A great place to start is with Ebsco.

Click [Choose Databases] to add the following additional databases:

þ Biomedical Reference Collection: 

þ CINAHL Plus with Full Text: 

þ Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials: 

þ Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews: 

þ Cochrane Methodology Register: 

þDatabase of Abstracts & Reviews

þ Health Technology Assessments: 

þ MEDLINE: 

þ NHS Economic Evaluation Database: 

þ Nursing & Allied Health Collection: 

Academic Search Premier

SportDiscus (sports medicine)

*Check the "Apply Related Terms" box to enhance your search

Web of Knowledge - Thomson (Web of Knowledge)
Provides access to Web of Science (Arts & Humanities Citation Index, Science Citation Index Expanded, Social Sciences Citation Index), Medline, and Journal Citation Reports

**Enables you to sort your results by Times Cited - Highest to lowest

**Does not have a peer-review/refereed/scholarly article limiter.

The definitive international public health database, Global Health is the only specialist
bibliographic, abstracting and indexing database dedicated to public health research and
practice.  It *does not have 'peer-review' limiter

This handout from UNC - Chapel Hill provides several effective strategies for writing the literature review.

• Include only the most important points from each source -- you want to summarize, not quote from the sources.
• Include your own conclusions from analyzing, evaluating, and synthesizing what you learned from these articles.
• Avoid plagiarism in your lit review. Consult this tutorial on Academic Integrity if you need some guidance.

This is a WONDERFUL concise video that was made by North Carolina State University and I really think it is worthwhile to view it!

• Peer-reviewed
• Refereed
• Scholarly

Journals recognized as scholarly by their academic or medical peers

Identify peer-reviewed journals by searching for the journal title in Ulrich's Periodical Directory.

**Use synonyms for your concepts
including both more specific and/or more general terminology can be useful and separate these terms by OR

(EX:) blood OR hemoglobin OR plasma

**Use the wildcard symbol (often the asterisk (*)) to truncate
(EX:) child* will retrieve child, child's, children, children's

**Use quotation marks to search for an exact phrase
(EX:) "global warming"

Use Boolean operators when allowed
AND – use to combine concepts (when both must be present)
OR – use for synonyms (when either term could be present)
Use parentheses to group terms

Thinking About Your Search Topic

You might like this tool:

• How to Generate Keywords

  The "generator" is designed to help students think about the essential parts of their topic, identify additional terms, and construct a search statement.

Lack of search success seems to go wrong in two opposite directions --- many results but not focused on the topic or not many at all.

Consider:

• Using synonyms
• Using broader terms
• Narrowing the search with appropriate other terms
• That the defaults of the search interface may not be as you expect; words may be searched as a phrase
• Looking at the indexing terms of search results that are good matches
• Using limits