How to search Medline and email its relevant Abstracts wherever you wish

[Guest guest]

Hi Ed & All,

 

Ed wrote:

> when I try to go to Medline, all I get is a very brief sentence or

> two of the abstract. How do I access the entire study. Do I have to

> join Medline first? E Kasper LAc

 

AFAIK, Medline is accessible from any browser without the need to

join or register. It is totally free. IMO, Medline is the best act of

Foreign Policy that the US Government has ever made, and a

humanitarian act of magnificent generosity.

 

Most other medical databases are fee-paying and expensive to use.

 

If you think that you may ever need to search Medline, and you do

not know the quirks of the system, FILE this mail carefully in a

folder called MEDLINE SEARCH, and try this exercise, exactly as

described below:

 

1. NOTE that link words (AND, OR, NEAR, etc) in the Medline

Boolean-type search MUST be in capital letters.

 

Note also that brackets MUST be matched logically, for example:

(aaa OR bbb) AND (yyy OR zzz OR (ccc NEAR ddd)).

 

The number of right-facing (opening) brackets MUST match the

number of left-facing (closing) brackets, as in the example above,

where there are 3 right- and 3 left- facing brackets

 

Open Medline at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi

 

2. In the search panel, type (exactly as below):

 

(acup* OR acupo* OR acu-po* OR aquapunc* OR moxibustion OR

shiatsu OR tuina OR tui-na) AND (colic OR (abdom* NEAR (pain

OR spasm* OR cramp*)))

 

Note that there are 4 right- and 4 left- facing brackets in that rather

complex search.

 

3. Press Go [to the right of the search panel]. This should return 19

titles (as of today).

 

Each initial Hit has only 4 lines: Author, Title, Journal, and PMID

data.

 

4. To see any ONE abstract, click on the beige page icon to the

left of the Title of the paper.

 

To go back to the main page, click the Left Arrow (Back Arrow) on

your Browser.

 

5. To send ALL abstracts as an email to yourself, select " E-mail "

in the " Send to " panel, and click the " Send to " button.

 

6. On the next page, select:

Format: ABSTRACT

as: TEXT (or HTML, whichever you wish)

Start with item: 1

send: 20 [select a number greater than the number of

hits shown just to the right of the send panel

Email enter your CORRECT email address

 

Then press the Mail button and wait.

 

After a varying time (depending on the number of abstracts to be

mailed), the system will return you to the original search page, and

a nmessage will appear in the pink line near the top of the page:

E-mail sent to xxxx@yyyy [the address that you entered on the

previous page]

 

Medline, however, can only email ABSTRACTS. If you need FULL-

TEXT articles, you must access them one-by-one via the online

journal (often costing a saucy fee), or via your nearest library.

 

Some medical journals offer full-text free. Links to those journals

appear beside the abstract in the Medline pages.

 

Try the search above (or one of your own choosing) now! MEDLINE

is an unbelievably useful resource.

 

 

Best regards,

 

Email: <

 

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