Our previous article (VNT17.03) discussed the importance of journal clubs, how they engage VNs with up-to-date literature, and how we need to identify, critically appraise and synthesise such research via a comprehensive literature review (Smith and Noble, 2016).

This article will look at how to find veterinary information to use in daily nursing activities.

Many benefits exist in searching scientific literature to guide clinical decision-making. It can help fill knowledge gaps for training and development to produce client handouts, or update your practice protocols.

Books are a good place to start for general and specific information. However, remember to check they are up to date; usually published in the past five years – especially if you are looking for clinical or drug information (Havard, 2007).

As a beginner to literature searching, it may be useful to start a journal club or begin by reading journals freely available in your clinic library/staffroom to develop an appreciation of information found in articles, updates and news.

How to search

As the volume of available electronic veterinary information can be immense, it may be helpful to write a clinical question to help find the best-worded search that will yield the most beneficial answer. The problem/population, intervention, comparison and outcome (PICO) framework is helpful to develop these terms (Panel 1).

Once you have done your PICO framework, you should have an idea about the keywords that could be used for a search. However, when choosing these, consider using synonyms, acronyms and different spellings, too (Panel 2).

Once you have created keywords, you can combine them using the so-called Boolean operators – “AND, OR, NOT” – to refine your search. See our EBVM toolkits (http://bit.ly/2r500S2) for detailed information and a worked example of these techniques.

You can add limits to your search, too, such as patient groups, ages (kittens or adults) and geographic area (UK or EU).

Where to search

So, now it’s time to search. While having access to high-quality information resources and databases is important, it is also important to search the “right” databases for veterinary literature, as different databases focus on different topic areas.

Produced by the Centre for Agriculture and Bioscience International (CABI), CAB Abstracts is a subscription-based database that covers 90% of veterinary literature – for comparison, PubMed only has coverage of 36% of veterinary information, which means you may miss relevant articles in your search (Grindlay et al, 2012).

The VetMed Resource database – which provides access to more than 1.8 million abstracts, around 120,000 full text documents, and news articles, book chapters and disease datasheets – is a child product of CAB Abstracts, and members of the RCVS Knowledge library and the BSAVA have access to this resource. Each database has unique searching features and many databases have help screens to guide you.

BVNA members may also access VN Knowledge, which has many interesting webinars and resources for VNs. A number of medical nursing databases may also be of interest, with detailed surgical and medical nursing protocols.

Barriers to search

Searching for information can be difficult if you are no longer at college or university with access to databases/journals.

If this is the case, you may be able to visit your local academic library if a veterinary university or academic library is near you – it may also have a medical collection with nursing articles. However, this may not be a practical and cost-effective way of gaining access.

As access to information can be challenging, as many journals on PubMed and Google Scholar are not free, reading the abstract can give you an idea of article content and relevance.

Also, the RCVS Knowledge VN library membership is heavily subsidised, and allows VNs access to databases and journals for £45 a year.

Although published papers have undergone a peer-review process, it is always important to determine for yourself the quality and relevance of an article (Bloor, 2012).

If searching the web for information, make sure you are diligent – remember, anyone can put information on the internet. Panel 3 contains some places to start.

Recording your search

Keep a log of your search strategy, dates and the databases, as this will prevent duplicate searches and save time. The log is also a valuable reflective tool and can be of use for future searches or subject information.

A well-structured literature search is certainly the most effective and efficient way to locate sound evidence on the subject you are researching (Havard, 2007).

By developing your literature searching skills, you are then able to consider if information is valid and reliable, and implement these aspects of clinical practice and patient care into evidence-based nursing practice (Badger and Jeffrey, 2016).

However, searching databases to retrieve relevant information can be a lengthy process, so some training in this area may be beneficial for veterinary staff. RCVS Knowledge runs free literature searching workshops that cover database searching and accessing online resources, including searching electronic journals.

With practice and experience, you can quickly develop a useful strategy to search for information.