LibGuides: NURB 361: Introduction to Nursing Research: Evidence Based Practice

What is Evidence-Based Practice?

According to the Journal of Nursing Administration, evidence-based practice is an approach to healthcare that uses the most current research available to improve the health and safety of patients while simultaneously reducing the overall costs and variations in health outcomes. It combines best practices from the most up-to-date medical literature alongside clinical experience while also valuing the preferences of the patients being treated.

Evidence-Based Databases

CINAHL {Cumulative Index of Nursing and Allied Health Literature} This link opens in a new window
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CINAHL (Cumulative Index of Nursing and Allied Health Literature) indexes and abstracts more than 900 nursing, allied health, biomedical, and consumer health journals. It includes healthcare books, nursing dissertations, standards of professional practice, nurse practice acts, and educational software.
Subject Coverage:
nursing and allied health
Dates of Coverage:
1982 to present
1986 to present (for records with abstracts)
Update Frequency:
monthly
Size:
more than 670,000 records
MEDLINE This link opens in a new window
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Produced by the National Library of Medicine and covers journal literature published internationally in all areas of medicine.
Subject Coverage:
experimental medicine, clinical medicine, nursing, psychiatry, health services administration, dentistry, nutrition, toxicology, education, pathology, veterinary medicine
Dates of Coverage:
1965 to present
1975 to present (for records with abstracts)
Update Frequency:
monthly
Size:
more than 12,000,000 records
more than 4,800 biomedical journals
Note:
Uses MeSH (Medical Subject Headings) indexing with tree hierarchy, subheadings, and explosion capabilities.
PubMed (for MSU) This link opens in a new window
Is a huge index database for biomedical literature maintained by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This link is to a customized version for Morehead State University which allows for quick links within the interface to articles from the online journals to which the library subscribes.
Subject Coverage:
medicine and biology
Dates of Coverage:
varies by journal title
Update Frequency:
varies by journal title
Size:
more than 23 million citations

Note:
Recommended for users of Chrome - LibKey Nomad is a browser extension that makes linking to full-text easier in PubMed. Go to https://thirdiron.com/libkey-nomad/
PubMed Central This link opens in a new window
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Is a digital archive of peer-reviewed life sciences journal literature written in English that was created and is maintained by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Subject Coverage:
life sciences
Dates of Coverage:
varies by journal title
Update Frequency:
varies by journal title
Size:
more than 7 million articles
UpToDate This link opens in a new window
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A clinical decision support resource which includes access to over 11,000 topics in over 22 specialties.
"UptoDate is a well-known resource in the medical field. This database functions as a clinical decision support tool providing quick access to information that can help the clinician at the bedside. The information provided in each of the many clinical topics is considered evidence-based and has gone through a peer-review process before the summary of findings is presented. Additional tools such as drug interaction monitoring, clinical calculators, images, and practice changing updates are also highly sought after in the community of medical and health science users."
-- review from ccAdvisor

Other Resources

TRIP (Turning Research into Practice)
"The TRIP Database is a clinical search tool designed to allow health professionals to rapidly identify the highest quality clinical evidence for clinical practice."
Evidence-Based Research from AHRQ
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality is a branch of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.