Modern methods of searching the medical literature.
OBJECTIVE
To review the methods of electronic retrieval of biomedical journal articles; to demonstrate CD-ROM and online searching techniques; and to compare major biomedical databases.


METHODS
A CD-ROM MEDLINE search was made by a medical practitioner, with the assistance of an experienced librarian. An online MEDLINE/Excerpta Medica search was made by the same medical practitioner after completion of a two-day course in search techniques. The search example covered the period 1983 to 1992, and the topic was "whether steroid use for asthma/airways disease leads to osteoporosis".


RESULTS
Search duration, article yield and search cost were assessed.


RESULTS
The CD-ROM MEDLINE literature search took 60 minutes to find 31 articles (43% of the possible articles). This compared with an online search to the Bibliographic Retrieval Services database in Chicago, which produced the same articles when MEDLINE was searched (but took only 16 minutes) and which also found 47 articles (with an overlap of only seven) when Excerpta Medica was searched. We estimated that the combined MEDLINE and Excerpta Medica search detected 93% of all known relevant articles, based upon an assumed gold standard.


CONCLUSIONS
Online searching is a fast and powerful alternative to CD-ROM searching. Formal training is necessary for quick and cheap reference finding. Other benefits such as direct transfer from online searching to your own computer bibliography database make online searching of biomedical databases essential to consider.
Smith
B J
BJ
Centre for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, University of Newcastle, Royal Newcastle Hospital, NSW.
Darzins
P J
PJ
Quinn
M
M
Heller
R F
RF
D016251:CD-ROM; D003365:Costs and Cost Analysis; D016206:Databases, Bibliographic; D016247:Information Storage and Retrieval / Q000191:economics; D016239:MEDLINE; D008722:Methods; D009862:Online Systems; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D013997:Time Factors