Module 2/Question 1

Describe your clinical problem and choice of electronic index.  How did the index facilitate (or impede) your ability to construct an efficient search?  How time consuming was your search?  Would there be barriers to using the index in daily practice?

I used PubMed to search for patients pain perceptions.  Pubmed is fairly user-friendly, however I do prefer to use CINAHL.  It was fairly time consuming because I had to change my search strategy a couple of times to get a big enough selection or articles to be helpful, but not thousands, which would be unmanageable.

The time consuming part of using PubMed is to figure out your search terms and then to look through the articles you find.  I like how there is an option to search for only full-text linked articles.  This is both user-friendly and time-saving.  I don't think I would use PubMed in my daily practice due to time constraints, but I would use it to look up topics that I may need more information or to write a research paper.  Of course this would be done after hours.  I like the up-to-date website for quick reference.  I use this in my daily practice for questions I come across and it has truly up-to-date information.