Here are the top free (and no-so-free) starting points in complementary & alternative medicine for the November 19th BCLA Workshop on answering health and medical questions.
1. Starting points: CAM at UBC Library, NCCAM and Wikipedia.
2. More background: MEDLINEplus and Drugs – Supplements.
3. Clinical trials: CAM on Pubmed and NCCAM Trials Information.
4. Systematic Reviews: Bandolier and Wiley’s Cochrane Library.
5. Searching for free & Open vs. Locked CAM Resources.
In MEDLINE, use the MeSH complementary therapies (see specific therapies). CAM is defined as “…therapeutic practices which are not currently considered an integral part of conventional allopathic medical practice. They may lack biomedical explanations but as they become better researched some therapies (ACUPUNCTURE, HYDROTHERAPY) become widely accepted whereas others (humors, radium therapy) fade away, yet are important historical footnotes”.
In PubMedCentral, see the many open access EBM-CAM research articles.
Yvonne Chan
lse721