Using CINAHL

Follow the steps below to find articles with a nurse as an author:

1. Open CINAHL Complete and find the filter labeled "Journal Subset." (You will need to scroll down the page).
2. Click "Core Nursing," then scroll down and do a CTRL+click on "Nursing" (this will make sure both "Core Nursing" and "Nursing" are included in your limiters).  If you are using a Mac computer, use "Command" + Click.
3. Apply your date range, peer-reviewed, and other filters as needed.

Please be careful using the two filters below.  Depending on your topic, you may be able to retrieve many results or very few.

'First Author is Nurse'

Checking this box will retrieve results in which the author specifically has RN after his or her name and may exclude nurses with additional training and degrees, thus limiting your search to a very thin sliver of possible results. 

'Any Author Is Nurse'

This filter will search for articles from 2009 and beyond AND retrieve results that may include non-US journals.

It is recommended that you start with the Journal Subset filter as you will get a more robust set of results that includes more articles with different nursing credentials and journals from the United States.

Verify the credentials by looking at the 'Affiliation' field in a CINAHL record: (right-click on the image and select "Open in a New Tab" for a larger view)

Highlighted fields:

• Affiliation:  This will tell you if the authors are working at a nursing school, hospital, or other medical-related facility.
• Source:  Look here to determine if the journal is nursing or medical-related.
• Publication Type:  Look here to determine if the article is considered primary or empirical research. In this example, the article contains a case study, which would fall under the primary/empirical category.
• Journal Subset:  This will tell you that the journal is categorized under the Core Nursing and Nursing categories in the database.  It will also tell you if the article is Peer-Reviewed.

If the author's credentials are NOT listed after their names, and you cannot verify through the Affiliation field that one or all of them are nurses, you will need to open the PDF and look for their credentials there.

See the example screenshot below:

We can now verify that the author is a nurse because of the credentials RN, BSN, CCRN.

If you are not finding what you need with these filters, you may need to expand your search with different keywords, use different subject headings, or add additional databases such as MEDLINE to find literature. 

For more information, please see the CINAHL FAQ below:

• The CINAHL Databases - Frequently Asked Question

See an example search result below:

• Results of RESEARCH Articles With a Nurse as an Author

Using Primo

Here is an example:

We are searching for articles involving mechanical ventilation and we want to make sure they are nursing related.  We will use the Advanced Search in Primo.

Build the search as follows:

• Any field contains exact phrase mechanical ventilation
• Subject contains nursing

You can then add your Date Range, Peer-Reviewed Journals filter, and Articles filter after clicking Search.  It will look like the screenshot below:

Make sure you "lock" your filters in Primo so they don't disappear as you are revising your search.  Click the "Remember all filters" to lock them.

The search results may also contain the word "Nursing" as a Subject.  It is recommended to apply this to the search so the articles will be narrowed sufficiently.  You can find this in the Subjects list on the left-hand sidebar of Primo.

You will then need to verify through looking at the article that they have nurses as authors.  You will need to open the PDF and look underneath the title for credentials such as RN, MSN, FNP, DNP, etc.  Sometimes, their credentials are listed at the end of an article as well.