Health Statistics Resources
Nanda (National Neighborhood Data Archive) | (umich.edu)
University of Michigan’s data archive includes data on different levels of scale (county, census tract, etc.) on topics such as healthcare, housing, and socioeconomic status. Data can be useful for research on social determinants of health.
National Center for Health Statistics
Website of the CDC entity that collects health data and statistics.
Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS)
State-level data regarding health conditions, preventive services, and health-related behaviors collected via telephone surveys.
“Health Topics” on Medline Plus
Many of the included health topics on this National Library of Medicine site have a "Statistics and Research" section leading to more information about data sources on the topic.
Information on more than 800 health indicators in categories including disparities, health costs and budgets, Medicaid and Chip, mental health and substance use, and more.
Demographic, location, and economic data collected by the US Census Bureau presented in tables, maps, and datasets.
Explore Health Rankings | County Health Rankings & Roadmaps
County Health Rankings and Roadmaps (CHR&R) was created by the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute and includes data, evidence, and examples to measure health of nearly every county in the United States.
The City Health Dashboard gathers data on 35 measures of health and health factors across cities in the United States, speaking to five dimensions: Health Behaviors, Social and Economic Factors, Physical Environment, Health Outcomes, and Clinical Care.
RHIhub was designed to be a clearinghouse on rural health issues. Includes statistics showing rural health needs by area.
Other Resources
- e-JournalsSearch a complete list of all our journals. If you have a citation, use this link to find full-text.
- e-BooksSearch our books; read online and download PDFs.
- LibraLibra is the University of Virginia’s open access institutional repository, the online archive of scholarship created by the University community. It provides a central, stable location for the scholarly output of the University community (journal articles, datasets, theses/dissertations, etc.).
- Directory of Nursing Journals | INANE - International Academy of Nursing EditorsINANE's directory includes a list of reputable nursing journals and their contacts.
- Nursing Theory and FrameworksLooking for more information on nursing theory and frameworks? Follow the link to our guide.
Finding scales, tools, and measurements
- CINAHL This link opens in a new windowIn the "Publication Type" dropdown menu, choose "equations & formulas," "forms," "questionnaire/scale," or "research instrument."
- Mental Measurements Yearbook This link opens in a new windowSearch this database of over 2,700 contemporary testing instruments.
- PubMed This link opens in a new windowAdd the MeSH term "Surveys and Questionnaires*" to your search.
- Reference List of Tools, Instruments and Measurements Useful to NursesSigma Repository's reference list of instruments and measurements relevant to nursing.
Finding Clinical Trials
- ClinicalTrials.gov This link opens in a new windowThe U.S. National Library of Medicine's registry and results database of publicly and privately supported clinical studies of human participants conducted around the world.
School of Nursing Resources
Searching for and Appraising Evidence
Looking for more information about how to search a specific database? Check out our database tutorials.
Learning How to Search for Evidence
Where to search?
First consider what type of information could answer your question.
If you're looking for background information on a topic, consider some of these sources, including Virgo, our library's catalog.
If you need peer-reviewed journal articles on a specific topic, choose databases with appropriate coverage for your topic.
Visit our page for resources on the history of nursing.
Basic Principles of Database Searching
- MIT's Guide to SearchingThis written guide covers the basics of Boolean operators and other search syntax.
- Searching School Video TutorialsCarrie Price's series of 3-4 minute videos offers a great introduction to the principles of database searching from a health sciences librarian.
Database-Specific Tutorials
How to Obtain Full-Text Articles
Database searches provide bibliographic citations - information about articles, such as their titles, abstracts, author names, etc. Sometimes, the full text of an article is also available because we subscribe to the journal that the article is contained in.
Consider installing the LibKey Nomad extension on your browser. This extension makes it easy to obtain PDFs of full-text articles in one click, although it won't work with all databases. Review the "Connecting from Off-Grounds" page for more information about LibKey Nomad and other extensions that will help discover full-text PDFs.
If we don't have a subscription for the journal your article was published in, we can get a PDF of the article for you via interlibrary loan.
Point-of-Care Resources
Point-of-care resources provide answers based on the best available evidence at your fingertips. These resources can also be useful to explore background questions on a topic.
- Access AnesthesiologyOffers a wealth of information to support education and clinical practice: eBooks, procedure videos, instructional animation, guidelines, quick references tools, and more.
- Access Medicine This link opens in a new windowOver 85 leading medical textbooks, including among others, Harrison's Online, Current Medical Diagnosis & Treatment, Hurst's the Heart, Williams Obstetrics, Schwartz’s Principles of Surgery. Drug Monographs. Multimedia examination & procedural videos. Study Tools including Flash Cards and Review Questions
Unlimited simultaneous users. - ClinicalKey This link opens in a new window
This medical search engine works a little like Google. It includes medical and surgical reference books, access to journals/articles, procedural content and videos, point-of-care summaries, drug info, and access to MEDLINE. Includes images and videos too.
- Cochrane Library This link opens in a new windowA collection of databases that contain high-quality, independent evidence to support healthcare decision making. Includes full-text access to the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, as well as the full-records from DARE, Health Technology Assessment Database (HTA), and NHS Economic Evaluation Database (NHS EED).
- Essential Evidence Plus (Formerly InfoRetriever) This link opens in a new window
Consists of 8 separate databases that provide new research information, basic drug information, evidence-based clinical guidelines, and clinical decision-making tools.
- Lexidrug This link opens in a new window
Provides point-of-care drug information, including dosing, administration, interactions, toxicology, warnings and precautions, pharmacology, pharmacokinetics, pharmacogenomics, and more. Generic or product name searches link to additional information, including AHFS Essentials, AHFS DI, Martindale, Facts and Comparisons A to Z Drugs, as well as information for pediatric and geriatric populations. Also provides links to the UVA Health System Formulary, the Formulary Monograph Service, and Trissel's IV Compatibility.
- Lippincott Nursing Procedures and Skills This link opens in a new window
Contains almost 1,300 current, evidence-based procedures in all major clinical categories. It provides detailed descriptions of procedures that allows users to identify the procedure they need quickly and easily. Complete instructions, preparation guidelines, implementation steps, special considerations, and references are included in each entry.
- Mental Measurements Yearbook This link opens in a new windowProvides users with a comprehensive guide to over 2,700 contemporary testing instruments. All MMY entries contain descriptive information (e.g., test purpose, publisher, pricing) and edited review(s) written by leading content area experts, covering educational skills, personality, vocational aptitude, psychology, and related areas as included in the printed Mental Measurements Yearbooks.
- UpToDate This link opens in a new windowA physician authored clinical decision support resource with synthesized evidence ideal for point-of-care decisions. Compiles the most recent information to support its evidence-based recommendations.
- VisualDx
VisualDx is clinical decision support tool intended to be used by medical practitioners, including primary care practitioners, to assist them in differential diagnosis.
Davis's Drug Guide for Nurses by ISBN: 1719646406Publication Date: 2022-05-18Davis's Drug Guide for Nurses®, Eighteenth Edition delivers everything you need to administer medications safely across the lifespan--643 well-organized monographs encompassing hundreds of generic drugs and thousands of trade names. Its nursing-focused Cure & Care' approach explains what the drug does and describes what the nurse does and how the nursing process relates to the pharmacotherapeutics.
Databases
This list includes our most-used databases for performing literature searches and finding articles on nursing topics.
- CINAHL This link opens in a new windowSearches related to nursing or allied health should include the CINAHL database. CINAHL uses the EBSCO search platform, so the user experience is very similar to using EBSCO's PsycINFO.
- EmbaseEmbase is a very large database with specialized coverage of drugs and pharmacology, medical devices, clinical medicine, and basic science. Good coverage of European and other international journals makes Embase a good choice for searches related to quality. Any thorough literature search should include at least one of the large multidisciplinary databases: Scopus, Embase, or Web of Science. Embase also searches Medline, but you can limit your search results to exclude Medline results if you've also searched PubMed or OVID Medline.
- Google Scholar This link opens in a new windowGoogle Scholar can be a great place to look for background information on your topic, but remember that it can be difficult to tell whether information is peer-reviewed or not.
- Health Source: Nursing/Academic Edition This link opens in a new windowProvides nearly 550 scholarly full text journals focusing on many medical disciplines.
- OVID Medline This link opens in a new windowThe core content of PubMed (Medline) overlaps with OVID's Medline database. Generally, you'll want to choose between searching PubMed or OVID Medline in your literature search.
- PsycINFO This link opens in a new windowDoes your topic involve psychology, psychiatry, social sciences, or education? You'll want to include a search of PsycINFO. PsycINFO is offered on the same EBSCO platform as CINAHL, so searching is very similar.
- PubMed This link opens in a new windowPubMed is a large database of biomedical literature - it's a great place to start a literature search, especially if you're not sure where to start. The core of PubMed is Medline, so you should generally choose between searching PubMed or Ovid Medline.
- ScopusScopus is another very large multidisciplinary database. Any thorough literature search should include at least one of the large multidisciplinary databases: Scopus, Embase, or Web of Science.
- Web of Science (WoS) This link opens in a new windowWeb of Science is a broad interdisciplinary database covering medicine, life science, social sciences, and more. Any thorough literature search should include at least one of the large multidisciplinary databases: Scopus, Embase, or Web of Science. WOS also lets you see which articles have cited an article. By entering a key article into WOS, you can investigate the literature on your topic both backward in time (by looking through the article's bibliography) and forward in time (by seeing what other articles have cited the article). This can be particularly useful in understanding the scope of your topic in the literature.
- Alt HealthWatch This link opens in a new windowThis database focuses on the many perspectives of complementary, holistic and integrated approaches to health care and wellness.
- List of All DatabasesWe've covered the most often-used databases for nursing research above, but don't forget that HSL users have access to many other databases.
Gray Literature
What is gray literature?
Gray literature is any informational resource that exists outside of commercial publishing.
Gray literature may include sources such as ongoing clinical trials, governmental research, conference abstracts and proceedings, dissertations, theses, and more.
Where should I search for gray literature?
The answer depends on your research question and the type of evidence that could help answer it.
Google Scholar and our pre-filtered Google search limiting results to .gov, .edu, & .org sites are good places to start.
The NIH (National Institutes of Health) guide to gray literature provides links to many other suggested sources for gray literature.
Resources for Finding Clinical Practice Guidelines
PubMed and CINAHL can be searched for guidelines that were published in journal articles.
PubMed: Run your search, then select "guideline" under "additional filters." You may need to refresh your results to apply the filter after clicking "show."
CINAHL: Run your search, then choose "show more" under "limit to" menu on the left side of the screen. Under "publication type" choose "practice guideline."
- Guidelines CentralAccess to current practice guidelines and summaries.
- U.S. Preventive Services Task ForceRecommendations on preventive services. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF or Task Force) works to improve the health of people nationwide by making evidence-based recommendations on effective ways to prevent disease & prolong life.
Consider also searching sites of professional organizations (for example, the American Academy of Pediatrics) or national non-profit organizations such as the American Heart Associations.
Levels of Evidence (Evidence Based Practice (EBP) Research)
The levels of evidence pyramid provides a way to visualize both the quality of evidence and the amount of evidence available. Evidence is broken down into three categories: Critical Appraisal (filtered), Experimental & Observational Studies (unfiltered), and Background Information. As you go down the pyramid, the amount of evidence increases as the quality of the evidence decreases.
Business, Education, Engineering, Academic, and Other Health Databases
- Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new windowOffers full text coverage of information in many areas including animal science, anthropology, area studies, astronomy, biology, chemistry, civil engineering, electrical engineering, ethnic & multicultural studies, food science & technology, general science, geography, geology, law, materials science, mathematics, mechanical engineering, music, pharmaceutical sciences, physics, psychology, religion & theology, veterinary science, women's studies, zoology, and many other fields.
- Business Source Complete This link opens in a new windowTopics such as marketing, management, MIS, POM, accounting, finance and economics. Find articles plus financial data, books, book digests, conference proceedings, case studies, market, industry, and country reports, company profiles, and SWOT analyses.
- EBSCOhost Databases This link opens in a new windowIncludes the educational database ERIC, EBSCO business, and many others. EBSCO business provides trade publications, company profiles, and information on public and private companies.
- IEEE Xplore
Find articles and other information from the journals, proceedings and standards published by IEEE and by the Institution of Electrical Engineers. Full-text is from 1988 to present with some selected earlier content.
- Oxford Bibliographies - Public Health
Oxford Bibliographies offers exclusive, authoritative research guides across a variety of subject areas. Combining the best features of an annotated bibliography and a high-level encyclopedia, this cutting-edge resource directs researchers to the best available scholarship
- Sage Research Methods This link opens in a new window
Sage Research Methods is a methods library with more than 1000 books, reference works, journal articles, and instructional videos by world-leading academics from across the social sciences, including the largest collection of qualitative methods books available online from any scholarly publisher.