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Systematic Search for Health

Subject headings

Subject headings are consistent lists of terms attached to the record of every article in the database to describe the article topics. They can retrieve most of the literature on a topic regardless of the terminology the author uses to describe the topic. For example, MEDLINE uses the Medical Subject Heading (MeSH) "Hearing Loss", this would find articles that use a variety of terms for hearing loss, e.g. “hard of hearing”, deafness, “difficulty hearing”.
 

Check out the video (3:12) below for an introduction to what subject headings are and why they're important.


How to collect subject headings

It is important to always use the database's subject heading collection to add subject headings, rather than manually entering them in the search box. This will ensure that you are accurately adding up-to-date subject headings to your search. Each database's subject heading collection and tool will be a bit different but the same principles still apply.

 

Check out the video (07:12) below to learn how to use MEDLINE MeSH subject headings in the EBSCO platform.


Subject heading essentials

These are the most important facts and frequently asked questions about subject headings. For those new to subject headings it can take a while to get your head around them, so the videos and these FAQs are here to help.