
















































INVITED COMMENTARY 
 

 

 

Hypothesis 
Vol. 33 No.1  

Fall/Winter 2021 

Review of "One Database at a Time: PubMed for Expert Searchers and 
Systematic Reviews” 

 
Alexandria Q. Wilson, MSIS, AHIP  
Assistant Professor, Research and Learning Services Librarian  
Preston Medical Library  
The University of Tennessee Graduate School of Medicine 
Knoxville, Tennessee  
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2649-8252 
 
As the interest in systematic review expertise grows, the Medical Library Association 
Technology in Education and Systematic Review Caucuses came together to co-
sponsor a webinar series called “One Database at a Time” that examines and discusses 
how to use a different database for systematic searches. The Technology in Education 
Caucus (TEC) acknowledged the expertise available in the Systematic Review Caucus 
and approached them about co-sponsoring the series. The caucuses hope to provide 
both expert searching and systematic review tips for health science librarians and 
informationists. 
 
The first session, focused on the PubMed database, was offered on March 23. 
Moderated by Margaret Foster and led by panelists Alyssa Grimshaw, Liz Suelzer, and 
LaTeesa James, the session covered a variety of topics, from building your systematic 
search in PubMed to systematic review software.  
 
The session began with setting up a systematic search in PubMed. Panelists 
recommended starting with MeSH (Medical Subject Headings). Then, they 
recommended combining MeSH terms with keywords to facilitate translating the 
strategy to databases that do not use MeSH vocabulary and to catch any results that 
are not indexed with their MeSH terms yet. 
 
Another key piece of advice was to utilize “search details.” This allows searchers to see 
how PubMed translated the search. This even includes warnings if a search term does 
not map correctly or is pulling in irrelevant terms (e.g., the word “refusal” mapping to 
refuse or garbage).  
 
While this session mainly focused on PubMed, there were topics covered that anyone 
completing a systematic review could benefit from, even if they do not use PubMed for 
their systematic search. The next section covered the documentation process of the 
search and guidelines to follow, such as PRISMA and the Equator Network. Once the 
search has been documented appropriately, panelists stressed the importance of using 
a citation manager, regardless of searching PubMed or not, to export and manage 



INVITED COMMENTARY 
 

 

 

Hypothesis 
Vol. 33 No.1  

Fall/Winter 2021 

those results. The pros and cons of citation managers EndNote (Clarivate Analytics), 
Mendeley (Elsevier), and Zotero were discussed. 
 
Systematic review software options of Covidence, Rayyan, and DistillerSR were briefly 
introduced before a formal Q&A session, although the moderator and panelists engaged 
in questions from the attendees throughout the webinar. The chat feature of the webinar 
and the Q&A session were moderated by Kay Hogan Smith and Tara Brigham. 
Questions and answers brought up important discussions comparing PubMed to 
OVID/Medline, signing up for search alerts versus re-running the entire search to 
update a systematic review, reproducibility concerns, and the “ideal” number of 
databases to search, if such a number exists. 
 
Future sessions in this series will be determined via popular vote, and OVID/Medline is 
planned for the second session. This webinar recording was edited by Julia Stumpff, 
who also led the advertising efforts. To watch the recording in full or access the 
transcript, please visit https://iu.mediaspace.kaltura.com/media/t/1_shw3x5ld.  
 
 

 

https://iu.mediaspace.kaltura.com/media/t/1_shw3x5ld

