Databases provide a comprehensive index with abstracts for the contents of international healthcare journals, with some access to full text articles (publisher permitting). Some databases are freely accessible worldwide, and some are provided in Ireland by national subscription. Core databases that are essential for systematic reviews in medicine, nursing and all allied health topics include PubMed and the Cochrane database, in addition to relevant subject databases – some of which are available here without subscription. This section outlines the resources and the subject areas covered along with details of how to access each database.
PubMed – Medicine; includes Nursing, Pharmacy, Psychology and other related topics.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
PubMed is a large medical database produced by the National Library of Medicine in the US. It contains over 37 million records and abstracts, including all those from Medline and PubMed Central (PMC). Links to full text are shown, some will be open to all and some are dependent on publisher access.
You can use your own keywords as well as the MeSH (Medical Subject Headings) thesaurus to search for your topic.
Cochrane Library – Systematic Reviews and Clinical Trials
https://www.cochranelibrary.com/ (Free access for the island of Ireland is funded by the Health Research Board, Ireland, and Health and Social Care, Northern Ireland)
Cochrane systematic reviews are the gold standard of research. The Cochrane Library is a collection of databases that contain different types of high-quality, independent evidence to inform healthcare decision-making. The Cochrane Collaboration commissions systematic reviews on clinical topics. You can run a basic search using your own keywords, or an advanced search using MeSH subject headings
PEDro – Physiotherapy Database
Physiotherapy Evidence Database: A free database of over 50,000 trials, reviews and guidelines evaluating physiotherapy interventions. Produced by the Institute for Musculoskeletal Health at the University of Sydney and Sydney Local Health District and hosted by Neuroscience Research Australia (NeuRA).
ERIC – Education
ERIC is an education database that covers all aspects of teaching and learning, including Assessments, Higher Education, Science Education and many other topics. You can search using your own keywords or the ERIC thesaurus subject heading terms. It is provided free by the Institution of Education Sciences in the US.
Google Scholar
Google Scholar is a web search engine for scholarly literature across a range of disciplines and sources. Click on the top left menu icon to find the Advanced Search option. You can enter all your keywords in the “with all of the words” option, or type in an exact phrase you’d like to search for. You can add a date limit to reduce your results. Results may include some free full text articles and open access sources.
Open Alex
Open Alex is a huge open database of 250 million research outputs with helpful filters that pop up as you type. As well as searching by keywords, its filters allow more controlled searching to build up a set of criteria, for instance by author, affiliation or SDG. The results can be exported or the URL shared.