Tacoma Community College Library: Emergency Medical & Health Services: Finding Websites

Using the "free" Web to find articles

Google Scholar

You may find scholarly works out on the "free" Web. Not all of them will be available in full text. (Results that have links to the right of the article record, link to full text.) Try the Google Scholar search box below. If you find an article you like that is not full text, note the journal that it comes from, and find out if we subscribe to that journal in the Library.

Websites

Finding Credible Info on Websites

There is much general distrust about information available to the public on the World Wide Web. Some of the concern is valid; anyone at any time can create a website about anything, with or without the experience or education an authority on a topic should have.

For all of its "untamed" nature the web contains a great deal of reliable, authoritative information.

This page is dedicated to helping you find some of those sources on your own.

Some suggested web sites

Suggested Websites

Here are a few ideas for web sites with reliable information. The information is reliable, but not necessarily academic or scholarly. Much of the information is directed at the general public, but there are also technical articles and presentations--particularly if you dig a bit. Many of your topics are covered at one or more of these sites.

National Institutes of Health
The NIH is "the nation's research agency". Type the condition or disease in the search box in the top right corner.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
Part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Reliable information and statistics about diseases and healthy living. Tip: Either type in keywords in the Search bar at the top, or browse the "Healthy Living" section and drop-down menu across the top.
World Health Organization (WHO)
The United Nations specialized agency for health. This site includes a listing of health topics, countries, publications, data and statistics, and a listing of WHO web sites. Also available in Spanish.
MedlinePlus
The National Institutes of Health's Web site for patients and their families and friends. Produced by the National Library of Medicine, it provides information about diseases, conditions, and wellness issues in layman's language.

Know these search engine commands

Useful Search Engine Commands

Use a Phrase Search

To force the search engine to look for two or more words in a particular order and with no other words in between, use the phrase search. Place the phrase in quotation marks: "legionnaire's disease" "compartment syndrome"

Use the Asterisk

If you are unsure of the form of a word (or the spelling!) use an asterisk as a wild card. For example: teen* will return results containing teen, teenager, teenagers, teens. And transport* will return transport, transporting, transportation, etc.

Use the Boolean AND

Use the "Boolean operator" AND to make sure that the search engine searches for all of your words or phrases. AND directs the search engine to provide results that contain the items on both sides of the operator, for example, intubation AND emergency

Use the Boolean OR

Use the "Boolean operator" OR to look for synonymous terms. For example, if I am wondering whether there is an organization centered around caring for obese patients, I might search Google like this: "bariatric medicine" AND (association OR organization OR society). This means I'll take any results that include the phrase bariatric medicine and any one of the other three terms.

This search would look like this:

Try a search using the link to Google below: