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This was published when the organisation was the Royal Pharmaceutical Society.

A quick reference guide

The RCPharm library subscribes to two databases via our EBSCO supplier.

They are:

• MEDLINE Complete.
• Biomedical Reference Collection.

Our databases contain circa 6,000 full-text journals and many more citations.

You can search these for information on any healthcare topic, from e-cigarettes and smoking cessation to antimicrobial resistance.

Being familiar with a few useful techniques can make it easier to find the information you need.

How to access our databases

Once you have accessed the e-library page, choose the search our databases tile. You will need to be a member of RCPharm and logged in to to see the tile.

Select the database you would like to use by clicking on the searching link, located above the search boxes, and choosing an individual database. The default is for simultaneous searching.

If you are conducting more advanced searches, it’s better to search the databases individually so that you can map your search terms to Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) when searching MEDLINE, for example.

What are subject headings and why should I use them?

We use keywords to search databases and this is where subject headings/controlled vocabularies are useful, because they direct us to the term that subject specialists have used to index articles.

Example: You want to find articles on the use of Inderal for controlling hypertension. Using MEDLINE, go to MEDLINE – MeSH 2026 underneath the search boxes and add the search term in the MEDLINE – MeSH 2026 search box.

Type ‘Inderal’ into the search box. The preferred term for ‘Inderal’ is ‘Propranolol’; tick the box next to ‘Inderal use: Propranolol’. Click on the add to search button.

What is Boolean and why does it matter?

The term Boolean originates from Boolean algebra. It’s used as a means of linking words or concepts to make database searching more efficient.

Examples:

• ‘And’
  • ‘And’ narrows your search.
  • It only retrieves results where both search terms appear in the record.
• ‘Or’
  • ‘Or’ broadens your search. 
  • It retrieves records containing either search term or both. It is particularly useful for connecting synonyms.
• ‘Not’
  • ‘Not’ narrows your search 
  • It excludes terms from your search results; for example, ‘headache not migraine’ will pick up every item on headache but will exclude those that include migraine.

Why would I use truncation?

Truncation enables you to retrieve documents which include variants of a word. 

Our databases use the asterisk * truncation symbol. Just add it to the root of the search term; for example, pharm* will retrieve pharmacist, pharmacists, pharmacy, pharmacies (etc.) in the search results.

Using limiters

Even combining Boolean search techniques can retrieve a large set of results, and this is where being able to limit those results is useful. 

Each database has a different set of limiters but common ones are date, language and publication type.

Further information on searching our databases

• Video tutorial: introduction to the new user interface.
• A quick guide to the new user interface (link to be added soon).