Use the drop menu and select the Title option

• or the Title and Abstract option

Author Search:

• searches for your words in the author field only
• authors frequently publish under various forms of their name (e.g. Smith, JA; Smith, J; Smith, John A; Smith, J. Aaron; etc.). It is best to search using last name with just the first initial.
• CINAHL - use the drop menu and select the Author option (see title search example)

Understand what the CINAHL filters are actually filtering: 

Geographic Subset:

• Selecting USA (or any other country or countries) within this filter limits the results to journals published in the selected locations or content focused on the U.S. population - Not the locations where the study was conducted.

Location of Practice:

• Selecting a country or countries within this filter limits the results to the country or region where the study or practice was conducted. Selecting "United States" here will return articles describing studies or practices that took place in the U.S.

Publication Type:

• Use this filter to limit to Care Plans, Clinical Studies, Journal Article, Meta-Analysis, and much more. 

Evidence Based Practice:

An option in the Special Interest field. This filter will limit your results to:

• Articles from evidence-based practice journals
• Articles about evidence-based practice
• Research articles (including systematic reviews, clinical trials, meta analyses, etc.)
• Commentaries on research studies (applying practice to research)

Humans:

• Getting too many animal studies or in vitro studies? Use this filter to limit the results.

                                                             

Place phrases in Quotations Marks

• e.g. “Health expenditures” or “intensive care unit” or "Calgary Family Assessment"

Caveat: 

• Turns off automatic term mapping

Truncation and Wildcards:

• Can be used at the end or in the middle or a word
• Offers a way to easily search for words with multiple endings, variant spellings, or word groups
• Symbols are not universal – check database help as needed
• Any terms retrieved using either truncation or wildcard characters are not considered when sorting your results based on relevance

CINAHL: ( *  ?  # )

• The asterisk (*) matches multiple characters
  • use either at the end of words or within words
    • e.g. nurs* finds nurse, nurses, nursed, nursing, nursery, etc.
    • e.g. equ*y finds equity, equitability, equality, equally
  • use between words to match a single word
    • e.g. nursing * education finds nursing education, nursing diabetes education, nursing and education
• The hash sign (#) matches one optional character.
  • use where an alternate spelling might contain an extra letter
    • e.g. orthop#edic finds orthopedic, orthopaedic
• The question mark (?) matches exactly one character.
  • use to replace a letter
    • e.g. Wom?n finds women or woman; Assistan?? finds assistance or assistants
  • cannot be used as the first character of a search term
    • e.g. ?ffect
• truncation and wildcards can be combined in a search term
  • e.g. p#ediatric* finds pediatric pediatrics pediatrician pediatricians paediatric paediatrics paediatrician paediatricians

Caveats:

• cannot be used as the first character of a search term
  • e.g. ?ffect
• using wildcards turns off the automatic inclusion of plural and possessive forms of the search word
  • e.g. wom?n will not include womens' or woman's

Proximity searching allows for searching for two or more terms within a certain number of words of each other.

CINAHL: 

• The proximity operators are composed of a letter (N or W) and a number (to specify the number of words). The number cannot exceed 255.

• The proximity operator is placed between the words that are to be searched

N# = terms appear in any order

• N3 finds the words if they are a max of 3 words apart, regardless of the order in which they appear.

  • e.g. insurance N3 reimbursement will find:

    • insurance reimbursement

    • insurance for reimbursement

    • reimbursement practices of insurance companies

    • insurance approval and reimbursement

W# = terms appear in the order entered

• W4 finds words that are within 4 words of one another, in the order entered
  • e.g. Covid W4 protocols will find
    • COVID pandemic and public health protocols

    • COVID related protocols

  • will not find protocols for Covid