Searching is made simple in AccessMedicine. In the search bar, type in the topic you would like information on, and it will return resources including books, tables, infographics, reference resources, and more on that topic.
Step 1: Type in your topic and press the blue search button.
Step 2: Select the type of resource you are looking for on the left side of the page. You may also choose to refine by textbook title or topic.
Step 3: If necessary, modify your search. This can be done on the left side of the page above Format. You can search by Keyword, Title, Author, or ISBN. You can also add an additional term(s) to search.
How are search results ranked?
Search results are ranked according to a mix of semantic tagging and text matching. Exact phrase matching, particularly in the title of a resource, will cause a result to be ranked highly. By default, all content types are mixed in search results according to overall ranking. To improve the overall results mix, Patient Education handouts have been ranked much lower than other content types, but may still be directly accessed by using the format filter to filter for this content type.
When searching across all sites, are all search results limited to my subscription?
When you are signed in, or authenticated through your institution, search results will automatically be limited to resources within your subscription.
For searches across all sites, you may still view all resources available, subscribed or not, by toggling “All results” on bottom of the left side of the search results page. If you are not signed in, or not authenticated through your institution, all search results available will display by default.
Are Boolean operators supported?
When running a search, the search algorithm uses an implied “AND” by default. This “AND” operation is in place to increase search relevancy. For example, a search for abdominal pain without this implied “AND” would return results including “abdominal” or “pain”, leading to many irrelevant results. As a result, this search engine does not support Boolean searching with “NOT” or “OR.” The search engine does support, however, exact phrase searching.
