User:Mathglot/sandbox/Drafts/Using medical database collections
 | This is an information page. It is not an encyclopedic article, nor one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines; rather, its purpose is to explain certain aspects of Wikipedia's norms, customs, technicalities, or practices. It may reflect differing levels of consensus and vetting. |
| This is an explanatory essay about Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources (medicine). This page provides additional information about concepts in the page(s) it supplements. This page is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. |
Wikipedia includes many pages containing biomedical content. Information about identifying reliable sources for such content can be found at Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources (medicine). This page provides some methods and resources for using publicly available medical database collections in order to find and evaluate reliable sources for biomedical information.
Background
The Wikipedia guideline on Identifying reliable sources on bio medical content supports the general sourcing policy with specific attention to what is appropriate for medical content in any Wikipedia article. This
Ideal sources for biomedical information include: review articles (especially systematic reviews) published in reputable medical journals; academic and professional books written by experts in the relevant fields and from respected publishers; and guidelines or position statements from national or international expert bodies. Primary sources should generally not be used for medical content – as such sources often include unreliable or preliminary information, for example early lab results which don't hold in later clinical trials.
Besides general search engines like Google and Bing, there are many specialized search engines available which have searchable collections of scholarly journals or other content. Google scholar is perhaps the best known of htese, but there are many others, and some may be suitable for searching for reliable sources for biomedical content. However like Google, all search engines return algorithmic results based on published documents, and they are not curated for adherence to Wikipedia's guidelines on biomedical content. Individual collections have their strong and weak points, and indiviual documents returned by search need to be vetted like any other source for compliance.
Searchable collections with biomedical content
This section lists searchable database collections which may contain reliable sources for certain queries.
| abbr | Name | Ex | Scope | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cochrane | Cochrane Library[a] | link  |
Lit surveys and systematic reviews | Long_remarks_here_Cochrane |
| DOAJ | Directory of Open Access Journals | link |
Directory of Open Access Journals | Long_remarks_here_DOAJ |
| Gale | Gale Academic OneFile | link[b] |
Academic publisher portal | Long_remarks_here_Gale |
| scholar | Google scholar | link |
academic papers and other scholarly research | Long_remarks_here_scholar |
| books | Google books | link |
published books | Long_remarks_here_books |
| JSTOR | JSTOR | link  [b] |
academic journals | Long_remarks_here_JSTOR |
| OpenMD | OpenMD | link |
medical documents from government, global health organizations, medical journals, and reference sites | Long_remarks_here_OpenMD |
| PubMed | PubMed | link |
National Center for Biotechnology Information from the NIH | Long_remarks_here_PubMed |
| ScienceDirect | ScienceDirect | link |
Elsevier's scientific, technical, and medical research portal | Long_remarks_here_ScienceDirect |
| Springer | Springer | link |
Nature's portal for journals, books, and reference works | Long_remarks_here_Springer |
| Trip | Trip Database | link |
clinical research evidence | Long_remarks_here_Trip |
| Wiley | Wiley Online Library | link |
Wiley's portal for academic articles, books, and collections. | Long_remarks_here_Wiley |
| GIN | Guidelines International Network | link |
Content from the library and registry of guidelines in development. | Long_remarks_here_GIN |
| WP Library | Wikipedia Library | link |
Academic content from dozens of partners of Wikipedia. | Long_remarks_here_WP_Library |
Evaluating and comparing collections
This section contains tips and advice on how to decide which database collections are likely to have the best results for the article or topic you are researching.
![[icon]](/wiki/File:Wiki_letter_w_cropped.svg?lang=en){kind=small} | This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. |
Evaluating sources from search results
This section explains how to evaluate sources returned in the search results for a given collection to identify if it is WP:MEDRS-compliant.
| This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. |
See also
Notes
- ^ Cochrane Library: including the Cochrane database of systematic reviews
- ^ a b Subscription required for full-text access; better access available via Wikipedia Library (please log in first).
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