Article Lookup at BCIT
Databases can be discipline specific (such as CCOHS), or multidisciplinary (such as Academic Search Complete). Many contain full text material, some only the reference and abstract.
Resist the temptation to limit your initial search to full text only, unless you absolutely need the article immediately. You may miss citations for appropriate articles not found in that database but could be found through one of our other databases.
Find more databases by browsing the database list by subject. Health Sciences databases.
Start your research with these recommended databases:
It is a good place to start your research. Library databases provide a more efficient and effective means to access information. Advanced Google Searching tips
See below how to set up Google Scholar settings to find items held by the BCIT Library when you are searching off campus.
Be aware that:
Pathogen Safety Data Sheets (PSDSs) (previously titled Material Safety Data Sheets for infectious substances) are technical documents that describe the hazardous properties of a human pathogen and recommendations for work involving these agents in a laboratory setting.
All aspects of transportation, including Health and Safety. The database contains over half a million records of published transportation research including technical reports, books, conference proceedings and journal articles. From the U.S. National Transportation Library.
Governments sponsor research, collect statistics, grant patents, enact laws, participate in treaties, and more. Their publications and websites offer valuable information for researchers.
Using Google: Since many government sites are freely available, Google searching can be a useful way to find government sources.
Google Government Documents Search. Custom search screen for Canadian government documents. Searches 775 core domains at the federal, provincial and municipal levels.
Canadian Business and Current Affairs (CBCA), Environmental Science Database, Materials Science Database, Public Health Database and Sociology Database are all Proquest databases.
PubMed: interactive tutorial: Get the full text for an article (2 min. video) -- you can now link back to the BCIT Library resources or request for Interlibrary loan from PubMed. Look for the
button, on the top right.
Using PubMed in Evidence-Based Practice Training Course
CINAHL Complete, Environment Complete and GreenFILE are EBSCO databases. Basically you search them the same way.
**Remember, if you are looking for articles on a particular topic, it's easiest to cross-search many journals using the library's databases (listed on this page).
If you specifically want to find journals relevant to OH&S, this is the tab for you!
Journals contain collections of articles and are generally published on a regular basis (e.g. issues are released monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly etc.). They can be found via the Library databases link.
Journals are the primary medium for scholarly communication. They:
There are different types of of journals. Not all journals are suitable for your assignments.
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Types of journal articles |
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Peer-reviewed |
Original research |
Original research is a primary resource. These articles often include an introduction, methods, results and discussion sections. |
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Review articles |
Review articles are secondary resources. They provide a comprehensive summary of research on a certain topic and often have an extensive list of references. |
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Not peer-reviewed |
Editorials |
In a scholarly publication, the editorial summarises the contributions in the publication, providing a balance between opinion and synthesis. |
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Book reviews |
Book reviews are written by scholars and provide a summary of a newly published book. |
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A publication in which all articles go through a peer-review process performed by subject experts before being published. You find peer reviewed articles by searching different databases. You can find a selection of databases in this guide.
P.S. When searching for peer reviewed journals from a database, select the "peer reviewed" or "peer reviewed & academic" limiters in the database you are using to ensure that only journals that have a peer reviewed policy for at least one kind of article are returned.
What is the peer-review process more exactly? Watch the video from North Carolina State University to get a clear understanding:
"Scholarly" sources are
Most (but not all) scholarly publications are peer reviewed or refereed by external reviewers.
