In a study of 700 Medline references indexed in duplicate, the consistency of main subject-heading indexing was only 68% and that for heading-subheading combinations was significantly less [ 16].
As no MeSH headings or index terms currently exist for COS papers, and these papers do not appear to be indexed in a consistent way, key search terms were also targeted and no limits were applied to the search.
When available medical subject headings or index terms were used in each database.
We searched the databases using a combination of MeSH (Medical subject Headings) and relevant index terms.
Our search string combined a wide range of free text terms and subject index headings, and was evaluated and refined by assessing retrieval of known studies.
These results show that the MeSH headings of articles indexed in PubMed are good indicators for identifying high-throughput studies.
The National Library of Medicine's (NLM's) Journals database provides a functionality that allows users to browse journals by discipline via Subject Terms: a set of MeSH® headings designated for indexing MEDLINE® journals by subject (e.g. biochemistry).
Although work on the development of COS goes back at least 30 years [ 19], the term itself has not been widely used until relatively recently and there are currently no MeSH headings in MEDLINE or index terms in other bibliographic databases for identifying COS papers, and they do not appear to be categorised consistently across different databases.
Find the information you need from the document using the table of contents, index, or headings.
The selection of literature for inclusion in the review was based on examination of abstracts and indexing (subject headings) where available, and on full text or the table of contents if accessible.
Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) are used to index the majority of databases generated by the National Library of Medicine.
