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Health Information Management: Understanding & Evaluating Sources
Understanding Health News
The following list of resources was created by the U.S. National Library of Medicine to help you evaluate the reliability of health information reported in the news media.
- MedlinePlusCheck out the topic pages for Evaluating Health Information, Health Fraud, and Understanding Medical Research.
- MedlinePlus toolsLocated here are two tutorials: Understanding Medical Words and Evaluating Internet Health Information.
- Know the ScienceThis information was developed by the U.S. National Center for Complimentary and Integrative Health and will help you learn how to tell if a news story is reliable.
About articles: types, parts, publication process
- From Idea To LibraryThis short video explains how research articles get published and how they ultimately show up in your search results. Created by NCSU Libraries.
- Types of PublicationsThis short video, created by East Carolina University, explains how to tell if an article is scholarly, for the public, or for a specific profession.
- Anatomy of a Scholarly ArticleThis interactive tutorial will help you understand the various parts (or sections) of a scholarly article. Created by NCSU Libraries; shared under the Creative Commons Attribution - Noncommercial - Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Evaluating Information
- How to evaluate informationThis infographic shows guidelines that can help you determine if a source is credible or not. Created by the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA).
- How to Read a PaperCall Number: E-BookPublication Date: 2019Clear and wide-ranging introduction to evidence-based medicine and healthcare, helping readers to understand its central principles, critically evaluate published data, and implement the results in practical settings.
Peer Reviewed Articles
- Peer Review in 3 MinutesThis 3-minute video from North Carolina State University explains the peer review process and why it's important.
How to use Ulrichsweb database for peer-review status
Why use Ulrich's?
- Find out if a particular journal is peer reviewed
- Find out which databases index a journal
How to use Ulrichsweb to determine if an article is in a peer-reviewed journal:
1. Ulrich's can tell you whether a journal is peer-reviewed, not individual articles (but, research articles in a peer-reviewed journal will be peer-reviewed).
2. Go to Ulrichsweb database from a GVSU link, either on a subject guide or from the database list.
3. Enter the name of the journal/magazine (not the article or author!).
4. For example, I recently found this article through PubMed database. Notice the journal title is "Pediatric Obesity" (or Pediatr Obes for short):
5. Next, go to Ulrichsweb and type in Pediatric Obesity. This is what the results look like:
6. There are 2 versions of Pediatric Obesity, print and online. In either case, there is a "refereed" symbol (red circle) next to the journal name. This means the journal is "refereed," which is another way of saying peer-reviewed.
NOTE: not every article in a peer-reviewed journal may be peer-reviewed; commentary, news and opinion pieces usually are not peer-reviewed.
- Last Updated: Dec 18, 2024 11:11 AM
- URL: https://libguides.gvsu.edu/him