Subject Resources for Medicine, Nutrition and Physician Associates
The collections provided below are electronic resources (eResources) and give you instant access to high quality scholarly research through journal articles and databases. You can access these eResources 24/7 and each collection has its own to help pages to guide you through accessing and navigating the resources. If you need any additional support to develop your information literacy and research skills please visit the Further Help and Support tab.
Key journals and databases
- Anatomy TV is an interactive educational resource that provides 3D models and illustrations of human anatomy.
- Biomed Central (BMC) Journals are dedicated to publishing high quality, open access, peer-reviewed journals in biology, health sciences and medicine.
- British Medical Journal (BMJ) is a partially open access, fully peer-reviewed, journal focused on improving the creation and dissemination of research evidence; improving clinical education and practice, advocating for universal, equitable, high quality healthcare; championing the health and wellbeing of doctors; and improving the social and environmental determinants of health.
- British Medical Journal (BMJ) Best Practice is a clinical decision support tool that offers a guided approach to help manage patient diagnosis, prognosis, treatment and prevention. Please read the BMJ Best Practice User Guide for support with first time access and setting up an account.
- British Medical Journal (BMJ) Journals is a collection of medical and allied science titles providing the latest clinical knowledge and opinion.
- British Psychological Society provide access to a range of psychology journals including Clinical Psychology, Health Psychology and Psychology and Psychotherapy.
- Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) Complete provides access to top nursing and allied health journals, evidence-based care sheets and quick lessons providing overviews of disease and conditions, biomedicine, consumer health, physical therapy, psychological aspects of social work and nutrition.
- Clinical Key is a clinical database containing a large number of eBooks, medical journals, images and videos, divided into three collections:
- Clinical Skills contains highly illustrated, step-by-step explanations and checklists for hundreds of clinical procedures and is available to students on Nursing, Midwifery, Paramedic and ODP programmes of study at Edge Hill – the Faculty of Health Social Care and Medicine will provide access and support on request.
- Cochrane Library is a collection of databases that contain high-quality, independent evidence to inform healthcare decision-making. Databases are searched simultaneously and include research on the clinical effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of healthcare interventions, systematic reviews, meta-analysis and randomised controlled trial research.
- Emerald Insight is an industry leading digital research platform providing access to a range of full-text journals on a range of professional and practitioner disciplines, including management, marketing, information science, engineering, health and social care and many more.
- Health Research Premium Collection provides central access to hundreds of full-text journals covering nursing, allied health, alternative and complementary medicine and consumer health.
- International Journal of Emergency Services (IJES) provides access to the development of scholarship in the management of all emergency services both universal services, such as fire and rescue, police and ambulance services, and more specialised services, such as the coastguard, air sea or mountain rescue.
- InterNurse is a comprehensive collection of peer-reviewed journals essential for nurse education, nurse prescribing, children’s, mental health, community and palliative care nursing, supporting the learning and professional development of students and practitioners working in healthcare settings all over the world, covering both primary and secondary care.
- MedicinesComplete provides quick and easy access to unbiased and evidence-based knowledge on the latest drug and healthcare information – from diagnosis to prescribing, dispensing and administrating medications
- MEDLINE is the National Library of Medicine’s (NLM) premier bibliographic database containing millions of journal articles, references, citations and abstracts in life sciences and biomedicine.
- PsycArticles is a database of full-text articles from journals published by the American Psychological Association.
- PsycInfo is a bibliographic database from the American Psychological Association (APA) containing peer-reviewed journals, books and dissertations on topics related to psychology.
- Public Library of Science (PLOS) publishes a suite of influential open access journals across all areas of science and medicine.
- PubMed provides access to millions of citations for biomedical literature from MEDLINE, life science journals, and online books.
- Royal Marsden Hospital Manual of Clinical Nursing Procedures includes hundreds of evidence based clinical procedures related to every aspect of care, from hand washing to cardiopulmonary resuscitation.
These resources are great for use across all disciplines and programmes of study.
- Academic Search Premier is a multidisciplinary database with more than 4,600 magazines and journals, including full-text access to nearly 3,900 scholarly and peer-reviewed journals.
- Box of Broadcasts is an on-demand TV and radio service for educational research brought to you from Learning on Screen. The academically focused service enables you to watch and record programmes from over 75 free-to-air channels in the UK and search an extensive archive of over 2.2 million broadcasts. The service includes ten foreign language channels and allows you to create clips and playlists to share or embed into presentations.
- Browzine gives you access to top journals from your area of study in the Browzine Scholarly Journal Room. Browzine is a browsable newsstand of the University Library’s top journals, which lets you easily discover, read and monitor the key journals in your field. Learn more about Browzine in this short video.
- CREDO Reference is a general knowledge database and a great place to begin exploring your research topic as it has thousands of introductory level reference titles, millions of articles, and lots of images, charts, maps and more covering a wide variety of subjects.
- Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB) is a community-driven discovery service that indexes and provides access to scholarly, peer-reviewed open access books and helps users to find trusted open access book publishers.
- Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) is an online directory that indexes and provides access to high quality, open access, peer-reviewed journals.
- Gale Research Complete provides access to proprietary databases, eBooks, scholarly articles and rare primary sources that can enhance your research, learning and discovery, including thousands of journals and other authoritative sources in Academic OneFile.
- Libby (OverDrive) is a reading for pleasure collection of eBooks, audiobooks and magazines, providing you with a new digital library via the Libby app open 24/7 to all Edge Hill students and staff.
- LinkedIn Learning gives you full, free, unlimited access to thousands of high quality online courses and video tutorials written by industry experts. The courses cover many topics including using a wide range of software, and personal development skills in education, public speaking, employability and much more. You can even claim and display certificates for courses you complete on your LinkedIn profile, to give your online CV a boost!
- Overton is the world’s largest searchable index of policy documents, guidelines, think tank publications and working papers. You can access this platform with your University email address to search the literature and find out who is influencing policies and policy makers.
- Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is widely accepted as the most complete record of the English language ever assembled.
- Oxford Reference is an online reference database, covering a wide range of subject areas, providing access to millions of digitised materials from across Oxford University Press’s Dictionaries, Companions and Encyclopedias.
- ProQuest Dissertations and Theses is the world’s most comprehensive collection of dissertations and theses from around the world, spanning from 1743 to the present day.
- Sage Datasets is a collection of US and international datasets sourced from governmental, commercial and private organisations, allowing you to search and browse billions of datasets, compare and contrast variables of interest, and create customised exportable charts and tables.
- Sage Research Methods is a database which supports research at all levels by providing material to guide users through each step of the research process. From writing your research question and choosing a method, to analysing data, writing up and publishing the findings. Resources include a methods map, books, reference works, journal articles, podcasts and instructional videos from world-leading academics. With information on qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods, Sage Research Methods is the ideal tool to support you through your research.
- ScienceDirect is a leading full-text scientific database offering access to thousands of journal articles and book chapters for subjects including physical sciences and engineering, life sciences, health sciences, sports and physical activities, social sciences and humanities.
- Scopus is the world’s largest abstract and citation database, containing 24,600 journals from 5,000 publishers. It is excellent for literature reviews or for finding out what has been published in your area as it can locate high quality journal articles, book chapters and more, for any subject.
- Springer Link provides researchers with access to millions of scientific documents from journals, books, series, protocols and reference works.
- Statista is a comprehensive statistics platform offering over 1.5 million data sets. Find studies and reports, forecasts and surveys from over 400 industries that you can download in a range of formats. There are also video tutorials and a quick user guide to help you make the most of Statista.
- Taylor and Francis Online is a collection of multidisciplinary journals covering subjects from arts, humanities, business, computer sciences, social sciences, geography, sports, social work, education and many more.
- Wiley Online Library is a leading scholarly articles databases providing access to thousands of full-text multidisciplinary journals, covering life, health and physical sciences, nursing, psychology, social work, education, media, technology, business, social sciences and the humanities.
In addition to journals and databases, you can also access printed and electronic books (eBooks) within your subject area.
The table below is a great place to start browsing the physical Library shelves. It lists a range of useful topics related to your subject area and the associated call number for that subject. The call number is the numbers (and usually letters too e.g. 808.042/GIL) on the spine of the book, which allows them to be arranged in a logical order on the Library shelves.
The call numbers listed below are the general area you will find books on the related subject, but you can also complete a search on Discover More for more specific titles and to access any eBooks on your chosen topic.
Subject | Call Number |
Health Care Law and Ethics | 344.4 |
Health Research | 344.42 / 610.72 |
Public Health | 362.1 |
Anatomy and Physiology | 611 |
Pharmacology | 615.1 |
Clinical Medicine | 616 |
Emergency Medicine | 616 |
Health Psychology | 616 |
Mental Health | 616.89 |
Newspapers can be a useful way of keeping up to date with current affairs or recent events and newspaper archives usually contain issues with less recent information, which is useful for finding articles of a more historical interest.
- British Library Newspapers (1800-1900) contains a large range of national, regional and local newspapers from the period. These include the Illustrated Police News, the Chartist Northern Star and the Morning Chronicle.
- Daily Mail Historical Archive (1896-2004) contains news stories and images that capture twentieth century culture and society. Offering full page and article images, with searchable full-text back to the first issue, this is a useful resource for historical research.
- Financial Times contains news and analysis about the world of business and finance reaching back as far as 1999. Business and Economics students, or any researchers wishing to subscribe to daily updates, would benefit from accessing the Financial Times direct. Anyone wishing to research older content would benefit from visiting the Financial Times via Gale OneFile.
- Gale OneFile: News contains articles from over 2,300 newspapers from around the world. These include major British newspapers, as well as United States and Australian titles. It also has thousands of images, radio and TV broadcasts and transcripts.
- The Guardian and The Observer Historical Newspapers (1791-2003) provides genealogists, researchers and scholars with online, easily searchable first-hand accounts and unparalleled coverage of the politics, society and events of the time.
- Illustrated London News Historical Archive (1842-2003) was the world’s first fully illustrated weekly newspaper, marking a revolution in journalism and news reporting, presenting a vivid picture of British and world events, including news of war, disaster, ceremonies, the arts and science.
- Lexis+ Newspapers provides access to an archive of UK national and regional newspapers, with coverage from the 1990s to the present day.
- Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection is Reverend Charles Burney’s collection of early English news media. A comprehensive primary source for this period, which helps track the development of news.
- Times Digital Archive contains every issue of The Times from 1785 to 2019. You can search by keyword or for a particular issue and each story appears as it looks in the original print copy of the newspaper.
- Times Educational Supplement is the UK’s foremost weekly publication covering primary, secondary and further education and can be accessed by creating a personal account with your Edge Hill University email address.
Referencing
Referencing is the acknowledgment of all the sources that have been cited in your assignment, whether you have quoted them directly or paraphrased. This can include sources such as books and journal articles. There are various referencing styles available and your tutor will let you know which one they want you to use in your work.
Visit the UniSkills Referencing web page to learn more about academic integrity; the what, why and when you should be referencing; information, guides and interactive toolkits to support your referencing skills development; further Edge Hill Harvard Referencing support; and how to access further referencing support.
Vancouver
Some programmes within Medicine use the Vancouver referencing style. and can access further information in the Vancouver Referencing Guidance and Vancouver Referencing Toolkit. Further information and examples of references are available from the U.S. National Library of Medicine website.
Medical professionals rely on information that is evidence-based in order to make the right decisions for patient care. Evidence-based means that the information you as a professional use, is based on sound research, not someone’s opinion. Typically, that means you must locate the best, published research studies on the topic you are researching. The published article (sometimes in paper, but most often in electronic form) presents the actual research results, so that you can see how the conclusions were reached. In addition, the researcher provides data to support those conclusions.
Finding the Evidence
- BASE is one of the world’s most voluminous search engines especially for academic open access web resources.
- CINAHL Complete Useful for postgraduates/researchers and more intermediate/advanced searchers.
- Cochrane Library A user guide, videos and webinar recordings are available from the Cochrane Library Training Hub.
- COnnecting REpositories (CORE) provides a comprehensive, open access, bibliographic database of the world’s scholarly literature, collecting and indexing research from repositories and journals.
- MEDLINE contains citations and abstracts from over 5200 biomedical journals and has been created by the United States National Library of Medicine.
- NICE Clinical Knowledge Summaries provide primary care practitioners with a summary of the current evidence base and guidance on best practice.
- PubMed comprises more than 25 million citations for biomedical literature from MEDLINE, life science journals, and online books.
- Springer Nature Experiments Research solution allowing researchers to quickly find and evaluate protocols and methods.
Appraising the Evidence
Assessing the strengths and weaknesses of research articles is required to determine the validity, reliability and applicability of the research to clinical practice. A checklist can help you with this process:
- BestBETs
- CASP
- CEBM
- How to Read a Paper (BMJ series)
- SIGN Critical Appraisal Notes and Checklists
- University of Glasgow EBP Checklists
Recommended Resources
- Analyse This is a free online tutorial to help students learn how to analyse research data.
- BestBETs Best Evidence Topics reviews (BETs) provide rapid evidence-based answers to real-life clinical questions, using a systematic approach to reviewing the literature.
- National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) is aimed at helping those working in the NHS, local authorities and the wider community deliver high-quality healthcare by developing evidence-based guidelines on the most effective ways to diagnose, treat and prevent disease and ill health.
- TRIP: Turning Research into Practice is a clinical search tool designed to allow health professionals to rapidly identify the highest quality clinical evidence for clinical practice.
Accessibility
There are lots of accessibility features available across all eResources and we’ve pulled together a useful A-Z list of these in a new Online Reading List: Database List and Accessibility Information. You can also explore some highlights of these accessibility features in our UniSkills Focus On: eResources Accessibility blog.
Reading Lists
Your Online Reading Lists are a great starting point when beginning your research. Your reading lists contain materials your tutor has identified as essential and/or recommended reading.
UniSkills
UniSkills support all undergraduate (UG) and taught postgraduate (PGT) students with their academic skills.
If you need any further help and support developing your research skills you can access lot of useful information on the UniSkills Finding Academic Information web page.
UniSkills also offer a range of academic skills workshops, including support with finding academic information and conducting literature reviews and you can book on as many UniSkills Workshops as you need throughout the year.
For more tailored support developing your research skills, or getting the most out of your subject resources, you can book a one-to-one Information Skills appointment with an experienced Academic Skills Advisor.
Research Support
If you are staff engaged in research or a research student (including PGCert in Research, MRes, MPhil and PhD) you can access additional support from the University Library Research Support team. Visit the Research Support web pages for more information.
TechSkills
TechSkills is a package of face to face support, online resources and activities to help you develop and enhance your technology skills. You can find out more about specialist workstations and software available by visiting the TechSkills web page.
Ask Us
You can always access our online knowledge base and help tool Ask Us to search our frequently asked questions (FAQs) and even send us an email, if you can’t find the information you need – accessible 24/7.
Digital Skills
E-learning for Healthcare (e-LfH) is a Health Education England programme working with the NHS and professional bodies to support patient care by providing e-learning to the health and social care workforce.
- Module 1 – Introduction to Searching
Consider the processes involved in searching and identify areas to develop. - Module 2 – Where Do I Start Searching?
Ensure that you are looking in the right places for information. - Module 3 – How Do I Start to Develop a Search Strategy?
Develop a simple search strategy and save time by planning your search. - Module 4 – Too Many Results? How to Narrow your Search
Techniques to narrow your search to find relevant articles in less time. - Module 5 – Too Few Results? How to Broaden your Search
Techniques to increase results when there doesn’t seem much available. - Module 6 – Searching with Subject Headings
Use advanced techniques to find more relevant articles in less time. - Module 7 – How to Search the Healthcare Databases (HDAS)
Use the Healthcare Databases (HDAS) to find relevant articles.