If you wish, select it by consulting the indexes made available in all search fields. To open a specific index, select the field and click on "index".

To type more than one word in the same line, it is necessary to use a boolean operator so as to relate one to the other (example 1). Use lines 1, 2 and 3 to search more than one word and/or in different fields (example 2).

The symbol $ is a truncation resource for retrieval. Type $ after a root of a word to retrieve all the words which have this root.
Example : educa$ will retrieve terms like: educator, education.

Click on "Search" to start the search. 

Most important MEDLINE´s data fields:

Content: words from the summary, words from the title of the article in its original and translated forms, and MeSH/DeCS descriptors.

Note: most articles have a summary in English, even if their original language is a different one, and every article bearing a title which is not in English has its title translated to English.

Searching in this field must be word for word combined with a boolean operator (and, or, and not), preferably in English.

Subject Descriptor

Content: descriptors which identify the subject of the article, originated from the MeSH - Medical Subject Headings´ controled vocabulary, produced by the U.S. National Library of Medicine, translated to DeCS - Descriptors in Health Sciences by BIREME/PAHO.

Searching in this field must be obligatorily in English.

Two indexes have been made available in this field: a permuted one and an alphabetical one.

A qualifier may be added to the MeSH and DeCS descriptors so as to indicate the descriptor´s specific aspects.  The qualifier represents the author´s point of view in the article and is represented by an abbreviation consisted of two letters attached to the MeSH´s and DeCS´s headings, separated by a slash (/).

The alphabetical index in this field displays the list of the descriptor and the qualifiers related to it.

Example:
Malaria/       - malaria and all the qualifiers
Malaria/CO  - malaria complications
Malaria/DI   - malaria diagnosis
Malaria/TH  - malaria therapy
...
Complete list of all qualifiers.

Words from the title

Content: words from the title of the original and translated article.

Note: most articles have a summary in English, even if their original language is a different one, and every article bearing a title which is not in English has its title translated to English.

Searching in this field must be word for word combined with a boolean operator (and, or, and not), preferably in English.

Searching using words in a language other than English will be successful if they occur in the field original title of the article.

Author

Content: name of authors registered in the format of last name and name initials, not separated by a comma between the last name and the initials and without a period between the initials. Example: WILL AF

Note: Spanish names have compound last name.
Example: Ramirez Rodriguez FG
Compound names with Junior, Senior, Second, Third, etc,are registered in an abbreviated form, after the name initials.
Example: Reed CE JR

DeCS/MeSH Limits

Content: MeSH and DeCS descriptors which limit your search to articles where a particular concept in the main point. Example: age group, publication type, type of article, human vs. animal studies, male vs. female studies, and others.

Searching in this field must be obligatorily in English.

Some Limit Descriptors: "PREGNANCY" , "HUMAN" ; "ANIMAL" ; "MALE HUMAN" ; "FEMALE HUMAN" ; "HUMAN, ADULT" ; "HUMAN, CHILD" ; "HUMAN, ELDERLY" ; "CASE REPORT".

The age groups are:

Infant, Newborn ( birth  to 1 month)
Infant (1 to 23 months)
Child, Preschool (2 to 5 years)
Child (6 to 12 years )
Adolescence (13 to 18 years)
Adult (19  to 44 years)
Middle age (45 to 64 years)
Aged (more than 65 years)

Language

Content: Language of the text of the article.

Note: the language of the text of the article corresponds to the same language of the original title, with the exception of transliterated titles (from other alphabets, for example Japanese and Chinese). In this case, the titles are shown between brackets [ ].

The original title will always be the first. The translated title is shown after that, separated by a slash ( / ).

Example:

Title: Salud-educación: lo que pudo ser y no es. / Health education: what it can be, but it is not.

In this example the original title is in Spanish, so the language of the text will also be Spanish.

Searching in this field must be with the name of the language in English. Example: English, Portuguese, French, Spanish.

Journal

Content: abbreviated titles of journals indexed according to the National Library of Medicine rule and corresponding issues.

Example: Diabet Med (abbreviated form of "Diabetes Medicine")

Searching must be based on the abbreviated title and without periods.

Two indexes have been made available: alphabetical and permuted. The alphabetical displays, besides the journal, the year and specific issue.

Example:

Diabet Med           - all the articles of the journal
Diabet Med/1993  - articles of the year 1993 of the journal
Diabet Med/1993,10(3) - articles of issue 3, vol. 10, year 1993

Publishing Year

Content: year referring to the publishing of the article in the journal.

Searching this field makes it possible to retrieve all the articles published in a certain year. In the form, type the year using four digits.

Note: There are cases in which the publishing year of an article does not correspond to the year of entry of the article in the database. For example, articles published in the end of a year will only enter the database in the following year. For this reason, when searching the year of 1998 in MEDLINE, it is possible to retrieve articles published in 1997.

Unique Indentifier

Content: number of the article´s identification in the database. Each article has a single number designated by MEDLINE´s database itself.

The first two numbers of the indentifier represent the year of entry of the article in the database. Example: 97003456
The article in case was registered in the year of 1997 and can only be retrieved when searching in the Medline group which includes this year.

Aspects of a qualifier descriptor

A qualifier may be added to MeSH and DeCS descriptors so as to indicate the subject´s specific "aspects".

List of Aspects - Qualifiers: