MSPS Program Guide

Search PubMed

Step 1: Formulate a Question

A well structured question will help you:

• select search terms
• decide which database to search
• figure out what results to exclude

PICO Question Format

PICO is a clinical question format for Evidence-Based Practice. This question format includes four components:

P = Patient/Population/Problem

The most clinically relevant characteristics of this patient, population, or problem.

I = Intervention

The intervention you are considering in relation to the patient/population, such as therapy, diagnostic method, prognostic factor, etc.

C = Comparison

An alternative intervention or the control (no action or the current standard of care). Sometimes left out of a question.

O = Outcome

Measurable impact, change, or improvement.

The chart below comes from the Center for Evidence-Based Medicine's guide on asking a focused question.

There are other methods for structuring and formatting a question. If PICO doesn't work for you or the type of question you are asking, try one of these other formats.

Step 2: Build a Search Strategy

A search strategy has four basic components. These links will take you to our tutorial on searching the literature.

1) Where to search

2) What search terms to use

3) How to connect those search terms together

4) What filters to apply to the search results

Step 3: Record Searches & Manage Results

For all searches, you will need to sort through results and identify what you most need.

This may be done informally for simple and very quick searches. For more intermediate level searches that may be shared with others or take repeated sessions, there are tools you can use to help you track searches and results.

Saved Searches & Alerts

Almost all databases have a way to save searches and individual sets of results in folders for you to return to later. In some databases, you can also set up alerts on saved searches, so you will be emailed when new results are added to the database.

To use these features you must create a personal account directly with the database. You can ask a librarian for help with this.

Search Spreadsheet

You can set up a search document for yourself. Below is a template and a filled out example with directions.

This strategy is best for searches you need to share with a faculty member or other researcher, but it can also help you for assignments when you must report on your search strategy.