Boolean search experience and abilities of medical students and practicing physicians.
BACKGROUND
Little is known about physician ability to utilize Boolean search skills to access information.


OBJECTIVE
Determine the proficiency of medical students and practicing physicians to identify efficient Boolean phrases.


METHODS
Experiential survey and multiple-choice questions administered to 49 4th-year medical students and 42 practicing physicians. Subjects identified the best answer or correctly ranked 3 Boolean search phrase options.


RESULTS
Practicing physicians identified the single best query phrase significantly more often than did medical students (85.7% vs. 75.0%, p < 0.001), and both groups had significantly more difficulty correctly rank-ordering the queries (students, 75% vs. 54%, p < 0.001; practitioners, 85.7% vs. 57.1%, p < .04). Only recent MEDLINE use was an independent predictor of accuracy in both groups.


CONCLUSIONS
Students and physicians demonstrated deficiencies in identifying optimal Boolean phrases. Although formal instruction has not demonstrated clear improvement in skills, more creative teaching of Boolean search techniques should be undertaken and tested.
Bronander
Kirk A
KA
Department of Medicine, The University of Nevada School of Medicine, Reno, Nevada 89502, USA. firkb@unr.edu
Goodman
Philip H
PH
Inman
Todd F
TF
Veach
Tracy L
TL
D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001076:Aptitude; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D002983:Clinical Competence / Q000592:standards*; D016206:Databases, Bibliographic / Q000592:standards; D004504:Education, Medical, Undergraduate / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D009505:Nevada; D010820:Physicians / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D013337:Students, Medical / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013997:Time Factors; D014584:User-Computer Interface