Development of two search strategies for literature in MEDLINE-PubMed: nursing diagnoses in the context of evidence-based nursing.
OBJECTIVE
To develop and validate search filters for MEDLINE via PubMed according to two categories of the NLINKS-EBN matrix.


METHODS
The search results of the search filters were compared to a gold standard.


RESULTS
The usage of nursing classification terms for the literature search in evidence-based nursing (EBN) is still limited because taxonomies are neither widely used in nursing literature nor applied for indexing by MEDLINE. The proposed filters achieved a sensitivity of 96% and a specificity of 94% for "secondary data" and a sensitivity of 87% and a specificity of 73% for "diagnostic tests."


CONCLUSIONS
The usage of database-specific search filters are a reliable and valid method to search for nursing classification terms in medical databases.
Berg
Almuth
A
Philipps University, Marburg, Germany.
Fleischer
Steffen
S
Behrens
Johann
J
D002965:Classification / Q000379:methods; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D016247:Information Storage and Retrieval / Q000379:methods*; D016239:MEDLINE; D009733:Nursing Diagnosis; D009626:Terminology as Topic