As a further big fan of SUMSearch (formerly Medical SmartSearch)
can I chip in the following:
A review of SUMSearch, including comparison with PubMed, is soon
to be published in Evidence Based Medicine 5 (3) May-June 2000.
The authors are myself and Dr Alan O'Rourke. We simulated a
clinical query across both platforms and compared results. The
filters for the two platforms do not act in exactly the same way -
SUMSearch also provides added value with its adverse effects
features etcetera. Our conclusion was "horses for courses" but this
did not survive the transatlantic linguistic leap so I'll leave you to
read the verdict for yourselves :-)
Fans of the one-stop shop might also check the following (to be
added to TRIP and SUMSearch (thus making a three-stop
shop??!!):
http://drsdesk.sghms.ac.uk/
Andrew Booth
> Trisha,
>
> I agree this is a useful tool - it's become my first point of call for
> most of my searches since I was tipped off about it by Andrew Booth.
>
> It uses Pubmed so it's more up-to-date than the commercial CDROM based
> systems, and it does seem good at intelligent searching. If one is
> looking for original pap ers, using the "Related articles" links for
> each one found often allows one to winkle out other papers that were
> completely missed before. The "clipboard" feature
> works well.
>
> It's sometimes slow (in the UK its best to use it in the morning) and
> the site was down for a while a few weeks ago while software was
> upgraded; the guidelines ha ve a US bias, but they're none the worse
> for that. I havn't come across any other negatives.
>
> Regards, Mark Farrington [Cambridge, UK]
>
> [log in to unmask]
>
Andrew Booth BA MSc Dip Lib ALA
Director of Information Resources
School of Health & Related Research (ScHARR)
Regent Court
30 Regent Street
SHEFFIELD
S1 4DA
Tel: 0114 222 5420 or 5214 Fax: 0114 272 4095
The author of Netting the Evidence:
http://www.shef.ac.uk/~scharr/ir/netting.html
and Trawling the Net:
http://www.shef.ac.uk/~scharr/ir/trawling.html
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
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