MEDLINE® is the United States National Library of Medicine’s (NLM®) premier bibliographic database providing information from the fields of medicine, nursing and allied health amongst others.
MEDLINE is long established and world-renown, search it to find evidence that could change practice. Carry out comprehensive searches to find research to improve healthcare delivery and to avoid missing critical information on diseases, conditions – historical or current – that could impact on clinical decision making.
The database contains over 23 million bibliographic citations and author abstracts from more than 5,600 biomedical and life science journals published in the United States and in 70 other countries, dating back to 1946. Everything in MEDLINE is assigned keywords that describe its context, using prescribed Medical Subject Headings (or MESH).
At CCCU, we have access to MEDLINE on three platforms – OVID, Ebsco and Web of Science. This guide covers the OVID platform. Also available is PubMed, the free, public version of MEDLINE. Read our PubMed goes mobile blog post to find out more about MEDLINE and PubMed’s relationship.
View the video produced by OVID to find out how to search MEDLINE efficiently and effectively. View Chapter 15 for advice on how to carry out an Advanced Search and Chapter 18 for an example of a Basic Search. (Once loaded, click on the paper icon to view the captions)
Try searching MEDLINE (OVID) by following the steps outlined below. You’ll practice using some of the most common functions and be ready to search for information for your assignments.
The PubMed version of MEDLINE is optimised for mobile devices.
Your Learning and Research Librarian will be able to help you make the best use of online resources. For detailed guidance, book a tutorial via the Learning Skills Hub.
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