Searching for rehabilitation articles on MEDLINE and EMBASE. An example with cross-over design

Area of Science:

• Rehabilitation Medicine
• Biomedical Informatics
• Information Science

Background:

• Effective literature searching is vital for evidence-based rehabilitation practice.
• Biomedical databases like MEDLINE and EMBASE are primary resources for rehabilitation research.
• Identifying optimal search strategies across databases is essential for comprehensive reviews.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the utility of MEDLINE and EMBASE for rehabilitation literature searches.
• To determine necessary search terms and descriptors for comprehensive rehabilitation research.
• To assess the overlap and relevance of articles retrieved from both databases.

Main Methods:

• Systematic search of MEDLINE and EMBASE for rehabilitation articles published since 1990.
• Inclusion of neurologic, orthopedic, respiratory, urologic, and rheumatologic rehabilitation topics.
• Identification and linkage of relevant descriptors and text words with "cross-over" terms.

Main Results:

• 165 articles found in MEDLINE, 159 in EMBASE, with only 17% overlap.
• Relevance rates were 32% in MEDLINE and 35% in EMBASE.
• 84% of non-overlapping articles were in shared journals but indexed differently.

Conclusions:

• Utilizing at least two databases (MEDLINE and EMBASE) is necessary for comprehensive rehabilitation literature searches.
• Searching EMBASE after MEDLINE yielded an additional 25 relevant articles (32%).
• The complexity of rehabilitation literature necessitates collaboration between information professionals and clinicians for effective searching.