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Do you find yourself struggling to sift through endless search results for health and medical information? Say "No!" to that frustration.
This guide explains the differences between "consumer health information" and information geared to healthcare providers and scholars and links to your best bets for finding authoritative information for both audiences.
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Add Quotation Marks to search for an exact phrase or words in a specific or EXACT order. An exact phrase will return more accurate results because it snaps all of the words together, turning it into a phrase that must be found exactly in that order.
Example: chronic bronchitis vs. "chronic bronchitis"
Apply filters to limit your search results. Because they limit your results, filters might also be called limiters. The most common and helpful filters to limit your results are:
Create a list of keywords associated with your topic.
What else could it be called (synonyms)? What describes it specifically (hyponyms)? What is it related to broadly (hypernyms)?
Example: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a group of lung diseases that includes chronic bronchitis and emphysema.
Topics can be narrowed or broadened depending on the use of search terms.
General: COPD
Narrower: emphysema
Broader: lung disease