Useful information on critically appraising literature.
If you are unsure how to conduct an effective literature search, contact us for 1:1 or group training on using databases or critically appraising literature. Alternatively, you can consult our online literature searching guide for self-directed learning resources.
The NHS Knowledge and Library Hub
For a simple literature searching the NHS Knowledge and Library Hub is the best place to start. It brings together many different databases (including Medline, CINHAL Ultimate, ClinicialTrials.gov and Cochrane) making them searchable in one place and provides links to full text where available.
Key databases
For more in-depth searching, such as for a review, you have access to the following databases via your OpenAthens account.
CINAHL Ultimate is the new definitive resource for nursing and allied health research, providing full text for more of the most used journals in the CINAHL index than any other database. It covers more than 50 nursing specialties and includes quick lessons, evidence-based care sheets, CEU modules and research instruments. CINAHL Ultimate includes rigorous curation and indexing of open access (OA) journals, which has resulted in a growing collection of 1,253 active global OA journals. Once validated and certified for inclusion, these OA journals are treated with high-quality subject indexing and sophisticated, precise/accurate full-text linking. Note: Includes full text access to the Nursing Times.
Access: NHS OpenAthens account for eligible users
Subjects Covered:
Ambulatory care nursing
Cardiovascular nursing
Critical care nursing
Emergency medical technicians
Gerontologic nursing
Nuclear medicine technicians
Occupational therapy
Oncologic nursing
Pediatric nursing
Physical therapy
Psychiatric nursing
Embase (Excerpta Medica Database) is a biomedical and pharmacological database containing more than 30 million records including articles from more than 8,500 journals. It is especially strong in its coverage of drug and pharmaceutical research, pharmacology and toxicology.
Access: NHS OpenAthens account
EMCARE covers all nursing specialties and nursing healthcare professions. Includes international coverage of allied health, education and training, development and management, midwifery, health and healthcare economics, clinical medical and healthcare social work, psychiatry and mental health, and traumatology, emergency and critical-care medicine.
Access: NHS OpenAthens account
MEDLINE provides authoritative medical information on medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, the health care system, pre-clinical sciences, and much more. Created by the National Library of Medicine, MEDLINE uses MeSH (Medical Subject Headings) indexing with tree, tree hierarchy, subheadings and explosion capabilities to search citations from over 5,600 current biomedical journals.
Access: NHS OpenAthens account
Trip is a clinical search engine designed to allow users to quickly and easily find and use high-quality research evidence to support their practice and/or care. Users can search across research articles and papers, images, videos, patient information leaflets, educational courses and news.
Access: Trip database - Freely available; Trip Pro - user account must be set up using a computer on the Barts network or users can now login with an NHS OpenAthens account
Want to find more? See our full list of available databases on our Database A-Z page.
