How to use the database

Search field:

The search field can be used to quickly identify all articles that include a particular search word or phrase (eg, author name, article title, disease state, etc.). The search field allows for the use of BOOLEAN operators such as AND, OR, and NOT. Note: The BOOLEAN operators must be capitalized.

Viewing article information:

On the search results page, you will see all of the articles that matched your search criteria. For each article listed, the title, citation, disease state(s), and clinical service(s) will be displayed.

By clicking the "More information" tab, you will be taken to another page that has more detailed information on the selected article. Once you have completed your review of that information, you can click the back button on your web browser to go back to the search results page.

As an option, on the search results page, you can click the box “Articles open in new window?”, to have your search results page stay as is and a new window open up with more information about each article you click on.

Browse Tab:

The Browse function has been created to allow the user to identify articles without having to type in search terms. This makes it extremely easy for a user to identify only those articles that include information related to a specific article type, type of outcomes studied, clinical service provided, disease state or condition, pharmacy type, study locale, environment, or geographic region of the United States.

How to Use the Browse Function:

The Browse function uses clickable filters which allow the user to limit the number of articles being displayed.

In the box that says “Refine your results”, clicking on the major category will display several sub categories. The clicking on the sub category will bring up the articles that include that sub category.

The filters are additive, in that clicking on subsequent filters continues to limit the number of articles that were displayed based on the previous filter.

For example, if you were interested in finding articles related to asthma services where they studied health outcomes:

1. Click on “Disease States” to show a drop down menu for the categories and subcategories.
2. Click on “the Asthma” box to limit the display to articles that relate to Asthma.
3. Click on “Outcomes Studied to show a drop down menu
4. Click on “Health Outcomes” to limit the display to those articles related to Health Outcomes in Asthma

Note: When Using Multiple Browse Filters to further limit a search, this will only work if you select filters from different main categories. Selecting multiple filters from the same category will increase your results to include articles from both subcategories.

Using Browse Function in Combination with Search Function:

You can use the Browse filters after you have done an initial search to help you narrow down articles you are interested in. This is especially useful if your initial search term resulted in a large number of article results.

Once you are on the “Search Results’ page, just click on one or more of the filters to further refine your search.

Geographic Regions Classifications

The U.S. Census Bureau’s four-region classification system was used for this database. The four regions are Midwest, Northeast, South, and West. The states included in each region are as follows.

Midwest: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin.

Northeast: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania

South: Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Washington, D.C., Delaware, Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas

West: Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming.

Limitations of the Database:

Although all attempts have been made to ensure this database contains a complete record of articles and stories related to community pharmacists providing patient care services published since January 1, 2007, we recognize that there may be relevant articles missing.

In addition, although the browse feature is meant to help the user identify studies related to a specific topic, each record is not guaranteed to have complete filter data. Many articles did not contain information related to the specific type of pharmacy, or geographic location.

Also, information related to study objectives, health outcomes and clinical outcomes are only those extracted from the article abstract. You must access the full-text article to get all of the study results and other information. Not all articles/abstracts included all information.

Lastly, the purpose of this database is to have one central database to search for articles related to community pharmacist provided patient care services. Links are provided to direct you to the full text source of the information. It is always recommended that you gain access to the full-text version of the articles for the most complete and accurate information.

NACDS Foundation does not gain any monetary benefit from this database if you click on the link to the full-text article, or if you purchase the full-text article from the publisher or any other vendor.

Browser support:

This site works best and has been exhaustively tested in Internet Explorer 7.0 and above, Firefox 3.0 and above, Safari 4.0 and above, and Google Chrome 3.0 and above. While other browser versions are not tested and some features may not work as expected, the main content of this site should be fully accessible.

Problems or errors:

Please notify us of any errors or technical problems with the database by contacting us at foundationdatabase@nacds.org