Table of Contents:
Scope | General Information |
Searching the Fields | Advanced
Searching
Stopwords | Limits |
Tools | Changing to AMED From Another Database
Sample Documents | Copyright Information
| Updated
The Allied and Complementary Medicine Database (AMED) is a unique bibliographic database produced by the Health Care Information Service of the British Library. It covers a selection of journals in complementary medicine, palliative care, and several professions allied to medicine.
Prior to the year 2000, the term sexual harassment was spelled incorrectly in the AMED database as sexual harrassment. Because search results were actually associated with the misspelling of this term at that time, you must use both spellings to retrieve all possible records associated with the topic. Note that from 2000 forward, the term has been spelled correctly.
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| Producer | |||
The British Library |
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| Years of Coverage | |||
| 1985 to present | |||
| Default Fields for Unqualified Searches | |||
| Abstract (AB) | Heading Words (HW) | Title (TI) | |
| All Display/Print Fields | |||
| Abstract (AB) | ISSN (IS) | Source (SO) | |
| Accession Number (AN) | Language (LG) | Subject Headings (SH) | |
| Author (AU) | Local Messages (LM) | Title (TI) | |
| Entry Terms (ET) | Publication Type (PT) | Update Code (UP) | |
| Default Fields for Display/Print | |||
| Abstract (AB) | Entry Terms (ET) | Title (TI) | |
| Accession Number (AN) | Source (SO) | ||
| Author (AU) | Subject Headings (SH) | ||
| Online Update Frequency | |||
| Monthly | |||
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The following list is sorted alphabetical by field alias. Click a field name to see the description and search information.
| Field Name | Label | Field Name | Label | |
| Abstract | AB | Journal Name | JN | |
| Accession Number | AN | Journal Word | JX | |
| Author | AU | Language | LG | |
| Book Description | BD | Pagination | PG | |
| Date of Publication | DP | Publication Type | PT | |
| Entry Terms | ET | Source | SO | |
| English Summary | ES | Subject Headings | SH | |
| Heading Words | HW | Title | TI | |
| ISBN | IB | Update Code | UP | |
| ISSN | IS | Volume | VO | |
| Issue/Part | IP | Year of Publication | YR | |
| Journal Abbreviation | JA |
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The following list is sorted alphabetically by the two-letter label, and includes the relevant alias, at least one example for all searchable AMED fields, and a description of the field.
| Label | Name / Example |
| AB | Abstract [Word Indexed] heart attack.ab. |
| The Abstract (AB) field includes the English language abstract for certain articles. The Abstract index contains all searchable words from the abstract; however, stopwords, such as "the" and "of" are not searchable. English Summary will display following an English summary abstract. | |
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| AN | Accession Number 8500011.an. |
| The Accession Number (AN) field contains a seven digit number that uniquely identifies each record in the Allied and Complementary Medicine Database. | |
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| AU | Author [Phrase Indexed] brewster c.au. |
The Author (AU) field contains the names of the authors of the article. Enter the last name of the author, or if it is a common name, enter the last name and the first initial. If you are unsure of the spelling of the last name (mcdonald or macdonald) enter one version of the name and then scroll through the list of names to find the other. |
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| BD | Book Description [Word Indexed] cullompton devon.bd. |
The Book Description (BD) field contains the place of publication, year, the number of pages and sometimes the price. This field is displayed in the Source (SO) field. |
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| DP | Date of Publication [Display Only] |
| The Date of Publication (DP) field contains the time period the journal came out. This can be the actual month, the month and day, or the season, etc. This field is displayed in the Source (SO) field. | |
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| ES | English Summary [Display Only] |
| The English Summary (ES) field is put in when the journal from which the article came from contained an English summary. This does not mean that there is an abstract associated with the article in the actual database. | |
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| ET | Entry Terms |
| The Entry Terms (ET) field contains all entry terms that are not part of the controlled indexing terms that describe the article. This field is phrase indexed. | |
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| HW | Heading Words heart.hw. |
| The Heading Words (HW) field contains a word indexed list of all the subject headings. | |
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| IB | ISBN 0962343803.ib. |
| The ISBN (IB) field contains the ISBN number of the monograph referenced. | |
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| IP | Issue/Part "6".ip. |
| The Issue/Part (IP) field contains the issue or part number of the journal. This field is displayed in the Source (SO) field. | |
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| IS | ISSN [Phrase Indexed] "0300-9742".is. |
The ISSN (IS) field contains the International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) for the journal in which an article was published. It appears as an 8-digit number, separated by a hyphen: 0028-4793. |
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| JA | Journal Abbreviation [Phrase Indexed] cancer res.ja. |
The Journal Abbreviation (JA) field contains the abbreviated name of the journal in which the article was published. Journal names are indexed as phrases, so enter enough letters of the journal name to locate the name in the index: new engl (for New England Journal of Medicine). This field displays as part of the Source (SO) field when the full journal title is not available. |
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| JN | Journal Name |
The Journal Name (JN) field contains the full name of the journal in which an article was published. This field displays as part of the Source (SO) field. Journal names are indexed as phrases, so enter enough letters of the journal name to locate the name in the index: new engl (for New England Journal of Medicine). Stopwords such as "of" ARE included in the JN index, but when "the" is the first word of a journal, it has been stripped. |
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| JX | Journal Word |
The Journal Word (JX) field contains individual words from every journal name in AMED. Stopwords such as "the" or "of" are not included. This field is used to retrieve every occurrence of a journal which includes a particular word, such as "obstetrics". |
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| LG | Language English.lg. eng.lg. |
| The Language (LG) field contains the language or languages of the document. It is possible to have more than one language assigned to a document. It is searchable by language abbreviation or by full name of the language. | |
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| LH | Locally Held [Display Only] |
| The Locally Held (LH) field indicates (with a "Y" or an "N") if a journal is held locally. | |
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| LM | Local Messages [Display Only] |
| The Local Messages (LM) field contains messages created by the System Administrator to indicate information about journals held in your local library system. | |
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| PG | Pagination "341".pg. |
The Pagination (PG) field consists of the first page of
the item. This field is displayed in the Source (SO)
field. |
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| PT | Publication Type [Phrase Indexed] editorial.pt. |
| The Publication Type (PT) field contains the type of article the record is, such as a commentary, lecture, letter, editorial, etc. | |
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| SH | Subject Headings [Phrase Indexed] learning disability.sh. |
| The Subject Heading (SH) field contains all keywords, entry terms and minor terms that describe the article. | |
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| SO | Source [Display Only] |
The Source field contains the citation information for
the article. It is made up of the Journal Name (JN),
the Volume (VO), Issue/Part (IP),
the Pagination (PG), and the Date of Publication
(DP), or in the case of Monograph records, the Book Description
(BD). |
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| TI | Title [word indexed] quality of life.ti. |
| The Title (TI) field contains the title of the article, book or conference paper. | |
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| UP | Update Code 199900.up. |
| Update Code (UP) field contains the date (YYYYMM) of the last transfer of the record from the database to OVID, where YYYY is the 4-digit year and MM is the month of the update. | |
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| VO | Volume "23".vo. |
| The Volume (VO) field contains the volume of the publication that contains the article. This field is displayed in the Source (SO) field. | |
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| YR | Year of Publication "1995".yr. |
| The Year of Publication (YR) field contains the year the article was printed. This field is displayed in the Source (SO) field. | |
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You can use special words and symbols to combine search terms and refine a search. For efficient searching, use the most appropriate operator from the list below to combine search terms. For more information on these and other searching techniques, including command line syntax searching, refer to the Ovid Gateway Help.
| Operator | Syntax | Example | Results |
| OR | OR | vitamin c or ascorbic acid | Retrieves records that contain either term or both terms. |
| AND | AND | cluster and migraine | Retrieves records that contain both terms. |
| NOT | NOT | headache not migraine | Retrieves records that contain the first term but not the second term. |
| ADJ | ADJ | bone spur | Retrieves records that contain both terms, in order, and adjacent in the same sentence. |
| ADJn | melatonin adj3 migraine | Retrieves records that contain both terms, in either order, with no more than n number of words between. The example will retrieve records containing the phrase, "therapeutic potential of melatonin in migraines". | |
| FREQ | x.fd./FREQ=n | blood.ab. /freq=5 | Retrieves records that contain n occurances of the term in the specified field. The example will retrieve records containing the word "blood," at least five times in the Abstract (ab) field. |
| $ | x$ | rat$ | The unlimited truncation symbol, $, retrieves records that contain the search term and all possible suffix variations of a root word. The example will retrieve records containing words such as rat, rats, rate, rationalize, ratify, etc. |
| x$n | dog$1 | The limited truncation symbol, $n, Retrieves records that contain the search term and all possible suffix variations of a root word with the maximum number of characters that may follow the root word or phrase, specified by n.The example will retrieve records containing words such as dog and dogs, but not dogma. | |
| # | # | wom#n | The mandated wildcard symbol, #, retrieves records that contain the search term with substituted character(s) in the specified locations. The example will retrieve records containing woman and women. |
| ? | ? | colo?r | The optional wildcard symbol, ?, retrieves records that contain the search term with either no characters substituted, or with substituted character(s) in the specified locations. The example will retrieve records containing color and colour. |
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Words of little intrinsic meaning that occur too frequently to be useful in searching text are known as stopwords. You cannot search for the following stopwords by themselves, but you can include them within phrases by placing the entire phrase within quotation marks.
| a | by | having | neither | seem | those |
| about | can | how | no | seen | through |
| after | could | however | nor | several | thus |
| again | did | if | not | should | to |
| all | do | in | obtain | show | under |
| almost | does | into | obtained | showed | up |
| also | done | is | of | shown | upon |
| although | during | it | often | shows | use |
| always | each | its | on | significant | used |
| among | either | itself | only | significantly | using |
| an | enough | just | or | since | various |
| and | especially | kg | other | so | very |
| another | etc | km | our | some | was |
| any | followed | largely | out | such | we |
| approximately | following | like | overall | suggest | were |
| are | for | made | per | than | what |
| as | found | mainly | perhaps | that | when |
| at | from | make | possible | the | whereas |
| be | further | may | previously | their | which |
| because | give | might | quite | theirs | while |
| been | given | min | rather | them | with |
| before | giving | mm | really | then | within |
| being | had | most | regarding | there | would |
| between | hardly | mostly | resulted | these | |
| both | has | must | resulting | they | |
| but | have | nearly | same | this |
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Popular Command and Sentence Syntax for Limits:
| Abstract | |
| Sentence Syntax: | limit 3 to abstract |
| Alternative Medicine | |
| Sentence Syntax: | limit 3 to hypnosis |
| English Language | |
| Sentence Syntax: | limit 1 to english |
| English Summary | |
| Sentence Syntax: | limit 1 to english summary |
| General Medical Concepts | |
| Sentence Syntax: | limit 1 to case reports |
| Languages | |
| Sentence Syntax: | limit 1 to french |
| Publication Type | |
| Sentence Syntax: | limit 1 to congress |
| Therapies | |
| Sentence Syntax: | limit 1 to drug therapy |
| Update Code | |
| Sentence Syntax: | limit 3 to up=199903 |
| Command Syntax: | ..l/3 up=199903 |
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| Command Syntax: | ..c/amed |
| Sentence Syntax: | use amed |
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<1>
Accession Number
0064739
Author
Yubin L
Title
How to learn Chinese herbs (part five)
Source
Journal of Chinese Medicine 2004 Jun;75:24-6.
Abstract
This latest part of Lu Yubins popular series on learning Chineseherbs
discusses the meanings of herb names, and their shape, colour and
characteristics , in such a way that students can get an entirely new
perspective on the herbs and find it much easier to remember their
properties. This article covers herbs that induce diuresis to remove
dampness.
Subject Headings
Drugs chinese herbal. Drug therapy. Education.
Language
English
ISSN
0143-8042
Publication Type
Journal Article
Update Code
200408
<2>
Accession Number
9148735
Author
Wilbur P
Title
The phyto-oestrogen debate - part 2.
Source
European Journal of Herbal Medicine 1996 Autumn;2(3):19-26.
Abstract
There exists disagreement as to the role phyto-oestrogens have to play in
therapeutic herbalism, mainly concerning the actions and properties of
phyto-oestrogens within the human body. Rarely does scientific research
throw light of the effects of phyto-oestrogenic herbs on the body, and the
traditional literature about these herbs may offer a much better guide to
usage than the list of phytosterols they contain.
Subject Headings
Estrogens. Plants medicinal. Materia medica. Research.
Language
English
Publication Type
Journal Article
Update Code
198700
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AMED is a copyright of the British Library Health Care Information Service 2001. All Rights Reserved.
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Field Guide Revised May 31, 2005
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