Looking for Databases beyond PubMed

Sometimes a clinical or research topic is more specialized than general medical sciences. Searching a database beyond PubMed may help discover relevant articles. The Pitt libraries subscribe to an array of databases that cover specialized subjects or health sciences fields. All of the databases below, and more, are available from the HSLS listing of Databases A-Z (you’ll be prompted for Pitt Passport if working remotely). Here are some highlights:

APA PsycINFO: Mental, social and behavioral health sciences inclusion, including psychology and psychiatry, make this resource a good choice for sociological, psych, or addiction queries. It encompasses both journals and books, along with dissertations.

EMBASE: This European-oriented database includes all disciplines of medical and biomedical sciences, but it excels at drug questions. It includes granular indexing for drugs with more drug-related controlled vocabulary terms using EMBASE’s EMTREE thesaurus. “Triplet chemotherapy,” “drug craving,” and “drug comparison” are three examples of drug-specific vocabulary terms not found in PubMed’s MeSH vocabulary. In addition, this would be a good source for conference abstracts and drugs used abroad.

Global Health: An intriguing blend of public health, tropical disease and infectious disease sources. It considers community health and nutrition, yet also includes parasitology, medicinal and poisonous plants, and more.

CINAHL: Try CINAHL for literature covering nursing, 17 allied health fields, and consumer health. Including National League for Nursing and the American Nurses Association publications, standards of practice and book chapters, this database includes more than journal articles.

Health Source: Nursing/Academic: Smaller but with a broad scope, Health Source: Nursing/Academic edition includes some full text. Indexing journals like Isokinetics & Exercise Science and Environmental Nutrition show its varied approach.

Business Source Complete: There’s a lot encompassed by the “Complete” section of this database’s name. It provides full-text content and covers varied disciplines of business, including management, accounting, finance, and economics. In addition to scholarly business journals, it indexes investment research, industry reports, company profiles, and SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analyses. In reflecting that healthcare is also a business, this database covers the managerial and marketing aspects not fully developed elsewhere. Are you looking for community pharmacy information? Try Business Source Complete for publications like Chain Drug Review, with full text right in the database.

Many of these databases overlap with PubMed and each other, but they still contain some unique publications not indexed elsewhere. Try searching beyond PubMed if you need additional literature.

If you have any questions, or would like assistance with a literature search, please contact us via Ask a Librarian.

~Michele Klein Fedyshin