Nursing Library Guide

 

Quick Search

A good place to start your nursing research.

See Below for Info on…

  • Finding Books

  • Finding Articles

  • All About CINAHL

  • Websites

Check out our Evidence-Based Practice guide for more in-depth information!

 

Contact the Library

Librarian for Nursing

Emma Fernandez (she/her)
efernandez@stephens.edu
(573) 441-5129

Book an appointment with me!

Library Contact Info

library@stephens.edu
Front Desk: (573) 876-7182
Text the Library: (573) 475-4211
Chat (when available)

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Finding Books

Resources

  • AccessMedicine

    Contains the full text of more than 130 medicine-related books, as well as more than 900 cases, 1,000 videos, and 11,000 Q&As.

  • Stephens Library Catalog - Search the traditional catalog for Stephens College books, videos, and more.

  • MOBIUS Catalog - Search the MOBIUS Consortium catalog and request physical/print books be sent to Stephens for pickup. Books are generally ready to be picked up in two to three work days.

  • eBook Clinical Collection

    Contains more than 3,800 full-text titles focusing on medical specialties, nursing, allied health and general practice areas.

Physical Book Locations

Nursing books are located in the following sections (second floor of the Stephens Library):

  • Q - Science (General)

  • QM - Human Anatomy

  • RT - Nursing

 

Search Tips

Search the Stephens Library Catalog to find physical materials and eBooks held at Stephens Library. The MOBIUS Catalog is also a good option to broaden your search for print books to libraries across Missouri.

Try using main concepts to get started, or use more specific terms for the field you’re researching.

Use the advanced search function and search for phrases as subject terms to find materials about that term (rather than narrowing to a specific title).

In addition, use the filters on the left hand side of the catalog to narrow or broaden your search.

  • Availability (Online vs. At The Library)

  • Found In (Subject, Title, Author, etc.)

  • Format (E-Book, Book/Print. DVD, etc.)

  • Language (English, Spanish, etc.)

  • Publish Date (use the sliding bar to create a timeline)

  • Place (U.S., Canada, etc.)

Creating keywords & a research question:

PICO is a mnemonic device used to describe the four elements of a clinical research question.

P = Population/Patient/Problem - What is the problem to be addressed or the population involved?

I = Intervention - What intervention or factor or is being tested/considered?

C = Comparison - Is there an alternative to compare with the intervention? (Sometimes there is not.)

O = Outcome - What can be measured/affected?

For example:

In hospital nurses, does antibacterial foam decrease bacteria count on hands as much as hand washing with soap and water?

  • P: hospital nurses

  • I: using antibacterial foam

  • C: hand washing with soap and water

  • O: decreased bacteria count

Finding Articles on Nursing

Resources

  • ClinicalKey - TEMPORARILY UNAVAILABLE

    Content type: articles, books, reference info, and video. Provides full-text access to over 600 journals, 1,000 books, and 9,000 medical and procedural videos.

  • CINAHL Ultimate

    Content types: articles. Provides full text of more than 900 nursing and allied health journals, and also includes quick lessons, evidence-based care sheets, and CEU modules.

  • DynaMed

    Content type: reference info. Clinical reference tool that assists with point-of-care needs.

  • Nursing Reference Center Plus

    Content types: reference info, video, and images. Evidence-based information resource containing disease, conditions, and drug topics as well as videos and images.

  • Pepid

    Content type: point of care resource. Provides both clinical and drug information.

  • PubMed

    Content type: articles. PubMed contains more than 30 million citations and abstracts of biomedical literature.

Search Tips

  • Break your research question into essential key words and connect with AND.

  • Use synonyms and connect them with OR

    • adolescents OR adolescence OR teens OR teenagers OR young adults

  • Use truncation (*) to get plurals and alternative endings.

    • educat* = educate, education, educating, educated, etc.

  • Put quotes around a term that’s a phrase to keep the words together.

    • “body image”

  • When you find a good article, look at the works cited or reference list at the end to help identify other useful resources on the same topic.

When searching these databases, you will likely come across articles that are not immediately available. In such cases, choose to “Request It” and complete the process. Articles usually become available within one business day, although it can take as many as five days. You can review your request history and make requests from scratch using Interlibrary Loan.

All About CINAHL

CINAHL (Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature) is an index of English-language and selected other-language journal articles about nursing, allied health, biomedicine, and healthcare.

What’s in CINAHL?

Provides indexing, abstracts and full text for more than 1,300 nursing and allied health journals. It also provides access to the Cochrane systematic reviews, health care books, nursing dissertations, selected conference proceedings, evidence-based care sheet and quick lesson disease overviews, and continuing education modules.

Using Explode and Major Concept

Explode

When you Explode a term, you create a search query that “explodes” the subject heading. The headings are exploded to retrieve all references indexed to that term as well as all references indexed to any narrower subject terms.

In a database with a tree, such as MeSH or CINAHL Subject Headings, exploding retrieves all documents containing any of the subject terms below the term you selected. In other databases, exploding retrieves all documents containing the selected term, as well as any of its first level of narrower terms. If a plus sign (+) appears next to a narrower or related term, there are narrower terms below it.

Major Concept

When you select Major Concept for a term, you create a search query that finds only records for which the subject heading is a major point of the article. Searches are limited with specific qualifiers (subheadings) to improve the precision of the search, and limited to major subject headings indicate the main concept of an article.

Combining Explode and Major Concept

If you select both Explode and Major Concept, you retrieve all references indexed to your term (and its narrower terms) and all articles for which the subject heading is a major point of the article.

Scope Notes

Click on the Scope link and view the entire Scope Note.

Using CINAHL/MeSH Subject Headings

Subject terms are assigned based on article content, allowing you to create a targeted search. When you click the CINAHL Subject Headings box above the search box, your terms are searched against the CINAHL Headings or MeSH Headings authority, depending on the database being searched. From there, you can select headings and subheadings to refine your search.

1) A result list of related terms is displayed. Check the box for a subject heading to view available subheadings.

2) Check boxes of desired subheadings to add them to your search. Terms are added to the Search Term Builder box on the right.

3) Click Browse Additional Terms to add more headings to your search.

4) Click Search Database to execute the search.

5) Result List is displayed.

Websites

Patient Safety

Global

Professional

Government