Library Orientation for Nursing

In this section we will review the steps you take in order to perform an effective search using databases and other resources. Every search begins with a research question or topic. If you have not developed your research question or chosen your topic you will need to complete this first step.

Step 1: Develop a research question or choose a topic

Step 2: Brainstorm your search terms, including MeSH terms, that should be included in your search

Step 3: Use Boolean logic to combine your terms

Step 4: Perform a preliminary search to determine if their is any literature on your topic (You can schedule an appointment with a librarian to assist you with performing your preliminary search.)

Step 5: Keep a record of your search strategy

PICO is an acronym for

• Patient
• Intervention
• Comparison
• Outcome

PICO is used to create a researchable question based on a clinical situation you have encountered.  Based on your PICO question, you will identify keywords and/or subject terms to use in database searches. 

You can use PICO to develop your clinical question.

P - Patient or population/disease: Which population are you studying? (Consider age, gender, ethnicity, group with a certain disorder, etc.)

I - Intervention, prognostic factor, or exposure: What do you want to do for the patient? (Consider therapy, exposure to a disease, risk behavior, prognostic factor, preventative measure, or diagnostic test)

C - Comparison or control: Are you comparing two interventions or variables? (Consider absence of disease, absence of risk factor, or use of placebo)

O - Outcome: What is the expected result or what do you hope to accomplish, improve or affect? (Consider disease incidence, accuracy of a diagnosis, rate of occurrence of adverse outcome, survival or mortality rates)What is the expected result or what do you hope to accomplish, improve or affect? (Consider disease incidence, accuracy of a diagnosis, rate of occurrence of adverse outcome, survival or mortality rates)

Figure from Tree of different types of studies, CEBM, https://www.cebm.net/2014/04/study-designs/

"Spotting the Study Design

The type of study can generally be worked at by looking at three issues (as per the Tree of design in Figure 1):

Q1. What was the aim of the study?

1. To simply describe a population (PO questions)  descriptive
2. To quantify the relationship between factors (PICO questions)  analytic.

Q2. If analytic, was the intervention randomly allocated?

1. Yes? RCT
2. No? Observational study

For observational study the main types will then depend on the timing of the measurement of outcome, so our third question is:

Q3. When were the outcomes determined?

1. Some time after the exposure or intervention? cohort study (‘prospective study’)
2. At the same time as the exposure or intervention? cross sectional study or survey
3. Before the exposure was determined? case-control study (‘retrospective study’ based on recall of the exposure)"

Information from Spotting the Study Design, CEBM, https://www.cebm.net/2014/04/study-designs/