Integrative Review Capstone Toolkit

If you're working on crafting a search strategy that you intend to return to repeatedly, edit, and revise, it can be extremely helpful to save that strategy in the database for later updates, or as a record for how you searched for literature in that database.

Most of the core health sciences databases offer you the option of creating an account to save your own searches. See the resources below for information about creating your personal database accounts and saving searches.    

Medline via PubMed 

• Create a MyNCBI Account
• Save a Search in MyNCBI

CINAHL Complete

• Create a MyEBSCOhost Account
• Save a Search in MyEBSCOhost

PsycNET (with PsycINFO)

• Create a MyPsycNET account 
• Save a Search in MyPsycNET

PsycINFO via Ovid

In addition to saving searches in the native database account where they were conducted, it may also be helpful to save them in an external document, which offers more flexibility for tracking the iterations of the search and making notes about useful/not useful terms.  Additionally, it can be nice to have all the database search queries in one place in order to make sure you are searching in a coherent way across sources.    

The resources below may be helpful for documenting your search terms

A Reproducible Search Query

When you save your search strategy outside of the native database environment, it is important to include sufficient details to make it as reproducible as possible.  You should note:

• The name and platform of the database you searched (e.g. CINAHL via EBSCO or PsycINFO via PsycNET)
• The terms you searched
• How they were combined with Boolean operators (ANDs / ORs)
• The database specific syntax you used
  • If you searched specific fields using field tags (e.g. the subject field, using the tag MH). If you did not specify the field, it's likely you searched for terms in 'all fields'.
  • Database-specific punctuation you used 
• What filters were applied, if any
• The date you performed the search

Many databases allow you to save or download the details of a search query to your computer. For more specifics, see:

• PubMed - Search History - Download 
  • Also see: Video Tutorial (no sound)
• EBSCO (CINAHL or Education Source w/ERIC) - Print Search History (Video, 43 seconds, no sound)
• Ovid (EMBASE, PsycINFO) - Search Sharing (PDF)

The table below shows an example of the information that might be included in a reproducible search query. Notice the documentation of limiters, search platform interface, and exact punctuation and Boolean operators.