FPEN Internet Training
http://fpen.org/train/

Making the Internet a Clinical Resource
Hands-On Exercise: Guided Search
Revised: February 17th, 1999

Search engines, which you will be using in the next hands-on exercise, are one way to find information on the web. However, since search engines are commercial web sites that increasingly are trying to generate revenue and given that for many searches they retrieve too many hits to be useful, a better place to start may be either a meta-index or a directory of directories. Using one of these sites will "guide" your search towards already reviewed and reputable web sites.

Meta-indices or directories can be defined as web sites that provide organized access to Internet resources. They usually include pointers to selected web sites on a particular topic. The especially useful sites will have evaluated the sites they are pointing to based on clearly defined criteria and provide brief annotations on what the sites contain. Another characteristic of a good meta-index or directory is the fact that it is continually updated and rarely includes dead links. Many of the search engines will not be as updated in this regard as a meta-index or directory.

Practice finding information on some of the more well known web meta-indices or directories.

Medical Matrix

One of the premier meta-indices in the medical field is the Medical Matrix web site sponsored by Slack, Inc. The Medical Matrix Project is devoted to posting, annotating, and continuously updating Internet clinical medicine resources. Pages are organized by disease/specialty or by type of resource. Although a registration procedure is required initially, the web site is free-of-charge. There are some links to fee-based resources, but many links are to free resources.

Connect to this site, http://www.medmatrix.org and explore some of the areas of your choosing.

Next, look for the links to the Medline database, many of them are free, under the Literature heading. Finally, look at some of the links to CME resources under the Education heading.

HealthWeb

HealthWeb provides links to specific, evaluated information resources on the web selected by librarians and information professionals at leading academic medical centers in the Midwest. Selection emphasizes quality information aimed at assisting health care professionals as well as consumers in meeting their health information needs.

Connect to HealthWeb (http://www.healthweb.org) and select Subjects. Note that most all of the specialties listed have been developed. Choose a topic of your choice and investigate some of the resources.

MedWeb

MedWeb is a comprehensive, well-supported set of web links in the medical disciplines, owned and maintained by Emory University. It is organized a little differently than the other directory sites you have explored and has gone through extensive revisions this year. N.B.: The use of the correct upper and lower case in this address is important.

Connect to MedWeb, http://www.medweb.emory.edu/MedWeb.
Click on Browse by Keyword
Scroll down to Electronic Publications and click on Browse Secondary Keywords. Look for links to electronic journals in Cardiology and then click on View Records.
You can also search alphabetically by journal title.

emedicine.com

Emedicine.com is not a directory or meta-index; instead it is an internal medicine textbook web site that is a collaborative effort with over 200 authors, including many subspecialists, contributing chapters organized by disease state. Chapters are reviewed by three to four physicians. The online textbook for emergency medicine is the most developed thus far.

Connect to emedicine, http://www.emedicine.com, and review the resources available on emergency medicine.

Yahoo:Health

Yahoo! is a directory site that contains organized information on a wide range of topics. It is not a search engine though many people refer to it as if it were. It is a large index of links that have been approved by Yahoo!  Yahoo! does not represent or endorse the accuracy or reliability of any of the information or advertisements to which it links. It also is much better for more consumer-oriented, or lay-level searches in the medical field. It is possible to select only the Health (and within Health, only the Medicine) portion of the huge Yahoo! database. This directory is especially easy to use, which is probably why it is so popular.

Connect to Yahoo:Health/Medicine (http://www.yahoo.com/Health/Medicine) and review the resources under Cardiology. Look for information on Long QT syndrome. Try searching the entire category, and then try looking under Heart Diseases for Long QT syndrome.

Now connect to the level above Medicine, to Yahoo:Health (http://www.yahoo.com/Health). Explore some of the other categories.