PubMed/Advanced Search: Using Limits (module 4.2)

MODULE 4.2 PubMed/How to Use Limits Instructions - This part of the:  course is a PowerPoint demonstration intended to introduce you to LIMITS  module is off-line and is intended as an information resource for reference use.

Table of Contents  Limits by author  Limits by journal  Limits by publication date  Limits by language  Limits by age  Limits by type of article  Limits by title/abstract  Limits by affiliation  Advanced Searching

Logging on to HINARI 1 Before logging into PubMed, we can Login to the HINARI website using the URL

Logging into HINARI 2 We will need to enter our HINARI User Name and Password in the appropriate boxes, then click on the Login button. Note: If you do not properly sign on, you will not have access to full text articles.

Remember - if you fail to use the Login page, you will have a second option on the Full text journals, databases, and other resources sub-page.

Main HINARI webpage Once you are logged in from the main HINARI webpage, access PubMed by clicking on Search HINARI journal articles through PubMed (Medline).

Main HINARI webpage Once you are logged in from the main HINARI webpage, access PubMed by clicking on Search HINARI journal articles through PubMed (Medline). From the initial (HINARI) PubMed page, we will click on the Advanced search option.

The Limits page displays as part of Advanced Search page. Searches can be limited by restricting terms to fields or setting specific date or record tagging parameters. Note that the Advanced Search option lets you use Limits with other PubMed features. We will discuss the Advanced Search options at the end of this module.

This slide notes the Limits options not listed on the previous one.

Limit by Author(s) This is an Author name search for Ribeiro. Note that you can further limit this by using the first letter of the author’s first name.

Limit by Author(s) Here is the Limits Author display for Ribeiro. Note that there are 6469 citations for this last name.

Note: once you have added any Limits, you must remove the Limits or they will continue to be active for any other search you complete. There are two ways to remove Limits. Here we will click on the Remove hypertext link in the Limits Activated box.

The second ways to remove Limits is by clicking on the Clear All hypertext link in the middle and bottom of the Limits page.

` The Journal Limits for Natu results in a drop down menu that lists all the journals with Natu in the title. We will click on the link to the Nature biotechnology journal.

Limit by Journal(s) The list (# of articles) for Nature biotechnology is It is sorted by Recently Added option. Remember to clear the Limits or the next search will retrieve articles only from this journal.

This is the Links to full text, Links to free full text, and Abstracts Limits box. Note, if use the Links to free full text option, you will limit the search to only free full text articles and exclude the HINARI ones. We suggest not using this Limit although the Abstracts option is useful.

For this example, we will use multiple Limits. For the HIV AND pregnancy search, we have selected Practice Guidelines and Review from the Type of Article option and English from the Languages option. Note, if your search result # is too large, add more Limits. If the number is too small, delete some Limits.

This Limits search has identified 1608 citations. To change your Limits, click on the change hypertext link. Note: the Limits Activated (Practice Guidelines, Review, English) are listed in a box in the top right of the page.

We now will add another Limit – All Child: 0-18

This search has identified 858 citations with the additional Limit. Again, the Limits Activated (Practice Guidelines, Review, English, Child: 0-18) are noted a box in the top right corner of the page.

We now will Limit the search to 2008 to present Publication Date. Note that to present is the default Limit.

This search has identified 54 citations with the additional Limit. Again, the Limits Activated are noted a box in the top right corner of the search. Note the listing of the Publication Date Limits in the Search box. Remember: once you have added any Limits, you must remove the Limits or they will continue to be active for any other search you complete. Here we will click on the Remove hypertext link in the Limits Activated box.

Again, the other way to remove Limits is by clicking on the Clear All hypertext link in the middle and bottom of the Limits page.

To Limit a term to a specific field in the record, select an option from the drop down menu under All Fields. We now will search for WHO in the Affiliation Limits field. This should now limit our search to articles where the first author listed has WHO in the address.

For Affiliation, we have added WHO to the Index box and clicked on AND within the Add to Search Box with option. Note that the Index option gives you the listing for WHO and also WHO with subheadings. We will click on the WHO option to display the 5033 citations.

The ”who”[Affiliation] now is displayed in the PubMed Search box. We will click on the Search box to complete this query.

We can see from the results page that WHO is listed as part of the Affiliation.

Reminder: While working with ‘LIMITS”, you probably noticed the line that has ‘Links to full text, ‘Links to free full text’ and ‘Abstracts’ options. By clicking on all three options, you would limit your search to all full text articles AND those articles that are available as free full text by various publishers AND those that have abstracts. Consequently, your HINARI list will be limited to only articles that are both free full text and HINARI – a significantly smaller number.

Limits page 1 We now will use new Advanced Search option that enables you to use Limits with other PubMed features. Note that you can access Advanced Search from the initial PubMed page or the Search Results page.

We have activated the Advanced Search option that displays the Most Recent Queries History. In this exercise, we will use Search #3 – a combination of the tuberculosis AND africa and HIV AND africa searches. By using Limits, we will refine this search. Note: The History option will be reviewed in Module 4.4

For search #3 (2334 citations), we have added the English Languages and Practice Guidelines and Review Type of Article and the All Child: 0-18 years Ages Limits.

The results of this Advanced Search are 64 citations with 8 Free Full Text and 28 HINARI articles. You can also use the Review/Index, Details and Citation Search options in Advanced Search. This is the end of Module 4.2. There is a workbook to accompany this part of module. The workbook will take you through a live session covering topics included in this demonstration with working examples. Updates