Databases for Finding Primary Studies - Systematic Reviews, Scoping Reviews, and Health Technology Assessments - Searching the Literature - Subject Guides at University of Alberta Libraries

Core Health Sciences Databases

The following databases are used in most Systematic Reviews, Scoping Reviews and HTAs in the areas of Medicine, Nursing, Rehabilitation Medicine, Public Health, Pharmacy and Kinesiology.

Choose either Medline or Pubmed, not both. They are different interfaces but have the same content.
Use Cochrane CENTRAL Trials only if you are including randomized controlled trials in your review
Scopus and Web of Science are both large interdisciplinary databases. Most comprehensive reviews will include at least one of these.

MEDLINE (1946-present via Ovid) This link opens in a new window Also includes Epub Ahead of Print, In-Process & Other Non-Indexed Citations and Ovid MEDLINE(R) Daily MEDLINE (1946 to the present) covers the world's biomedical and health sciences journal literature. The type of information contained in MEDLINE ranges from the basic biomedical sciences like anatomy, physiology, biochemistry to clinical information outlining the nature and course of disease or injury, as well as its treatment.
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PubMed (with links to UofA e-journals) This link opens in a new window
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EMBASE This link opens in a new window
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Similar to MEDLINE but with more European and developing country content. Also very strong for drug information.

The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL)
more...less...
Select 'Trials' from the results list.

CINAHL Plus with Full Text This link opens in a new window CINAHL Plus with Full Text (1937 to the present) provides indexing for the major English language journals in the areas of nursing, occupational therapy, physical therapy and other allied health fields such as respiratory technology, x-ray technology, etc.
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Topics covered by this database include patient care, health promotion, professional issues for health care workers, patient education, rehabilitation, and other related subjects. Those with little or no health science background may be able to find useful articles on the more common disease and injury conditions, as well as other health topics, because CINAHL does include some consumer health information. CINAHL Plus with Full Text also contains searchable cited references for more than 1,100 journals and provides full text for hundreds of journals, plus legal cases, clinical innovations, critical paths, drug records, research instruments and clinical trials. PDF backfiles to 1937 are also included. Includes text in Chinese, Danish, English, French, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, and Turkish languages.
Scopus This link opens in a new window
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Web of Science Core Collection This link opens in a new window
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Additional Databases for Specific Subjects

Brain disorders / Mental health

PsycINFO This link opens in a new window
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Health and Psychosocial Instruments (HAPI) This link opens in a new window Also known as: |HAPI (Health and Psychosocial Instruments)| Provides access to information on measurement instruments in the health fields, psychosocial sciences, organizational behavior, and library and information science. identify measures needed for research studies, grant proposals, client/patient assessment, class papers/projects, theses/dissertations, and program evaluation.
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Environmental Health

Compendex This link opens in a new window Ei Compendex (1884 to the present) provides international coverage of all fields of engineering including related areas of applied science, management, and energy.
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Fields covered include: aeronautics; applied physics; bioengineering and medical equipment; chemical engineering; polymers and food technology; computers and robotics; civil, structural, control, electrical, electronics, and environmental engineering; energy technology and petroleum engineering; industrial engineering; information science; light and optical technology; marine engineering; mechanical, mining, and metallurgic engineering; materials science; nuclear engineering; and transportation.
GeoRef This link opens in a new window GeoRef (1785 to the present) includes international coverage of the earth sciences and all aspects of geology and geophysics including archaeology, fossils, economics, education, engineering and environmental geology, expeditions, instruments, land use, landfills, soils, geologic hazards (avalanches, hurricanes, sunsorts, volcanoes, etc.), maps, magnetic fields, and medical and military geology.
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Environment Complete This link opens in a new window This database covers applicable areas of agriculture, ecosystem ecology, energy, natural resources, marine & freshwater science, geography, pollution & waste management, environmental technology, environmental law, public policy, social impacts, and urban planning. Contains records from domestic and international journals going back to the 1950s as well as from selected monographs.
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Foods and Nutrition

CAB Abstracts This link opens in a new window Also known as: |CABI CAB Abstracts (1910 to the present) includes international coverage of all aspects of agriculture, horticulture, animal production and forestry including: crop production, plant protection and breeding; forestry and forest products; soil science, land use and water management; animal husbandry, agricultural engineering; economics; rural development, sociology and education.
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Agricola

Global Health

Global Health This link opens in a new window Global Health brings together the resources of two databases - the Public Health and Tropical Medicine (PHTM) database, previously produced by the Bureau of Hygiene and Tropical Diseases (BHTD), and the human health and diseases information extracted from CAB ABSTRACTS. Coverage extends from 1910 to 2019.
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Global Health provides an alternative, complementary point of reference with a broad analysis of foreign language journals, books, research reports, patents and standards, dissertations, conference proceedings, annual reports, public health, developing country information, and other difficult to obtain material.

The Global Health database covers the following aspects of human health and disease:
- communicable diseases (including HIV/AIDS)
- tropical diseases, i.e, diseases in the tropics (including field and experimental studies)
- parasitic diseases and parasitology - medical entomology
- human nutrition (including food composition, food poisoning, effects of diet on health, nutritional disorders, and experimental aspects)
- community and public health (including chronic diseases, occupational health, health status indicators, the impact of agriculture on health, and cancer epidemiology)
- medicinal and poisonous plants (including pharmacology, tissue culture, animal studies, plant composition, allergens, and toxins)

Health Economics / Health Policy

EconLit This link opens in a new window
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PAIS International (1915 - current) This link opens in a new window
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ABI Inform Complete This link opens in a new window The contents of this database have been merged into the new, comprehensive ProQuest One Business platform
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Political Science Complete This link opens in a new window Indexes and abstracts journals in Political Science and povides full-text of select journals. Also includes full-text of select reference books, monographs, and conference papers.
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Health and Education

Education Multi-Database Search (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
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ERIC (via EBSCOhost) This link opens in a new window ERIC (1966 to the present) covers all aspects of education, from preschool to post-secondary and adult education, and all topics within the broad discipline.
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Education Research Complete This link opens in a new window Education Complete is a bibliographic and full text database covering scholarly research and information relating to all areas of education. Topics covered include all levels of education from early childhood to higher education, and all educational specialties, such as multilingual education, health education, and testing. Education Research Complete also covers areas of curriculum instruction as well as administration, policy, funding, and related social issues.
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Health Technology and Engineering

IEEE Xplore This link opens in a new window |IEEE Xplore, produced by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, provides full-text access to IEEE transactions, journals, magazines and conference proceedings published since 1884, and all current IEEE Standards. Coverage includes electrical and electronic engineering, computer engineering and computing science. IET conference proceedings from 2006 through current are also available here.
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Compendex This link opens in a new window Ei Compendex (1884 to the present) provides international coverage of all fields of engineering including related areas of applied science, management, and energy.
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Fields covered include: aeronautics; applied physics; bioengineering and medical equipment; chemical engineering; polymers and food technology; computers and robotics; civil, structural, control, electrical, electronics, and environmental engineering; energy technology and petroleum engineering; industrial engineering; information science; light and optical technology; marine engineering; mechanical, mining, and metallurgic engineering; materials science; nuclear engineering; and transportation.

Life Sciences

CAB Abstracts This link opens in a new window
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BIOSIS Previews This link opens in a new window
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Sports medicine / Kinesiology

SPORTDiscus with Full Text This link opens in a new window SPORTDiscus with Full Text (1975 to the present) is an international database containing information on sports medicine, exercise physiology, biomechanics, psychology, training techniques, coaching, physical education, physical fitness, active living, recreation, history, and facilities and equipment. SPORT Discus with Full Text contains citations for articles back to 1975, and full text of articles from selected journals as far back as 1985.
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Contains text in English, French / Français, German, Italian, Russian and Spanish languages.

Sociology of Health

SocINDEX with Full Text This link opens in a new window Indexes the literature of sociology and related disciplines. Includes full text for selected journals, monographs, conference papers.
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Contains text in English, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Dutch, Flemish, French / Français, German, Italian, Lithuanian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish and Turkish languages.
Criminal Justice Abstracts This link opens in a new window Covers the major journals in criminology and related disciplines, books, and reports from government and nongovernmental agencies. For each document, a summary of the findings, methodology, and conclusions is provided. Topics include crime trends, prevention projects, corrections, juvenile delinquency, police, courts, offenders, victims, and sentencing.
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National Criminal Justice Reference Service

Sociological Abstracts This link opens in a new window This site indexes the international literature of sociology and related disciplines in the social and behavioral sciences. It includes the companion file Social Services Abstracts, which provides bibliographic coverage of current research focused on social work, human services, and related areas.
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