Quick Guide to using Search 2.0

Go to the Cornwall Health Library Service databases page click on the ‘Clinical databases’ link, choose ‘NLH Search 2.0’ and enter your NHS Athens username and password in the LOG IN box.

Advanced Search

Click on Healthcare Databases Advanced Search

Selecting and searching one database at a time is recommended.

Click an appropriate database from the list.

Type asthma into the text box and click SEARCH (the default is set to Title and Abstract, you may want to change this).

Results are displayed in a Search History table

We need to add another term to the search. Type environment into the search box and click SEARCH.

Using truncated words

Some words can be found in different forms. Use the * wildcard with word stems to avoid typing. Environ** will find environment, environmental .

Combining different search terms

To find results which include both terms.

Select the boxes next to the results, this should “tick” the boxes (Nos. 1 and 2), Then use COMBINE SELECTED SEARCHES button.

Using phrases

Use quotation marks to search for a phrase, e.g., “dust mites” Your results will only contain these terms next to each other in the order entered.

Limiting results by date

You can choose date limits by selecting publication years in the drop down menus under Add Date Limits. Add both From and To Dates.

N.B. to search for a single year you only need to put the date in the From Publication Year box.

Viewing your results in Advance Search

Click on the number of results in the Hits column to display a list of references on your topic(s), in date order.

Click on the title of a reference to see further details, usually a summary or abstract, thesaurus terms and language.

Links to the full text or complete article are provided if available.

Print copies in local libraries are labelled Available in Print Holdings.at…see above

To return to your list of results click on Current Search Results in the Page headings below the green bars.

Make selections of relevant references, clicking in the box to the left and move through the pages of results using NEXT.

Select a full page by clicking the select all on this page option.

Managing selected results

Manage your search results using the panel provided on each page, below results. Select documents from your results, then choose Short (a brief citation including abstract), Medium (includes the Publication type and Language of the article) or Full format. Options are available to Export or Email selected results in Word, HTML, PDF, plain text or XML formats.

Use Export Results to display, print and save results.

Use Email Results to send the results to a specific email address.

Full text links and details are not currently exported in any format.

You can Save your Search strategy to use at a later date.

To return to the search screen, click Search and Limits from the headings below the green bar.

Applying Limits. There are a number of different types of limits you can use. Construct and build your search then use appropriate limits if necessary to focus your search. Limits vary between databases.

To apply relevant limits to your search results, select limits from the options displayed. The choice of Limits will differ in individual databases.

Use the arrows on the right to drop down each Limit section and choose from the options available. To select multiple options from the Limit options, hold down the CTRL key.

You can apply more than one limit

To view all the options in all the limits, click on Expand all limit and search options.

Once options from within a limit are selected, the Limit contracts leaving a pale blue reminder of what has been selected.

Finally type the search number for the results which you wish to limit in the search box..

Thesaurus mapping is recommended for more focused searches. This tool allows you to match your search term to the indexed vocabulary of a particular database.

Enter your search term and tick the Map to Thesaurus box. then SEARCH.

Terms which match the concepts of your keyword search will then be displayed.

The scope notes provide further information about the thesaurus term.

The full citation includes the thesaurus terms which can be added to your search by clicking on them.

Saving Searches

In Advanced Search you can save searches to run on a future occasion, or create Alerts to email you newly published articles on your search topic. Click on the button. Give your search a name then click Save.

Creating Alerts

To create an Alert, follow the same steps as described above, but when you save your search, click SAVE AND CREATE ALERT instead.

In the alert form enter an email address that you would like your alert to be delivered to. Choose a document type and frequency of delivery from the drop down menus.

Click SAVE ALERT to save your alert.

You can modify or delete saved alerts by clicking on My Saved Alerts.

You can create an Alert from a previously saved search by selecting the search in My Saved Searches and using CREATE ALERT.

Author Searching

You can construct a search to retrieve articles by particular authors .

Type the author’s name in the following way: "kendrick k” or "kendrick km"

Change the field from Title to Author.

If you do not know the author’s initial, you need to type “kendrick*”.

Quotation marks must be used.

Your session will terminate after 30 minutes of inactivity and your search will be lost.

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