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7 Reasons to use Clinical Key

 What is Clinical Key?

Clinical Key is an easy to use Clinical Search engine, providing you with access to a range of evidence-based full-text content, including journals, ebooks, topic summaries, clinical overviews, videos and patient information leaflets.

Banner for Clinical Key

How to Access…

Who is it for?

Clinical Key has been subscribed for staff at UHNM only.

Log in

You can log in using your NHS OpenAthens username. Once logged in you can activate your account. You’ll need to do this if you want to take advantage of all of the advanced features of Clinical Key.

All NHS-based resources are listed on the Health Library website:

Key Features

Clinical Search Engine

Use the search engine to search across a wide range of content, including Medline, for your clinical question. Predictive text is used to help you enter your search terms and filters are available to help you to focus your search.

Core eBooks

Over a thousand eBooks are available for a wide range of clinical specialities. Some books include related videos.

Key Journals

You can access the full-text of over 600 journals, including the Clinics of North America and the Lancet series of titles. Keep up-to-date with the latest release from your favourite journal by signing up to the alert service.

Save Content

Once you have your search results you can mark items as saved; group related items together using tags.

Presentation Maker

You can use Clinical Key to create presentations of images. Search for the images you require, save to a presentation and then export to powerpoint. The file created includes all the images along with their references.

Patient Information

Create leaflets to give to your patients using the patient education option within Clinical Key. 

Mobile Access

You can access Clinical Key on the go. The Clinical Key interface is responsive to your web browser screen size, or you can download the free app from your App Store.

Start Searching

Use the simple search interface to start searching:

Search engine interface in Clinical Key

  1. You can select the type of content you want to search
  2. Predictive text helps you to enter your search terms
  3. You can browse through the full-text content
  4. Activate your account to access the advanced features
  5. Click the dropdown box on the menu bar for advanced features

More Help

You can find more help on using Clinical Key – including step-by-step instructions and videos – from our Online Guides & Support section or try our new presentation Getting Started with Clinical Key.


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