Skip to main content

Develop Your Search Skills

 You’ve worked out your literature search plan; you’ve created your focused question; now you’re ready to start searching. Have you got the skills? Don’t just google it; use our healthcare specialist resources. To make the most of the resources you first need to develop your search skills. Complete our etutorials to learn how to identify your keywords and thesaurus terms; learn how to combine search terms and filter your resources, to get the most relevant information you need.

students working at a row of computers

Complete our tutorials

Identify your search terms New! Learn how to use keywords, phrases, wildcards and truncation

Using a thesaurus Updated! Learn how using a thesaurus can help you to find articles via databases

Combining searches with boolean operators New! Use AND, OR and NOT to combine search terms

Applying filters to focus results New! Use filters to focus your search results

Try it now

Go straight to our Information Skills eTutorials page on the Health Library website to access all our etutorials.

Need more help?

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month - November 2025

  November is Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month and this November the charity Pancreatic Cancer Action has launched their #DeadlyKiller campaign.  According to the charity, only 10-20% of patients diagnosed with pancreatic cancer are diagnosed in time to receive potentially life-saving treatment.  As such, they aim to raise awareness of the symptoms to assist with early diagnosis.   RELATED LIBRARY RESOURCES     The Health Libraries, both at the Royal Stoke and County Hospitals, offer resources related to this topic. In the lists below you’ll find a small selection of items from our collection. To locate these items, simply go to our online catalogue or ask at the counter.  This document covers the following resources – books , journals , journal articles and patient information .   BOOKS Challenges in pancreatic cancer ; Vladimirov, Borislav; Kovacheva-Slavova, Mila; 2021 (InTech Open) – [ available as an Open Access e-book ] Pancreatic ...

Christmas opening hours at the Health Library 2025

 The Health Library will have reduced opening hours over the Christmas holidays. Wednesday 24th December - Open 9am-4pm Thursday 25th- Sunday 28th December -  Closed Monday 29th- Wednesday 31st December - Open 9am-4pm Thursday 1st January -  Closed Friday 2nd January - Open 9am-4pm Normal opening times resume Saturday 3rd January. Please check our website for current opening hours . Online resources are available via the Health Library website .

Our website can help - Online Guides and Support

You can find lots of help on our website to help you to get to grips with all the resources that we provide for you. Our Online Guides and Support pages provide links to: ** help pages ** online tutorials ** printable guides ** Screen-shot showing the list of resources Here you will find more help for: Articles BMJ Case Reports Catalogue Databases Dynamed Joanna Briggs Institute and more...