Caitlin Meyer's blog

Despite the promise of tools like Quicksearch and the breadth of massive databases like Scopus, certain types of information simply cannot be found in one place. No need to fret, though! We've got you covered. This series of blog posts will serve as a home of recommended resources and searching tips for hard-to-find types of information. Have a suggestion for a subject? Shoot me an email!  Conference proceedings – the collections of papers and/or abstracts that are presented at conferences – may be published in book format, as special issues of a journal, or as a serial.  Sometimes they are in the format of an abstract, sometimes in the form of a ‘conference paper’. A conference paper may morph into a journal article (usually with substantial additional material) but not always. If a conference abstract is found, then further sleuthing is required to see if the organization supporting the conference published proceedings or stopped at abstracts only. You might do an author search in the following resources to see if the author followed up the conference abstract or paper with a full-length journal article: PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, Embase, or Google Scholar.  Last resort? Contact the author/researcher directly and ask! Recommended Resources Conference Proceedings Citation Index (Web of Science) Click on ‘More settings’ to restrict your search to specific conference proceedings citation indices or search the entire Web of Science Core Collection. Embase Limit to publication types: conference abstract, conference paper, or conference review.   ProceedingsFirst (OCLC) This is an index of worldwide conference proceedings – every published congress, symposium, conference, exposition, workshop and meeting received by the British Library Document Supply Centre. WorldCat  This ‘world catalog of publications’ is an excellent tool for finding conference proceedings. Search specific conference number and title (16th and “international AIDS conference”), limit by year(s): 1989 or 1990 or 1991 Tips & Tricks Associations usually publish abstracts from their Annual Convention in the association journal in the same issue or special supplement every year. Sometimes both the authors and the title will change when published as a full-length journal article. Make sure to search creatively and read carefully. Society, organization, and association websites frequently have information about their publications, including proceedings and annual meeting abstracts. Requesting conference proceedings through Interlibrary Loan may take longer than traditional requests. It may only ever be available as an abstract (see second bullet point).

Despite the promise of tools like Quicksearch and the breadth of massive databases like Scopus, certain types of information simply cannot be found in one place. No need to fret, though! We've got you covered. This new series of blog posts will serve as a home of recommended resources and searching tips for hard-to-find types of information. Have a suggestion for a subject? Shoot me an email!  Despite being the primary site of scholarly conversation in the sciences, not all disciplines revolve around the journal literature. Often considered "book-based" disciplines include archeology, law, politics/international studies, psychology, philosophy, sociology, history, communications, and media studies. Book chapters are generally cited less than journal articles and there isn't as established of a culture of research impact measurement around book chapters as there is around journal articles. Book chapters are still valuable pieces of academic writing, however, as they provide a home to content that doesn't fit well into the article format. Finding book chapters using electronic resources can be a little bit tricky, as the tools are scattered, but read on for specific tips, tricks, and resources to try out.  Recommended Resources Scopus  After a massive book expansion project completed a few years ago, Scopus is now home to more than 150,000 books. As with the rest of Scopus' massive collection, the books cover a wide range of disciplines. You can limit searches to "Book Chapter" to filter the results as you wish by using the "Document Type" search facet.   ProQuest E-Book Central  ProQuest Ebook Central is a great interdisciplinary resource for finding book chapters, covering Science, Medicine, Social Science, Humanities, and Arts. Enter your search terms and then you can switch to "Chapter Results", which will exclude book titles that met your criteria.   Web of Science  Similar to Scopus, Web of Science is a large interdisciplinary resource that has recently undergone a big book project. Whereas in Scopus you can limit on the front end of your search, Web of Science lets you set a preference for document type after you search.   Google Scholar  If you're looking for a book chapter and you know the title, Google Scholar might be worth a shot. Since it doesn't have any search limiting functionality for chapters, it isn't as good of a resource for pulling chapters on a topic to browse.   Medical Library E-Library  This tool assembled by the medical library allows you to search for e-books and enables browsing books by publisher and subject. It doesn't offer limiting or searching for chapter functionality, but could be useful for browsing.   PsycInfo  Produced by the American Psychological Association, PsycInfo is home to all of the publications from the group. Book chapters are readily available, and the subject matter touches on the psychological aspects of many disciplines. Tips & Tricks    If searching for the title of a book chapter, mark it as a "Keyword" or "All Fields" search instead of "Title". If you mark it as "Title", you might miss out if we have the whole book your chapter is in but it isn't entirely indexed. If you know the name of the book the chapter is in, try using Quicksearch to locate the book and navigate to the chapter that way.  Tools like Scopus have robust author profile systems. Try to search for the author of the chapter, click on their name, then all of their publications (hopefully the chapter you seek) will populate.  If the Yale libraries do not own the chapter, you can request a scan or delivery of the book through interlibrary loan. 

Welcome to Resource Spotlight! The Cushing/Whitney Medical Library provides access to an incredible array of databases, e-book collections, software and more. In this series of posts, we’ll be showcasing highlights from our collection. In this edition of Resource Spotlight, we’ll be looking at the Incidence & Prevalence Database (IPD). Made available by Clarivate Analytics, IPD is a compendium of global epidemiological data from hundreds of sources. The collection of data is intended to provide a comprehensive overview of your research topic - whether that be incidence, prevalence, morbidity, mortality, trends, cost, risk-factors, or disease classifications.  The sources integrated into IPD include government reports, medical journals, market investment reports, medical and scientific associations, national and international healthcare surveys, trade journals, database audits, and industry contacts. The website is updated monthly with new information and government statistics are typically updated annually.  In addition to the data sets procured from sources mentioned above, IPD also features:  Hundreds of “Article Reviews”, where expert analysts condense information into digestible pieces “IPD Summaries”, tables of worldwide and regional incidence and prevalence data  A self-produced “Global Incidence and Prevalence Report with Map” Information on U.S. patient discharges IPD offers some advanced searching functionality that allows users to search by countries or regions, by certain publication criteria (author, title, date), by ICD Code, or by their controlled vocabulary of keywords.  The Incidence & Prevalence Database may be useful to those involved in clinical research, public health, market research, product development, business development, and more.  Start exploring the Incidence & Prevalence Database today! For questions on how to best use IDP, feel free to contact Public Health Librarian Kate Nyhan.

We’ve offered PubMed and EndNote classes for years, but this year we’re trying something new to make our workshops as efficient and productive as possible! PubMed We realize that our different user groups use the same products in very different ways. Residents and attending physicians may need quick answers to clinical questions whereas students writing their theses may need a more comprehensive search of the literature. We also realize everybody is very busy and 60 minutes are hard to find. To meet these needs, we’ve created two new 30 minute PubMed classes: PubMed for Clinicians and PubMed for Research. Both classes are followed by an optional half-hour hands-on session where attendees can work through their own questions or provided examples.  EndNote Despite offering the same functionality, EndNote looks very different on Apple computers and PCs. To address these discrepancies and make learning basic EndNote tasks easier, we’ve split the introductory class into two: EndNote for Mac and EndNote for PC. Attendees can bring their own computers to become familiar with the interface and create a functioning, organized library by the end of the class. For advanced users, we’ve created a retooled Advanced EndNote class where attendees will fill out a survey prior to the class that lets the instructors cater each session to the needs and questions of the people in the room. No two sessions will be alike!   Check out the class calendar for upcoming workshops.  Are you interested in attending a library workshop and can’t make it to 333 Cedar St.? Let us know, and we can schedule something for your group at your location. 

Welcome to our new series, Resource Spotlight! The Cushing/Whitney Medical Library provides access to an incredible array of databases, e-book collections, software and more. In this series of posts, we’ll be showcasing highlights from our collection.  In this edition of Resource Spotlight, we’ll be looking at AccessMedicine. Produced by publisher McGraw-Hill, AccessMedicine is part of a robust family of resources including AccessAnesthesiology, AccessEmergency, AccessPediatrics, and AccessSurgery.  AccessMedicine is a great tool for students, residents, and faculty alike: Online access to more than 80 medical textbooks, such as Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine, The Color Atlas of Family Medicine, and Principles and Practice of Hospital Medicine Multimedia library with examination videos, patient safety modules, procedural videos, and more Exam preparation tools for board certification and Step 3 including Graber and Wilbur’s Family Medicine Examination & Board Review and large question banks with detailed answers Tools to help your practice such as the Pocket Guide to Diagnostic Tests, the differential diagnosis tool Diagnosaurus, and an integrated drug database in English and Spanish Patient education resources on thousands of topics in many languages AccessMedicine is available to Yale affiliates through the VPN, YNHH affiliates through the proxy server, and everybody on the YaleSecure WiFi network. For questions on how to best use AccessMedicine, feel free to contact Clinical Librarian Alexandria "Lexi" Brackett.