Research Guides: Public Health: Databases

Requesting Articles Through Omni

If the database/library does not provide access to the articles that you are trying to retrieve, you can request full-text articles via the library’s Interlibrary Loans service:

Complete a request using the Blank Request Form.
You must select a Pickup Location, however PDFs will be sent electronically.
The turnaround time for receiving PDFs via email can be as quick as one or two business days, however, some articles may take longer if they are challenging to track down and receive.

Introduction

Bibliographic/citation databases contain bibliographic information (e.g., citation information and abstracts) for sources of literature. The databases compared and listed below predominantly include bibliographic records for journal articles, however, most do not search or provide the full text articles. Instead, many databases will provide links for accessing full text articles from a publisher or journal website.

Databases that prioritize high-level evidence are sometimes referred to as evidence-based practice databases, some of which are available through the library (e.g. Cochrane Library) and others are freely available to search (e.g. Health Evidence).

Database Comparison

	Global Health	PubMed/ Ovid MEDLINE	Embase	CINAHL	PsycINFO	Cochrane Library	Web of Science
Years:	1973- present	1946- present	1947-present	1980- present	1806- present	Varies by database	1900- present
Journals:	>7,300	>6,500	> 8,500	>3,100	>2,500	N/A	>33,000
Records:	>3 million	> 33 million	> 41 million	~4 million	> 4 million	>1 million	>170 million
Record Types:	Journal articles, book content, theses, reports	Journal articles, some conference proceedings	Journal articles, conference proceedings, preprints	Journal and magazine articles, dissertations, books	Journal articles, book chapters, dissertations	High-quality journal articles (controlled trials and SRs), SR protocols	Journal articles, book chapters, conference proceedings
Subjects Included:	Public health: communicable diseases, epidemiology, infectious diseases, nutrition	Biomedicine incl. allied health, biological and physical sciences, humanities	Biomedicine, clinical medicine, pharmacology toxicology, life sciences, healthcare admin	Nursing, biomedicine, altern/compl medicine, consumer health, and allied health	Psychological literature incl. social, behavioral, and health sciences	Health care interventions, diagnostic assessments	Multi-disciplinary incl. science, technology, arts, social sciences, humanities
Subject Headings:	Global Health Indexing	MeSH	Emtree	CINAHL Subject Terms	APA Thesaurus Terms	MeSH, but only for some records	N/A
QUL Platforms:	Ovid	Ovid and PubMed	Ovid	Ebsco	Ovid and APA PsycNET	Ovid and Wiley	Web of Science
Notes:		No need to search both Ovid MEDLINE and PubMed		“Cumulative Index for Nursing & Allied Health Literature”

Databases

CINAHL
The Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature indexes over 3,100 journals in the fields of nursing, occupational and physical therapy, social work, and other allied health disciplines.
Cochrane Library (via Ovid interface)
The Cochrane Library (aka EBM Reviews on Ovid) is a collection of databases that contain different types of high-quality, independent evidence to inform healthcare decision-making.
Cochrane Library (via Wiley interface)
The Cochrane Library is a collection of databases that contain different types of high-quality, independent evidence to inform healthcare decision-making.
EMBASE
Medical database covering a wide range of journals in the biomedical sciences. Particularly useful for locating drug information, as it indexes many drug journals not covered by MEDLINE. Embase contains more than 30 million references from over 8,500 worldwide journals.
Global Health
Covers communicable diseases (including HIV/AIDS); tropical diseases; parasitology; human nutrition; 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. 40% of the records are unique to global health. Produced by CABI. Material indexed includes: 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. Content is derived from over 7,000 journals.
Google Scholar
Use the Google Scholar search engine to locate articles from a wide variety of academic publishers, professional societies, preprint repositories and universities, as well as scholarly articles published on the "open" web. Google Scholar also enables you to find articles that cite a previously published work.
Ovid MEDLINE
Medline (via Ovid) is a database of citations and abstracts in the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, health care systems, allied health and preclinical sciences. It contains more than 26 million references from over 6.500 worldwide journals.
PsycINFO
Provides abstracts and citations to the scholarly literature in the psychological, social, behavioral, and health sciences. Includes material of relevance to psychologists and professionals in related fields such as psychiatry, management, business, education, social science, neuroscience, law, medicine, and social work.
PubMed
Medline (via PubMed) is a database of citations and abstracts in the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, health care systems, allied health and preclinical sciences. It contains more than 26 million references from over 6,500 worldwide journals.
Web of Science
This large, multidisciplinary database provides access to bibliographic information, author abstracts, and cited references from scholarly journals and conference proceedings. A cited reference search enables you to find articles that cite a previously published work.
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Evidence Based Practice Resources

Resources listed in this section provide some type of evidence based analysis, synthesis and/or summary of a particular topic, study or question that will aid in evidence based decision making.

Campbell Systematic Reviews
Campbell Systematic Reviews is an open access journal prepared under the editorial control of the Campbell Collaboration. The journal publishes systematic reviews, evidence and gap maps, and methods research papers. Campbell has a growing list of editorial topic areas, including Social Welfare, Disability, Education, International Development, Crime and Justice.
Cochrane Library (via Ovid interface)
The Cochrane Library (aka EBM Reviews on Ovid) is a collection of databases that contain different types of high-quality, independent evidence to inform healthcare decision-making.
Cochrane Library (via Wiley interface)
The Cochrane Library is a collection of databases that contain different types of high-quality, independent evidence to inform healthcare decision-making.
Guidelines International Network
The Guidelines International Network (G-I-N) has the world's largest international guideline library. It is a Network of individual and organisations interested in guidelines. The vision of G-I-N is to lead the field of guideline development and implementation.
Health Evidence
This site allows access to 6,514 quality-rated systematic reviews evaluating the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of public health interventions, including cost data. We search the published literature and compile public health relevant reviews -- eliminating your need to search and screen individual databases.
Health Systems Evidence
The world’s most comprehensive, continuously updated repository of systematic reviews and economic evaluations about governance, financial and delivery arrangements within health systems, and about implementation strategies that can support change in health systems.
Joanna Briggs Institute EBP
Access to the systematic reviews and best practice sheets created by the Joanna Briggs Institute, an affiliated research unit of the Royal Adelaide Hospital and the University of Adelaide. Collaborating centres focusing on nursing, midwifery and allied health exist worldwide. Queen's University School of Nursing hosts a Joanna Briggs Institute Collaborating Centre.
NICE Guidelines
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) provides guidance, sets quality standards and manages a national database to improve people's health and prevent and treat ill health.
SIRENS (Social Interventions Research & Evaluation Network)
"As part of SIREN’s mission to synthesize, disseminate, and catalyze high quality research, we produce resources that we hope can help research teams and health care delivery system stakeholders both better evaluate and more easily present information on the evidence on social and medical care integration."
Social Systems Evidence
The world’s most comprehensive, continuously updated repository of research evidence about the programs, services and products available in a broad range of government sectors and program areas (e.g., community and social services, culture and gender, economic development and growth, education, transportation), as well as the governance, financial and delivery arrangements within which these programs and services are provided.
TRIP Database
TRIP was created in 1997 to bring together all the 'evidence-based' healthcare resources available on the Internet. This version includes coverage of peer-reviewed journals, medical images and patient information leaflets. The TRIP Database is updated monthly.