AM4801: Acupuncture & East Asian Medicine Clinic Entry

Using Clinical Questions to identify relevant research

Clinical (patient-centered) questions ask for specific information to facilitate clinical decision-making, forming a clinical question requires more knowledge in relation to individual patients or case scenarios. 

Clinical questions are structured using PICO - identify a search term for each of the letters of the acronym:

P - Patient or Population

I - Intervention

C - Control or Comparison

O - Outcome

Example clinical question:  Is acupuncture effective in alleviating depression?

P - Patients with depression:   Search term:  depression

I - Acupuncture

C - No acupuncture

O - Reduction in symptoms of depression. 

Combine P and I to search:  

depression AND acupuncture

NOTE: You don't need to include the C and the O in the search!  You need to read the articles you find to identify whether they show a reduction in symptoms (ie the Outcome)

Connecting your search terms so that a database understands your intention (so to speak) is really important to finding what you're looking for; watch this video to learn or refresh your memory about the functions of those pesky Boolean operators, AND, OR and NOT.

Produced by the University Libraries at McMaster University, Hamilton, Nov. 28, 2016; reused under Creative Commons Attribution Licensing.