As Michael notes, deciding which filters to use is a challenge and there are
various tools to help decide between them
(http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/crd/intertasc/critical_appraisal_search_filters.
htm).
In addition there is a real need for filter performance reviews to help us
decide which perform best under a variety of topics. Examples of filter
performance reviews can also be seen on the ISSG search filter resource
(http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/crd/intertasc/surveys.htm) - one performance
review of systematic review filters is listed there, but there is a need for
more:
Wong SS, Wilczynski NL, Haynes RB. Comparison of top-performing search
strategies for detecting clinically sound treatment studies and systematic
reviews in MEDLINE and EMBASE. Journal of the Medical Library Association
2006;94(4):451-5.
List members may be interested in a new project that Carol Lefebvre of the
UK Cochrane Centre, myself at York Health Economics Consortium and
colleagues in HSRU (Aberdeen) and Quality Improvement Scotland are just
beginning. The aim of the project is to investigate the methods used to
assess the performance of all types of search filters (methodological and
other), to explore what searchers require of search filters during the life
of various types of projects and what information searchers value to help
them to choose a search filter. The project is being funded by the MRC under
its programme to support the development of NICE methods. We will be
providing updates on our work to relevant email lists in the coming months
including invitations to respond to questionnaires.
Julie
Julie Glanville
Project Director - Information Services
York Health Economics Consortium Ltd
University of York
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YORK YO10 5NH
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-----Original Message-----
From: Evidence based health (EBH)
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Michael Power
Sent: 14 July 2010 17:03
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: The new PubMed Clinical Queries Interface
Thanks Helena
The "MA as topic" back is back in my strategy for SRs as a result of your
explanation!
Unfortunately it does not compensate for bad indexing by Medline, or for
authors who call their article a systematic review/meta-analysis, when it is
plainly unsystematic. That's why we need people to apply some intelligence
and experience to searching and filtering.
We do have a filter for searching for guidelines, which was developed after
a lot of careful searching for and experimenting with different filters.
But, I do not use it because it does not work very well. This is perhaps not
surprising, as the indexing is very poor. For example, guidelines such as
those developed by NICE are not indexed by Medline - except indirectly when
a summary is published in a journal.
Our information specialists have just gone home, so you will have to wait
until tomorrow before I can send it to you. Because the filter is so poor,
our information specialists supplement the automated search for guidelines
with quite a detailed strategy for human searching and filtering of a number
of bibliographic databases and guideline repositories.
If anyone has a better Medline search filter than ours, we would of course
be delighted to prove yours superior.
Best wishes
Michael
-----Original Message-----
From: Vonville, Helena M [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 14 July 2010 15:51
To: Michael Power
Subject: RE: The new PubMed Clinical Queries Interface
Probably the MA as topic is probably overkill, especially for a quick and
dirty search. However, I often work with students who are trying to develop
topics for their theses or dissertations. One of the benefits of using that
term is that you pick up comments and analyses from other authors that refer
back to the original SR/MA. Sometimes these comments serve as a stepping
off point for students so the overkill approach tends to work well for them.
And they appreciate my thoroughness which then encourages them to be as
thorough as possible.
As to your other comment-- I agree that a search for guidelines is critical.
In the course I co-teach, the students are strongly encouraged to look for
guidelines. During one of the lectures in our SR/MA course, the other
instructor goes into http://www.guidelines.gov and compares two or three
sets of guidelines for the same intervention/treatment/condition. This
provides the students with an opportunity to see the difference between
evidence-based guidelines and "because the experts say so" guidelines.
I probably should develop a filter for guidelines as well. Do you have one
that you use now?
Thanks so much for your comments.
Helena
Helena M. VonVille, MLS, MPH
Library Director
University of Texas School of Public Health Library
Houston, TX 77030
[log in to unmask]
713.500.9131 (office)
713.500.9125 (fax)
-----Original Message-----
From: Evidence based health (EBH)
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Michael Power
Sent: Wednesday, July 14, 2010 12:35 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: The new PubMed Clinical Queries Interface
Thanks Helena, I will try your filter out.
I have two comments though.
You probably do not need "meta-analysis as topic"[MeSH]" in your search
strategy.
Search strategies for systematic reviews will miss the systematic reviews
that have been done as part of a health technology appraisal or
evidence-based guideline or economic analysis. These reviews may be the most
current and most rigorously conducted ones, and therefore the ones that you
would most want to not miss. Therefore, a search for systematic reviews must
begin with a search for evidence-based guidelines.
Michael
-----Original Message-----
From: Vonville, Helena M [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 13 July 2010 20:06
Subject: Re: The new PubMed Clinical Queries Interface
There is a flaw in the Montori search in that the approach is far too
narrow. Try this in PubMed:
Medline[tiab] OR (systematic[tiab] AND review[tiab]) OR meta-analysis[ptyp]
"cochrane database syst rev"[Journal] OR "cochrane database of systematic
reviews online"[Journal]
#2 NOT #1
I retrieved over 1,000 Cochrane reviews from searching by journal title that
weren't retrieved with the Montori filter.
I modified with a filter I've been working on and came up with this:
"meta-analysis as topic"[MeSH] OR Meta-Analysis[ptyp] OR "systematic
literature"[tiab] OR "systematic review*"[tiab] OR meta-analys*[tiab] OR
"cochrane database syst rev"[Journal] OR "cochrane database of systematic
reviews online"[Journal] OR "research synthesis"[tiab] OR "research
integration"[tiab] OR "medline"[tiab] OR "data synthesis"[tiab]
I compared it against the Montori filter and found a fairly substantial
number of meta-analyses that the Montori filter missed.
I have not compared my filter against the PubMed filter. At least, not
lately. I've opted to take an overly-broad approach with the filters I've
developed. The filter above is not too broad, though, but it is a modified
version of the full SR/MA filter. A quick scan of the results shows a high
percentage of SRs and MAs.
Helena
Helena M. VonVille, MLS, MPH
Library Director
University of Texas School of Public Health Library
Houston, TX 77030
[log in to unmask]
713.500.9131 (office)
713.500.9125 (fax)
-----Original Message-----
From: Evidence based health (EBH)
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Paul Glasziou
Sent: Wednesday, June 30, 2010 1:08 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: The new PubMed Clinical Queries Interface
Good point Tanya - and nice idea to add the filters to MyNCBI.
I never use the PubMed systematic reviews filter - its pretty useless
(unlike the Therapy, Diagnosis, Prognosis, Etiology, Clinical Prediction
Rule ones - which are all great!).
So in MyNCBI I have saved one of the Montori filters*:
Medline[tiab] OR (systematic[tiab] AND review[tiab]) OR meta-analysis[ptyp]
If I am logged in to MyNCBI then this filter shows up whatever search I
do! (Including the Clinical Queries filters :-)
But this does not seem to work with the new interface.
Best wishes
Paul Glasziou
* Optimal search strategies for retrieving systematic reviews from
Medline: analytical survey.
Montori VM, Wilczynski NL, Morgan D, Haynes RB; Hedges Team.
BMJ. 2005 Jan 8;330(7482):68. Epub 2004 Dec 24
Feddern-Bekcan, Tanya wrote:
>
> Thank you for the heads up! Is it just me, or is there no drop-down
> box or checkbox for the Systematic Reviews option?
>
> Since one can have up to 15 Filters for their My NCBI account in
> PubMed, I'm thinking of just adding 4 of the clinical queries and
> Systematic Reviews as filters. It'd be a lot quicker than having to go
> to re-run the search on the Clinical Queries page. Is anyone else
> doing the same thing?
>
> Take care,
>
>
> Tanya
>
> Tanya Feddern-Bekcan, MLIS, AHIP, MOT, OTR/L
> (http://www.reocities.com/nqiya/libraryarticles.html) formerly Tanya
> Feddern
> 305.243.3999 - [log in to unmask] - 305.325.9670 (fax)
> EBM Theme Director, Head of Education, & Occupational Therapist
> Department of Health Informatics, Louis Calder Memorial Library at the
> University of Miami Miller School of Medicine
>
> They do random drug checks; why don't they do random hand swabs to see
> which unhygienic healthcare providers are killing their patients by
> spreading deadly infection?
>
> "A library without a librarian is a reading room."-- Jenny Garcia of
> the University of Wyoming, MLS, AHIP
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *From:* Evidence based health (EBH)
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] *On Behalf Of *Steve Clancy
> *Sent:* Wednesday, June 30, 2010 1:04 PM
> *To:* [log in to unmask]
> *Subject:* The new PubMed Clinical Queries Interface
>
> Howdy.
>
> Has anyone had a chance to work with the new PubMed Clinical Queries
> interface (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/pubmedutils/clinical)?
>
> What is your opinion?
>
> --steve
>
> --
> Steve Clancy, MLS
> Medical Librarian
> Science Library, Univ. of Calif., Irvine CA. U.S.A.
> 949-824-7309 * sclancy AT uci.edu
> http://www.faculty.uci.edu/profile.cfm?faculty_id=5109
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
> "We don't see things as they are...We see things as we are." - Anais Nin
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