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Literature reviews: Health: Search strategy

For level 6/7 students

Look at the 'check your progress' box at the bottom of this page to make sure you have completed all the steps for this stage of your search.

Develop your search strategy

Your Search Planning Form helps you work out the keywords for searching your topic and develop a research question. If you contact HSS Library Team for advice on your research skills, they will request your completed form.

Worked example of a search planning form

Concept tools: PICO & PEO

Contept tools allow you to think about your research question in a very structured way.

  • PICO is a well-known concept tool, very useful for queries about a specific treatment or intervention, focused on a specific group of people.

Some examples below:

PICO example 1 +

Question: do mass media interventions (e.g. adverts) help prevent smoking in young adults (12-18)?
  • Patient/population: young adults (12-18)
  • Intervention: mass media intervention
  • Comparison:no mass media intervention; other types of intervention (such as leaflets).
  • Outcome: smoking prevention.

PICO example 2 +

Question: does exercise improve recovery in adults (20-60) undergoing chemotherapy?
  • Patient/population: adults (20-60) on chemotherapy
  • Intervention: exercise
  • Comparison: no exercise
  • Outcome: improved recovery
  • PEO is very useful for qualitative queries:

Some examples below:

PEO example 1 +

Question: what is the effect of eating habits on the overall health of elderly people?
  • Population/problem: elderly people (65 and over)
  • Exposure: eating habits
  • Outcomes or themes: effect on overall health.

PEO example 2 +

Question: are student nurses trained to cope with future stress in the workplace?
  • Population/problem: student nurses
  • Exposure: education
  • Outcomes or themes: coping with stress in the workplace
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Check your progress

Stage of your search Things to remember
Have you formulated your research topic?
  • This IS NOT the final research question at this point.
  • You need to do the searching and find articles in order to determine what you are researching and what your actual research question is going to be.
List the search terms you have used