OTA: Specialized Searching

Another approach to finding articles is to leave the "big box" search behind. You may want to do this when:

• The number of search results is simply overwhelming or full of irrelevant hits.
• You need a specialized filters for health professions searching.
  • Limit to systematic reviews, clinical queries, evidence based articles, etc.
• You are having trouble narrowing your results to occupational therapy or even health and medicine related items.

American Journal of Occupational Therapy is indexed and FULL TEXT in CINAHL.

• Select a Field and choose SO Publication Name
• Type in American Journal of Occupational Therapy
• Add other search terms

OT Practice is Indexed Only in CINAHL

• Select a Field and choose SO Publication Name
• Type in OT Practice
• The library has issues on paper from 2005 forward.
• OT Practice on the web (use your student AOTA member login)

Tips for Searching:

• Try lots of words for the same thing:  Learning disability, learning deficit, learning disorder. As you find things, pay attention to the vocabulary of the database you are using. Understand different databases may use different vocabulary.
• Distill your concepts into keywords, keywords should represent your concept succinctly.
• Add lines in your search query for each concept.
• If your keywords are a phrase, try quotation marks,  “____"  e.g.   “learning disability”
• Pay attention to mechanics of searching:  did you check full text?  do you need to adjust dates? etc.
• Click on the Subject Terms in found articles to find more on that specific topic.

Assessing your Results:

• Look beyond the first 10. 
• Look at your sort. By default the articles are ranked by relevance.  Is that best for you?
• When you see something good, READ IT—look at the subject terms and abstract.
• OVERALL, stay flexible in your approach and try different strategies. 

If your initial search results in too many results:

• Use additional search terms
• Try synonyms for your original term(s)
• Search for full-text articles only
• Limit your search to more recent materials, the last five years, for example

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• This is the same login you use for Cobra, my.parkland, etc.
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