BUMC MEDLINE Plus/OVID Tutorial

Boston University Medical Center
Alumni Medical Library

Tutorial Menu Options
Tutorial Home
Instructions for Using this Tutorial
Developing Your Search Strategy
Formulating Your Question
Choosing An Appropriate Database
Selecting the Best Terms
Advantages and Disadvantages of Text Word and Title Word Searching
Selecting the Best Medical Subject Headings
Quiz Section I: Text Word vs. MeSH Searching
Mapping
Subheadings
Tree Display
Explode Function
Focus Function
Combining Sets
Quiz Section II: Combining Sets
Limiting
Quiz Section III: Reviewing the Explode, Focus, Subheadings, and Limit Options
Viewing or Displaying Search Results
Full Text Options
Printing, E-Mailing, and Saving Search Results
Ordering Articles
Searching Tips, Hints, & Reminders
Tutorial Evaluation
Additional Tutorial Topics
Explaining OVID's Main Menu Icons
Searching for a Specific Author
Searching for Title Words
Searching for Journal Names


For More Information...
You will exit this tutorial when you click on the links below:
O V I D MEDLINE
<1996 to the present>		Help

Now we are ready to apply what we have learned about combining sets to our search. We now know that we want the correlation between estrogen replacement therapy AND heart diseases, so we should combine these concepts using the boolean AND.

In BUMC MEDLINE Plus/OVID, we combine using the set numbers. In this case, we will combine 1 and 2.

    There are two ways to combine:
  1. We can combine by using the Combine menu option at the top of the page.

  2. Or, we can combine via direct entry, simply typing 1 and 2 at the "enter keyword or phrase" prompt.

Important Note: Do NOT combine like this:

estrogen replacement therapy and heart diseases

Combining terms at the "enter keyword or phrase" box will create a textword search, NOT a MeSH search. You will miss relevant articles that use terminology other than the exact phrases entered above. You will miss all of the citations that were found when the explode option was used.

Always search for each term/concept independently, then combine using set numbers.

Let's combine the sets via direct entry. Type 1 and 2 in the "enter keyword or phrase" box, then press PERFORM SEARCH to continue.

#Search HistoryResultsDisplay
1
*estrogen replacement therapy/
3200 Display
2
exp *heart diseases/
98882 Display
 
 


Enter Keyword or phrase:Map Term to Subject Heading

Limit to:
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