Power Searching & Database Tools
Michigan eLibrary Resources
The Michigan Electronic Library, or MeL, is available to any Michigan resident with an internet connection. MeL provides access to databases that contain scholarly, practitioner, and quality consumer health information. It is a resource you can use even if you don't have access to WSU Library resources, and the communities you work with should have access to it too.
- MeL eResourcesA collection of databases and eResources from MeL, many of which are Health-related, available to any Michigan resident. Includes consumer, practitioner, and academic health resources.
- MeL eJournal CollectionA collection of eJournals and other publications available through MeL which are organized by discipline.
Public Health Digital Collections
The NNLM Public Health Coordination Office (NPHCO) provides access to library resources, including e-journals, e-books, databases and research through the Public Health Digital Library (PHDL). Ongoing training and article delivery are also available to members of the NPHCO. Membership in the NPHCO is available to state level Public Health Departments located in the United States.
Digital Collections is the National Library of Medicine's free online repository of biomedical resources including books, manuscripts, still images, videos, and maps. The content in Digital Collections is freely available worldwide and, unless otherwise indicated, in the public domain. Digital Collections provides unique access to NLM's rich historical resources, as well as select modern resources.
Much of the information critical to the communication of public health messages is pictorial rather than text-based. Created by a Working Group at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the PHIL offers an organized, universal electronic gateway to CDC's pictures. We welcome public health professionals, the media, laboratory scientists, educators, students, and the worldwide public to use this material for reference, teaching, presentation, and public health messages.
Public Health Research Centers
NIAAA conducts research focused on improving the treatment and prevention of alcoholism and alcohol-related problems to reduce the enormous health, social, and economic consequences of this disease.
NIAID research strives to understand, treat, and ultimately prevent the myriad infectious, immunologic, and allergic diseases that threaten millions of human lives.
NICHD leads research and training to understand human development, improve reproductive health, enhance the lives of children and adolescents, and optimize abilities for all.
The mission of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) is to advance science on the causes and consequences of drug use and addiction and to apply that knowledge to improve individual and public health.
The mission of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences is to discover how the environment affects people in order to promote healthier lives.
The United States Department of Health and Human Services agency responsible for health and biomedical information and research.
NIMH provides national leadership dedicated to understanding, treating, and preventing mental illnesses through basic research on the brain and behavior, and through clinical, epidemiological, and services research.
NIMHD has a long history, beginning in 1990 as an Office and later designated a Center in 2000. The mission of NIMHD is to lead scientific research to improve minority health and eliminate health disparities. To accomplish its mission, NIMHD plans, reviews, coordinates, and evaluates all minority health and health disparities research and activities of the National Institutes of Health; conducts and supports research in minority health and health disparities; promotes and supports the training of a diverse research workforce; translates and disseminates research information; and fosters innovative collaborations and partnerships.
The NIH Clinical Center, America’s research hospital, provides a versatile clinical research environment enabling the NIH mission to improve human health by investigating the pathogenesis of disease; conducting first-in-human clinical trials with an emphasis on rare diseases and diseases of high public health impact; developing state-of-the-art diagnostic, preventive, and therapeutic interventions; training the current and next generations of clinical researchers; and, ensuring that clinical research is ethical, efficient, and of high scientific quality.
FIC promotes and supports scientific research and training internationally to reduce disparities in global health.
The mission of NCATS is to catalyze the generation of innovative methods and technologies that will enhance the development, testing, and implementation of diagnostics and therapeutics across a wide range of human diseases and conditions.
The mission of NCCIH is to define, through rigorous scientific investigation, the usefulness and safety of complementary and integrative health interventions and their roles in improving health and health care.
Understanding information sources
Finding scholarly information
- PICO Search Strategy WorksheetThis worksheet can be used to help develop a strategy for searching using the PICO method and to keep track of keywords and synonyms used in searches. If the worksheet is downloaded, the fields can be filled out and saved for later.
You can start your search using Summon (the search box below), the Library's discovery system. This is a very broad search that will find full-text articles, books, and more. The other databases listed will provide more targeted information as they are more specialized.
For all of them, you can use the limiters on the left side of your search results to select Scholarly/Peer Review (depends on the database) and Journal Article to get articles from peer-reviewed scholarly journals.
- PsycINFO This link opens in a new windowContains citations and summaries of journal articles, book chapters, books, and technical reports in the field of psychology and psychological aspects of related disciplines including medicine, psychiatry, nursing, sociology, education, pharmacology, physiology, linguistics, anthropology, business, and law.
- CINAHL Complete This link opens in a new windowCINAHL Complete is a comprehensive source of full text for nursing & allied health journals, providing full text for more than 750 journals indexed in CINAHL. This authoritative file contains full text for many of the most used journals in the CINAHL index with no embargo. CINAHL Complete is the definitive research tool for all areas of nursing and allied health literature.
- PubMed@Wayne This link opens in a new windowPubMed is a project developed by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) at the National Library of Medicine (NLM), located at the National Institutes of Health (NIH)--Overview. NLM's search service to access the 9 million citations in MEDLINE and Pre-MEDLINE (with links to participating on-line journals), and other related databases --Home page.
- Health Source: Nursing/Academic Edition This link opens in a new windowHealth Source: Nursing/Academic Edition provides researchers, allied health professionals, nurses and medical educators with access to full-text scholarly journals focusing on many medical disciplines. It provides indexing, abstracts and full-text for hundreds of nursing and allied health journals, many of which are peer-reviewed.
Health Stats and Demographic Data
Publicly accessible
- PubMed Central This link opens in a new windowFree online access to fulltext of life science research articles, provided by the U.S. National Institutes of Health.
- U.S. Census BureauThe Census Bureau's QuckFacts feature provides quick, basic demographic data at the state, county, and city/town (pop. 5000+) levels.
- SEMCOG (Southeast Michigan Council of Governments)SEMCOG is a membership organization of local governments in the greater Detroit area. They work with local elected leaders to help solve regional issues that extend beyond individual governmental boundaries.
- Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS)Formerly the Michigan Department of Community Health. By clicking on Inside MDHHS and then Health Statistics and Reports, you can access reports and statistics related to health issues and number of enrollees in health-related state programs.
WSU credentials required
- Social Explorer This link opens in a new windowThis resource is made possible through the partnership of the Center for Urban Studies and the University Library System. Use Social Explorer to visualize and interact with data, create maps, charts, reports and downloads that help you reach your goals. Explore hundreds of thousands of built-in data indicators related to demography, economy, health, politics, environment, crime and more. Easily add your own data for further impact.
- Gale Business DemographicsNow: Business & People This link opens in a new windowResearchers and entrepreneurs are provided with comprehensive business and demographic information valuable to assess business viability, create sales leads and marketing mailing lists, complete location analyses and business plans, analyze population trends, find potential sponsors and donors and much more. This versatile database is useful for those who want to start a business as well as those who want to take their established business to the next level. Michigan residents or WSU community.
Other helpful videos
Statistical Information
- Data Driven DetroitAn affiliated program of the Michigan Nonprofit Association, D3 offers "a comprehensive data system that includes current and historic demographic, socioeconomic, educational, environmental, and other indicators."
- Drawing DetroitThis blog from the WSU Center of Urban Studies works to answer "pertinent questions about Southeastern Michigan through statistics."
- Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research This link opens in a new windowICPSR is a membership-based, not-for-profit organization serving member colleges and universities by providing access to a large archive of machine-readable social science data, training facilities in basic and advanced techniques of quantitative social analysis, and resources that facilitate the use of advanced computer technology by social scientists.
- Socioeconomic characteristics of children by Detroit subcommunityAlthough a bit dated, these reports contain hard to find statistics, available at the neighborhood level. Data include school enrollment, spoken language, employment status of parents, income, and poverty rates. Also includes a map of Detroit subcommunities.
- State of Michigan DataSome statistics offered through the Michigan Data Store are broken down by county and city, giving census and demographic data, income breakdowns, and more for Wayne County and the City of Detroit.
- Bureau of Labor Statistics: DetroitThe Bureau of Labor Statistics offer current statistics in the broad field of labor economics and statistics.