Cinahl
is a nursing specialist database. It can help you to find good quality research
and evidence, focused on nursing topics. Here are a few tips and tricks to help
you to use it effectively.
Use
Quotes
When
searching with your own keywords, always put phrases (more than one word) in
double quotation marks " " eg
“high blood pressure”. This will help to focus your search to that specific
phrase.
Use
Truncation
Use
truncation after the stem of a word to ensure that you get singular and plurals
of words and other variations, eg nurs* gives you nurse, nurses and nursing.
This helps you to expand your search to include variations of your keywords.
Use
the Thesaurus
Always
back up your keyword search with a thesaurus search (CINAHL headings). Thesaurus
terms are added to articles, like an index in a book. This increases the
likelihood of you finding articles about that topic. It can also help you to
find more technical terms for your keywords. For example you could use the
phrase “high blood pressure” as well as the thesaurus term hypertension.
 |
| Screen-shot of an example thesaurus search |
Combine Search Terms
You
can combine similar terms using OR eg “high blood pressure” OR hypertension
You
can combine different concepts using AND, eg “high blood pressure” AND diabetes
Add
Limits
You
can add limits to the last line of your search if you want to filter the number
of results, for example by Date or Language. This can help you focus your
search. On the left of the Cinahl results page, find Limit To and click the
Show More link underneath for all the limit options.
 |
| Screen-shot of the Limit Options |
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