See Also Medicine and Nursing

ENCYCLOPEDIAS

There are no print encyclopedias per se; I mean, nothing like an Encyclopedia of Health Sciences. But since Health Sciences is a very broad area, consider these titles: Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine (Ref. RC 41 .G35 2002); Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine (Ref. RC 46 .H32 1998); Encyclopedia of Cancer (Ref. RC 262 .E558 2002); Encyclopedia of Neuroscience (Ref. RC 334 .E53 1987); Encyclopedia of Mental Health (Ref. RA 790 .E53 1998); Encyclopedia of Microbiology (Ref. QR 9 .E53 2000); Encyclopedia of Immunology (Ref. QR 180.4 .E56 1992); Encyclopedia of Gerontology (Ref. RC 952.5 .E58); Gale Encyclopedia of Alternative Medicine (Ref. R 733 .G 34 2001). There is also an online encyclopedias: Medical Encyclopedia from MedlinePlus and, from the Library of Michigan's Health and Wellness Center . Be sure to also browse in the RC and RA areas.
 

DICTIONARIES

We have oodles of dictionaries, mostly medical, in the Ref. R 121 area. Concise Dictionary of Biomedicine and Molecular Biology (Ref. R 121 .J86 2002) and Mosby's Medical Nursing and Allied Health Dictionary (Ref. R 121 .M 89 1998) come closest to health sciences. Mosby's is also online. Some other standards include Stedman's Medical Dictionary (Ref. R 121 .S8 1995) and Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary (Ref. R 121 D73). There are also a number of online dictionaries: Medline Plus; On-Line Medical Dictionary; BioTech's Life Science Dictionary; and List and Glossary of Medical Terms: English.
 

STYLE MANUALS

Author's Handbook of Styles for Life Science Journals (Ref. R 119 .A85 1996).
 

SUNDRY REFERENCE BOOKS

Statistical Record of Health & Medicine (Ref. RA 407.3 .S83 1995). This book is a "compilation of national, state, and municipal health and medical statistics from government, academic, association, trade, technical and media sources." Want to know what are the top ten hospitals for cancer treatment or how many latex gloves are used? Well, it's all here.

Merck Manual of Medical Information (Ref. RC 81 .M535 2003). Covers every disease in such fields as dentistry, gynecology and psychiatry plus many other topics such death and dying.

Merck Manual. This is the online version of the Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy (Ref. RC 55 .M4), commonly referred to as the Merck Manual.

Health Care State Rankings 2007. (Ref RA 407.3 .H423 2007)
 

National Center for Health Statistics

 

PERIODICAL INDEXES

There are a number of online indexes that you should know about and getting to them is easy. Click on Database by Subject and choose Health Sciences. There are ten databases there, four of which I will discuss. Medline covers over 9500 sources from 1965- current. As its title suggests, it covers medical literature. You should begin your search by using the right term. Use the Subjects feature on the search page-- it's on the top left of the page. If you don't identify your subject headings from this source, you will have a sloppy search. Once you get the right terms you can proceed by yourself but it will be better if you grab the Reference Librarian. Your search will be much more precise. The articles you find in Medline will be very scholarly. We do not carry many medical journals, so be prepared to use Interlibrary Loan. Next take a look at CINAHL. It too uses a thesaurus or controlled vocabulary called CINAHL Subject Headings.. Remember: No thesaurus=sloppy search. Now it's time to grab the Reference Librarian and ask how to input the subject headings. Since we have a nursing school we are in better shape in journals than with Medline. Still, don't forget about Interlibrary Loan. Health Reference Center Academic is the easiest to use; no thesaurus. It indexes journals and magazines on a variety of health related issues. The articles will not be as research-oriented as Medline or CINAHL, "for informational use only" is the disclaimer, but you can specify refereed publications and full text. Look off to the left and you will find a navigation bar that will allow you to do an advanced search. Health and Wellness Resource Center is for nursing and allied health students. It indexes general interest fitness, medical and professional journals, reference books and pamphlets.

EVALUATING RESOURCES IN HEALTH SCIENCES

Quality Issues/Evaluation Aids. This links you to several sites, the best of which is: Code of Conduct for Medical and Health Web Sites.
 

METASITES

A metasite will introduce you to the scope of a subject, such as professional organizations, listservs, electronic journals and so on. One of the best that I found is Internet Resources in the Health Sciences. Besides being a metasite itself, it will tell you about other metasites. Martindale's Health Science Guide is one of those sources that you could say if it's not here it probably doesn't exist. Scroll down to the "virtual" medical center and pick a "center," such as veterinary. You will get online journals, dictionaries, online classes, curriculum, anatomy. It is truly catholic--nothing lacking. Another such site is WWW Virtual Library: Medicine and Health. I clicked on the Complete List and what I got was an alphabetically arranged list of health sites, some links to organizations, institutions, online journals, resources and Metasites.Health Supersites is a directory of other metasites.
 

DISEASES

Here are some sites for finding information on diseases: Hardin Meta Directory , Diseases and Conditions and the Internet Public Library's Diseases, Disorders and Syndromes.
 

ORGANIZATIONS

Medical and Health Web Sites. This site will be good for associations and organizations. Also look at Healthfinders Organizations.
 

RESOURCES

Resources will provide you with links to certain specialties within the health field. Some of these sites include the Internet Public Library's Health and Medical Sciences, Health Information Resources, the W.K. Kellogg Health Sciences Library Subject Resources, CDC (Centers for Disease Control) which has information on just about any malady you can think of Internet Catalog.
 

HEALTH INFORMATION

Healthfinder. This site has a search engine. It is definitely for the consumer with an information need. Still, it is reliable.

NUTRITION

Nutrition.gov. This site has a search engine and you can browse by audience.

The Nutrition Source. Covers these topics: alcohol, food pyramid, fiber, Type 2 diabetes and many more.

DRUGS

RX List. Has a search engine and also a list of the 150 most prescibed drugs.

HIV

HIV Today. Good for news articles and international conferences on HIV.

ETHICS

The Hastings Center. Focuses on research in biomedical ethics.

PUBLISHER UPDATES

Elsevier. This is an important site as you can see the latest books in the field and the tables of contents for hundreds of journals.