Nursing- Legacy: Databases

About Databases

Databases contain references to journal articles, books, data, consumer websites and pamphlets, and often even the full text of journal articles. If you are looking for peer-reviewed articles for a class assignment, drug information, or other targeted information on a topic, you will want to search one or more of these resources.

The Health Sciences Library website provides a convenient way to access health-related electronic search tools.

The E-Research by Discipline page on the UNC Libraries web site provides access to all of the libraries' databases.

Health Sciences Databases

These databases contain varying levels of evidence. Ranging from expert opinions to systematic reviews and meta analyses, these health sciences databases are the best place to start your search. Most of the information in these databases has been peer-reviewed, but most articles have not been evaluated by experts to determine the strength of the evidence. This is called unfiltered information.

CINAHL Plus with Full Text
CINAHL Plus with Full Text is a collection of more than 770 full text nursing & allied health journals dating as far back as 1937, with bibliographic indexing for more than 5,000 additional nursing and related journals. Also included are select health care books, nursing dissertations, conference proceedings, standards of practice, educational software, audiovisuals and book chapters.

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.
Coverage: 1982-present
PubMed
Database of biomedical literature from the National Library of Medicine covering journal articles about medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, biology and public health from 1950 to the present; multiple mobile apps available, provides access to MEDLINE, etc. Includes links to full text of UNC-CH's electronic journal subscriptions.

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.
Coverage: 1957-present
Embase
Highly versatile, multipurpose and up-to-date biomedical database covering the most important international biomedical literature from 1947 to the present day. Supports drug discovery & development, pharmacovigilance, medical device development and post-market surveillance, and evidence-based medicine.

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users. Create an Elsevier account to export records from Embase.
ProQuest Nursing & Allied Health Database
This resource supports nursing and allied health professional education and practice with full-text journals, dissertations, e-books, practice guidelines, study resources, and an assortment of videos from MedCom.

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users. North Carolina residents with a borrower's card may access from off campus by visiting NCLive directly. Contact the Davis Library Service Desk for the NCLive password (instructions).
Health Source: Nursing/Academic Edition
Indexing, abstracts and full-text for hundreds of nursing and allied health journals covering a variety of specialties including pediatric nursing, critical care, mental health, nursing management, medical law and many more.

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users. North Carolina residents with a borrower's card may access from off campus by visiting NCLive directly. Contact the Davis Library Service Desk for the NCLive password (instructions).
Coverage: Coverage varies; Indexing, 1974-present; Full-text, 1990-present
PsycInfo
Database from the American Psychological Association covering the academic research and practice literature in psychology and related disciplines (medicine, education, social work, etc.) from over 60 countries in more than 29 languages. It provides indexes to journals, dissertations, book chapters, books, technical reports, and other documents from 1887 to the present.

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.
Coverage: 1887 - Present

Evidence-Based Practice Databases

These resources will generally provide higher levels of evidence because experts have collected, analyzed, and reported on the evidence for you. This is called filtered information.

Higher types of evidence include Systematic Reviews, Meta-Analyses, Guidelines, Critically Appraised Topics and more.

Cochrane Library
Leading source for full-text systematic reviews in health care. Searches a collection of databases that includes the CDSR, CENTRAL, Clinical Answers, and selected reviews from Epistemonikos. RCTs are from Medline, Embase, ClinicalTrials.gov, the WHO ICTRP, CINAHL (since 2020) and more. Click on "Search Limits" or the Browse tab to select content from a specific database.

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.
JAMAevidence
Provides tools for students and clinicians to evaluate and interpret medical literature and better understand the principles of Evidence Based Practice/Medicine, including the books Users' Guides to Medical Literature, The Rational Clinical Examination , etc.

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.

Additionally, many evidence-based practice groups publish their findings online:

AHRQ Evidence Reports
CDC's Community Guide
Systematic Reviews for Community Health and Preventative Services
American Psychiatric Association
Recommendations Assessment and Treatment of Psychiatric Disorders
Campbell Collaboration Library of Systematic Reviews
Systematic Reviews in Education, Crime and Justice, and Social Welfare
U.S. Preventative Services Task Force
Recommendation Statements

You can also search for specific Publication Types or Article Types like Systematic Review, Meta-Analysis, Guideline, or Randomized Controlled Trial in Health Sciences Databases like CINAHL, PubMed, or Embase.

Other Useful Databases

These databases are not focused on nursing, but they may also be useful depending on your topic. This information will also be unfiltered because it has not been appraised by experts.

You can search for an article title in these databases to see a list of all the articles that cite your article.

Scopus

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.
ScienceDirect

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.
Google Scholar

Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.

A to Z Databases

All campus databases

browse by title
browse by subject
search by database name

Find @ UNC

Click on the button in database results to:

Go directly to most online articles
Export article citations to Endnote or to formats for other reference managers
Search the UNC-CH Library Catalog to find the print journal
Send an Interlibrary Loan (ILL) request if the journal is not owned by UNC-CH

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