Inova Health Sciences Library: Anesthesiology: Keeping Current

Staying Current

As students approach residency, they often ask how they should keep up with the literature in their chosen discipline. While keeping up can seem overwhelming, there are a number of strategies professionals can use to make it more manageable.

The Problem: Research volume doubles every 7 years

Increasing # journal & articles = increasing scatter in the published medical literature

But...no increase in clinician time to read

Hoffman, C., Erueti, C., & Thorning, S. (2012). The scatter of research: cross sectional comparison of randomised trials and systematic reviews across specialities. BMJ, 344: e3233.

Best Bet: Topic Alerts

Topic alerts allow you to build a search, save it, and receive regular updates on the topic. You can search broadly or narrowly depending on your specialty and interest. You determine the search parameters + exactly how often you receive email alerts.

This strategy works very well if you are doing research, writing, or exploring a particular topic (e.g., therapies and interventions for COPD). It may not be as effective to keep up broadly with your field (e.g., hot topics in emergency medicine) or for "cocktail" knowledge.

To set up an Alert or Saved Search, develop a good search strategy in your favorite medical literature database, save it, and tell it to send you updates as often as you'd like (typically daily, weekly, monthly, or whenever a new article is published on the topic).

PubMed: Save Searches and Set Email Alerts via MyNCBI

Here's a quick video tutorial: https://youtu.be/WbFjV91YNNY

TOC's, Podcasts, & RSS Feeds

Subscribe to electronic tables of contents (eTOC) of your specialty journals (and maybe the journal heavyweights like NEJM, JAMA, etc).

You can usually do this from the journal’s website, it’s free, and you get an email every time a new issue is published. This strategy is great for general awareness and keeping up with your colleagues.

Many journals also offer podcasts & RSS feeds
These feeds often cover subtopics (e.g., geriatric-focused articles published in JAMA), recent news, and other happenings related to the journal.
- NEJM Emails, Podcasts, and Feeds
  
  Professional and government organizations also offer feeds and podcasts.
Use a feed reader to curate and manage your feeds.

Feedly is a good reader for personalizing your "news" feed.
Evidence Updates
Create article alerts customized by specialty and relevance. Articles rated by clinical impact and newsworthiness. Created by the BMJ and McMaster University.
MyNCBI
Email notifications for new articles from specific journals or saved searches. Create collections of articles to read later as you search.

Social Media

Twitter

Follow journals, professional organizations, faculty, and medical organizations

Top 20 Social Networks for Doctors and Healthcare Professionals

Dangers and opportunities for social media in medicine

Anesthesiology