CINAHL: Searching CINAHL

Cinahl Plus with Full Text

Cinahl Plus is a database devoted to the nursing literature. CINAHL database covers nearly 1000 English-language nursing and allied health journals. It also includes references to book chapters, pamphlets, audiovisual materials, software, dissertations, standards of professional practice and nurse practice acts. Covers from 1982 to the present. Evidence-based care sheets.

Note the simple query above. Is is called a keyword query. That means the these two keywords will appear in the title of the article, name of the journal, name of author, abstract (summary), or in the subject terms. That gives a list of 2,995 results.

But how many of these articles are really about needlestick injuries and how many are just mentioning needstick injuries but are about another topic? To change the search to include only articles about needlestick injuries, scroll down to Subject: Major Heading on the left menu.

Select one or two subject headings that most closely match the sjubjects you are interested in, as below, the phrase "Needlestick Injuries" has been selected. Then click

the green update button.

Limited are articles that have "Needlestick injuries" as a subject brings the search down by over 1,000 items. Subject phrases are powerful. Choosing a second subject would have provided an even more precise search.

Another way to create a better search is to limit to articles from scholarly periodicals. The Pfau Library has a tutorial explaining the difference between popular magazines and scholarly periodicals. To limit to only articles from scholarly periodicals, scroll down the left menu to see "Refine your results" and select "Scholarly (Peer Reviewed) Journals.) Then click the green update button.

Limiting to articles in scholarly journals brings the result down by almost 700 items.