Research Guides: Health (Nursing, Medicine, Allied Health): Find Articles/Databases

Selecting a Database

The literature of nursing is primarily indexed in MEDLINE (via PubMed), and CINAHL¹, linked in the box below. Questions related to medicine and health more broadly may also be well served by other databases like EMBASE, Web of Science, and PsycINFO.

1. Allen, M. P., Jacobs, S. K., & Levy, J. R. (2006). Mapping the literature of nursing: 1996-2000. Journal of the Medical Library Association : JMLA, 94(2), 206–220.

Sources of Nursing & Health Literature

Biomedical & Health Databases

Medline via PubMed This link opens in a new window
PubMed comprises over 30 million citations for biomedical literature from MEDLINE, life science journals, and online books. PubMed citations and abstracts include the fields of biomedicine and health, covering portions of the life sciences, behavioral sciences, chemical sciences, and bioengineering. PubMed also provides access to additional relevant web sites and links to the other NCBI molecular biology resources.
Medline via Ovid This link opens in a new window
The MEDLINE database is widely recognized as the premier source for bibliographic and abstract coverage of biomedical literature. MEDLINE encompasses information from Index Medicus, Index to Dental Literature, and International Nursing, as well as other sources of coverage in the areas of allied health, biological and physical sciences, humanities and information science as they relate to medicine and health care, communication disorders, population biology, and reproductive biology.
CINAHL Complete This link opens in a new window
CINAHL indexes over 3,800 journals from the fields of nursing and allied health, with indexing for selected journals back to 1937. Topics covered are related to nursing, physical therapy, health education, social service/healthcare, occupational therapy, and related disciplines. CINAHL also provides access to healthcare books, nursing dissertations, selected conference proceedings, standards of professional practice, educational software and audiovisual materials in nursing. Dates of coverage: 1937 to present.
PsycNET (with PsycINFO) This link opens in a new window
APA PsycNET is an integrated collection of databases from the American Psychological Association (APA), including the following: PsycINFO, PsycBOOKS, PsycTESTS, PsycTHERAPY, PsycARTICLES, and PsycEXTRA.

PsycINFO, the most popular database in PsycNET, is a bibliographic index covering core literature in the psychological and behavioral sciences and their related disciplines. PsycBOOKS includes online versions of the APA Handbooks in Psychology Series, as well as other ebooks and online encyclopedias published by APA. PsycTESTS is a source of structured information about psychological tests and measures as well as a repository for the full text of select instruments. PsycTHERAPY provides access to streaming psychotherapy demonstration videos.

Altogether, PsycNET provides information about and access to journal articles, books and ebooks, dissertations, conference presentations, tests and measures, videos, gray literature, and many other other publication types in the psychological, social, behavioral, and health sciences.
To search only a specific database (e.g., PsycINFO) within the PsycNET interface, use the "Select Databases" features at the top of the PsycNET landing page and check (or uncheck) the database(s) that apply.
PsycINFO via Ovid This link opens in a new window
PsycINFO via Ovid indexes core academic and professional literature in the psychological and behavioral sciences and their related disciplines. Coverage is from 1806 to the present. **Note that the database PsycINFO is also searchable on APA PsycNET platform.
EMBASE: Excerpta Medica 1974 – present (updated daily) This link opens in a new window
EMBASE is a biomedical and pharmaceutical database indexing over 3,500 international journals in the following fields: drug research, pharmacology, pharmaceutics, toxicology, clinical and experimental human medicine, health policy and management, public health, occupational health, environmental health, drug dependence and abuse, psychiatry, forensic medicine, and biomedical engineering/instrumentation. There is selective coverage for nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, psychology, and alternative medicine. Dates of coverage: 1974 to present (updated daily)
SPORTDiscus This link opens in a new window
SPORTDiscus covers many related sports medicine subjects, including nutrition, physical therapy, occupational health and therapy, exercise physiology, kinesiology and more. In addition to journals and monographs, the database includes references to tens of thousands of dissertations and theses. International references are included from journal and magazine articles, books, book chapters,
conference proceedings and more.

Multidisciplinary Sources with Health Coverage

Web of Science Core Collection This link opens in a new window
Web of Science Core Collection is a multidisciplinary citation index that includes scholarly articles, conference proceedings, and books in the biomedical, psychosocial, and arts and humanities. The collections contain Science Citation, Social Sciences Citation Index, Arts and Humanities Citation Index , Conference Proceedings Citation Index, Book Citation Index, Emerging Sources Citation Index and Current Chemical Reactions index.
Scopus This link opens in a new window
Scopus is a multidisciplinary index of peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings.
ProQuest Central This link opens in a new window
ProQuest Central is a large, multidisciplinary database with over 11,000 titles, with over 8,000 titles in full-text. It serves as the central resource for researchers at all levels in all markets. Over 160 subjects areas are covered extensively in this product including business and economics, health and medical, news and world affairs, technology, social sciences and more.
Dissertations & Theses Global This link opens in a new window
Dissertations and Theses Global contains indexes, dissertations and some theses. Full-text is available for many dissertations and theses, including those from NYU.

Education, Social Sciences & Public Health

Education Source with ERIC This link opens in a new window
Education Source with ERIC provides access to research on all levels of education from early childhood to adult education. The content includes peer reviewed journal articles, ebooks, book reviews, dissertations, conference papers and policy reports on all topics in the realm of education.
SocINDEX with Full Text This link opens in a new window
SocINDEX covers the sociology literature, encompassing all sub-disciplines and closely related areas of study. It indexes scholarly journals, books, monographs, and conference papers.
Sociological Abstracts This link opens in a new window
Sociological Abstracts represents the core database for sociological scholarship, covering literature in sociology and related disciplines in the social and behavioral sciences. It indexes scholarly journals, dissertations and theses, books, and conference papers and proceedings, and is international in scope.
PTSDpubs This link opens in a new window
The PTSDpubs (formerly Published International Literature On Traumatic Stress, or PILOTS) is a bibliographic database produced by the National Center for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Its goal is to include citations to all literature on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other mental-health consequences of exposure to traumatic events. Unlike other databases, PILOTS does not restrict its coverage to articles appearing in select journals. Instead, it attempts to include all publications relevant to PTSD and other forms of traumatic stress, whatever their origin, without disciplinary, linguistic, or geographical limitations, and offers both current and retrospective coverage.
Social Science Research Network (SSRN) This link opens in a new window
Social Science Research Network (SSRN) is composed of a number of specialized research networks in the social sciences. Topics covered by networks include accounting, economics, financial economics, legal scholarship, and management (including negotiation and marketing). The SSRN eLibrary consists of abstracts of scholarly working papers and forthcoming papers and an electronic paper collection of downloadable full text documents in pdf format.
In order to subscribe to the NYU network one must create an account with their NYU email address. Please note that when accessing through off-site connection you may encounter a login screen which indicates you can 'login anonymously.' If you reach this choose to login anonymously and you will be granted access.
Global Health This link opens in a new window
Global Health indexes publications from around the world. Provides coverage of the following aspects of human health and disease: communicable diseases, tropical diseases, parasitic diseases, human nutrition, community and public health, medicinal and poisonous plants. Language of publication listed in brackets after the title. Dates of coverage: 1910 to present.
3 concurrent users; please log off after each session.
AgeLine This link opens in a new window
AgeLine is a citation source focused on the population aged 50+ and issues of aging. It indexes journals, books, book chapters, reports, dissertations, consumer guides, and educational videos, including content from the health sciences, psychology, sociology, social work, economics, and public policy.
Health Policy Reference Center This link opens in a new window
Health Policy Reference Center contains full-text coverage of information relevant to many areas integral to health policy including, but not limited to: Health Care Access & Delivery, Health Care Administration, Health Care Financing & Economics, Health Care Planning, Health Care Quality, Health Care Reform, Health Insurance, Health Law, Health Services Research, Long Term Care, Maternal & Child Health, Medical & Health Care Ethics, Public Health, and Social Medicine.

Locating "Peer Reviewed" Articles

"Peer-reviewed" or "refereed" journals are those that subject content to a critical review by other experts in the field prior to accepting a manuscript for publication. Limiting your literature search to the peer-reviewed journals ensures a higher level of scholarship and research methodology.

Magazines, trade journals, and newspapers tend to be "non-peer-reviewed," meaning perhaps just the editor or someone who is not an expert in the field has reviewed the content before publishing.

Some article databases (not all) will have a filter (or "Limit") available for "peer-reviewed." Look for this feature in Proquest Central and CINAHL.

See this tutorial for more information about Peer Review in the Health Sciences.

How do you know if a journal citation is from a peer-reviewed journal?

You can do a journal title search in Ulrich's Global Serials Directory. There is a specific symbol ( ) that indicates a journal is "refereed."
You can look for the "Limits" feature in many databases to narrow search results by publication type.
An individual journal's website may describe the peer review process and policies - look for sections like "For Authors" or "Editorial Policies"

Health (Nursing, Medicine, Allied Health)

What is Google Scholar? How should I use it?

You can configure Google Scholar to:

Here's how to display NYU links in Google Scholar:

Here's how to change settings for Bibliography manager: