title: Selecting keywords: helping others find your article.
abstract: Keywords or indexing words help the intended audience of your article both directly and indirectly. Directly, they help the reader identify the topics covered. Indirectly, they help indexers identify the subject headings used in journal indexes and databases. This article reviews the indexing process, provides a step-by-step way of identifying keywords for your article, and identifies some common pitfalls to avoid.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Allen
mesh_terms: D000043:Abstracting and Indexing; D016208:Databases, Factual; D006801:Humans; D009726:Nurses; D010506:Periodicals as Topic; D011643:Publishing; D018875:Vocabulary, Controlled