LibGuides: Health Sciences: Websites

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For individual research help, schedule an appointment to meet with a librarian.

Hover over links for descriptions of resources.

Hover over link for description of these US National Institute of Health resources.

NOTE: Many government and organizational websites include statistical information and/or other research.

American Medical Association AMA focuses on access to care, quality of care, cost of health care, prevention and wellness, and payment models.
Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Information on government affairs, food and nutrition, and more.
American Psychiatric Association The world’s largest psychiatric organization.
World Health Organization WHO is the directing and coordinating authority for health within the United Nations system.

NOTE: Many government and organizational websites include statistical information and/or other research.

NOTE: Many government and organizational websites include statistical information and/or other research.

Need more guidance? Check out Finding and Using Health Statistics from the National Library of Medicine.

FastStats Faststats provides quick access to statistics on topics of public health. Links are provided to publications that include the statistics presented. Compiled by the National Center for Health Statistics within the Centers for Disease Control.
Hospital Compare Compare the quality of care that hospitals provide. It provides a list of U.S. hospitals which includes hospital demographics (location, hospital type) and 44 quality-of-care measures.
National Center for Health Statistics This division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention gathers statistics on many health topics. An excellent place to start your search for health statistics.
Statistical Abstract of the United States Access provided by NOVA Libraries.

Evaluate websites that have information you would like to use in your assignments.

Look on each website for an "About Us" page to answer some of the following questions:

	("affordable care act" OR Obamacare) AND seniors site:.gov
	174,000 results

	How does the affordable care act effect seniors?
	3,150,000 results

Here's how to craft a better search to get fewer and more relevant results:

Identify the main ideas in your research question.
How does the affordable care act effect seniors?
Connect the main ideas with AND.
affordable care act AND seniors
Use quotation marks around 2 or more words that need to be together.
"affordable care act" AND seniors
Use OR between synonyms/related terms.
("affordable care act" OR Obamacare) AND seniors
Limit your search to a specific domain, such as .edu, .gov, or .org.
("affordable care act" OR Obamacare) AND seniors site:.gov

How Wikipedia CAN be useful in the beginning stages of research:

	A basic overview of your topic.
	Important names, vocabulary and keywords related to your topic.
	Table of contents for some entries, helping you to understand how your topic can be organized.
	References and other websites that may be helpful (though you will need to evaluate them to be sure).

Why NOT to use Wikipedia for academic research:

X The accuracy and authority of a Wikipedia article cannot be verified.