title: Filtering Medline for a clinical discipline: diagnostic test assessment framework.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To develop and test a Medline filter that allows clinicians to search for articles within a clinical discipline, rather than searching the entire Medline database.
  
  
  METHODS
  Diagnostic test assessment framework with development and validation phases.
  
  
  METHODS
  Sample of 4657 articles published in 2006 from 40 journals. Reviews Each article was manually reviewed, and 19.8% contained information relevant to the discipline of nephrology. The performance of 1 155 087 unique renal filters was compared with the manual review.
  
  
  METHODS
  Sensitivity, specificity, precision, and accuracy of each filter.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The best renal filters combined two to 14 terms or phrases and included the terms "kidney" with multiple endings (that is, truncation), "renal replacement therapy", "renal dialysis", "kidney function tests", "renal", "nephr" truncated, "glomerul" truncated, and "proteinuria". These filters achieved peak sensitivities of 97.8% and specificities of 98.5%. Performance of filters remained excellent in the validation phase.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Medline can be filtered for the discipline of nephrology in a reliable manner. Storing these high performance renal filters in PubMed could help clinicians with their everyday searching. Filters can also be developed for other clinical disciplines by using similar methods.
authors.affiliation: Division of Nephrology, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, Canada N6A 5C1. amit.garg@lhsc.on.ca
authors.forename: Amit X
authors.initials: AX
authors.lastname: Garg
authors.forename: Arthur V
authors.initials: AV
authors.lastname: Iansavichus
authors.forename: Nancy L
authors.initials: NL
authors.lastname: Wilczynski
authors.forename: Monika
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kastner
authors.forename: Leslie A
authors.initials: LA
authors.lastname: Baier
authors.forename: Salimah Z
authors.initials: SZ
authors.lastname: Shariff
authors.forename: Faisal
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Rehman
authors.forename: Matthew
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Weir
authors.forename: K Ann
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: McKibbon
authors.forename: R Brian
authors.initials: RB
authors.lastname: Haynes
mesh_terms: D016239:MEDLINE / Q000592:standards*; D009398:Nephrology; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity