No subheadings for MeSH terms recently promoted from Supplementary Concept

If you come across a MeSH term which was recently promoted from being a supplementary concept to a proper MeSH, you may have to modify your search.

For instance, the drug Adalimumab shows Year Introduced: 2016 (2002). This means that it became a MeSH term in 2016, but was available as a supplementary concept since 2002.

I was feeling pretty good about this because 2002 was some time ago. My first search went:

("Adalimumab/adverse effects"[Mesh] OR "Adalimumab/toxicity"[Mesh]) AND ("Lung/drug effects"[Mesh] OR "Lung Diseases/epidemiology"[Mesh] OR "Lung Diseases/etiology"[Mesh])
There were 11 results (9 in English).

Pretty textbook, right? Yawn. What I didn't notice was that all of the results were from 2015+, which should have been a big hint.

Anyway, then I did the EMBASE search, and holey crowley. Tons and tons of highly relevant results, that should have been found by Medline.

Which is when I realised that all those articles indexed between 2002 and 2015 would have been indexed "adalimumab"[Supplementary concept] _with no subheadings_. Because supplementary concepts don't get subheadings! So when the term was promoted, they were changed to "Adalimumab"[Mesh], also without subheadings.

"Adalimumab"[Mesh] AND ("Lung/drug effects"[Mesh] OR "Lung Diseases/epidemiology"[Mesh] OR "Lung Diseases/etiology"[Mesh])
There were 107 results (99 in English).

So, watch out for those promoted terms. They're tricksy!

Pregnancy Outcomes

The MeSH tree is usually pretty good, but this is an instance where it fails. There is a MeSH term for Pregnancy Outcomes (added 1988), but it only lists two narrower terms: Live Birth and Stillbirth. That's all very well, but there are a lot of other outcomes to be considered.

"Pregnancy Outcome"[Mesh] OR "Abortion, Spontaneous"[Mesh] OR "Abortion, Induced"[Mesh] OR "Fetal Death"[Mesh] OR "Maternal Death"[Mesh] OR "Obstetric Labor Complications"[Mesh] OR "Perinatal Death"[Mesh] OR "Cesarean Section"[Mesh] OR "Infant, Low Birth Weight"[Mesh] OR "Term Birth"[Mesh] OR "Maternal Mortality"[Mesh] OR "Fetal Mortality"[Mesh] OR "Infant Mortality"[Mesh] OR "Birth Weight"[Mesh] OR "Birth Injuries"[Mesh]

"Obstetric Labor Complications" includes "Obstetric Labor, Premature" and its narrower term, Premature Birth. There is also "Infant, Premature" if this topic is of particular interest.

CINAHL:
MH "Pregnancy Outcomes" OR MH "Abortion, Spontaneous+" OR MH "Abortion, Induced+" OR MH "Term Birth" OR MH "Perinatal Death" OR MH "Infant, Large for Gestational Age" OR MH "Infant, Low Birth Weight+" OR MH "Infant, Postmature" OR MH "Infant, Premature" OR MH "Childbirth, Premature" OR MH "Labor, Premature" OR MH "Labor Complications+" OR MH "Maternal Mortality" OR MH "Cesarean Section+" OR MH "Birth Weight" OR MH "Birth Injuries+"

EMBASE:
pregnancy outcome/ or exp live birth/ or exp abortion/ or exp fetus death/ or exp maternal death/ or exp labor complication/ or exp perinatal death/ or exp cesarean section/ or exp birth weight/ or exp term birth/ or embryo mortality/ or fetus mortality/ or maternal mortality/ or exp perinatal mortality/ or prenatal mortality/ or exp birth injury/

Paternalism and the new PubMed syntax

It really annoys me when the computer thinks it knows better than I do what I want. Especially when it is wrong.

Call me a dinosaur, but I don't like the new PubMed syntax. I liked it better when you had to know what you were doing to get the syntax right, and in return, PubMed gave you back what you expected.
Now, you can type in, without quotes:
dialysis[mh]

Which sounds great, until you look at the Search Details, and see that it has actually searched "renal dialysis"[MeSH Terms] OR "dialysis"[MeSH Terms]

Excuse me! That is not what I asked for! If I wanted Renal Dialysis, I would have typed Renal Dialysis. What's the point of looking up the correct term in the MeSH database if they're just going to put in the wrong term anyway?

Now, I know what's happened here. PubMed assumes that, because when most people say dialysis they mean what MeSH calls Renal Dialysis, they're going to do us a favour and add in the thing that they think we really mean. And maybe it will help someone out there. But it's really annoying to those of us who read the scope notes and rejected Renal Dialysis because we really meant Dialysis.

I'm pretty sure that's what's going on because I tried it on a bunch of other examples, and it mostly didn't happen except for one other example where there was another lay term (depression) which usually refers to a different MeSH term (Depressive Disorder) but can also refer to another MeSH term (Depression).

I.e. if you type in depression[mh] it will run instead: "depressive disorder"[MeSH Terms] OR "depression"[MeSH Terms]

So, if you want your MeSH term and only your MeSH term, it's best to go back to the old way and always type in your quotation marks.

"Dialysis"[mh] will give you "Dialysis"[mh]
"Depression"[mh] will give you "Depression"[mh]

Whew! Back to normal. Which just goes to show that it's always better to do things the right way. Because if you pander to the people who want convenience, you're probably going to end up with a lot of unwanted paternalism as well.

Mild Traumatic Brain Injuries

These are really annoying because no one can quite agree on whether they are the same as concussion or not. Some people say that MTBIs are a type of concussion. Other people say that concussions are a type of MTBIs. Still others use then synonymously, while another group contend that they are entirely separate.

Secondly, the MeSH term "Brain Injuries, Traumatic" was added to the MeSH tree in 2017.

So what's a librarian to do?

For the next few years, this will probably do just fine:

"Brain Concussion"[Mesh]
OR
"Brain Injuries"[Mesh] AND (mild[tiab] OR mtbi[tiab])

If it's after 2022 and you just want results from the past 5 years, you could try this:

"Brain Concussion"[Mesh]
OR
"Brain Injuries, Traumatic"[Mesh] AND (mild[tiab] OR mtbi[tiab])

Yikes, I just realised that 5 years from now is in the 2020s! Scary thought...

If you want to get really fancy, you could do something like this:

"Brain Concussion"[Mesh]
OR
"Brain Injuries, Traumatic"[Mesh] AND (mild[tiab] OR mtbi[tiab]) AND "2017/01/01"[PDat] : "3000/12/31"[PDat]
OR
"Brain Injuries"[Mesh] AND (mild[tiab] OR mtbi[tiab]) AND "1940/01/01"[PDat] : "2016/12/31"[PDat]

You can change the 1940 part to whatever year suits your search.

Naturally, there may be some subheadings of interest (diagnosis and/or therapy, for example), to add to those MeSH.

Once you've got that set, with any appropriate subheadings, then add any additional MeSH terms and/or limits of interest.

What I like to do is, go through the results treating the terms as synonymous. That way you won't miss anything of relevance. However, when it's time to select some articles of particular relevance to attach to the email (or print and add to the enveloppe), I like to select articles using the same terminology which the doctor used.

Lastly, in the text of the email or the accompanying letter, I just explain to the doctor that there is some controversy about the terminology, and how I've dealt with it.

EMBASE:

exp traumatic brain injury/ and (mild or mtbi).mp.
OR
exp brain concussion/

Vitamins

Vitamins can be called by a number of different names. Here are some for your MeSH, keyword-searching and Word-highlighting use:

Vitamin A:

Mesh: "Vitamin A"[Mesh] OR "Vitamin A Deficiency"[Mesh]

keywords: "vitamin a"[tiab] OR retinol*[tiab] OR tretinoin[tiab]

There also seems to be a connection to carotene: caroten*[tiab]


Vitamin B:
There are actually a whole bunch of Vitamin Bs, and apparently some of them are other vitamins as well (Vit G, H, and M). Because, you know, that's not confusing at all!

I recommend use of Ovid for this one so that you can use truncation.
Mesh: exp Vitamin B Complex/ or exp Vitamin B Deficiency/
keywords: (vitamin b* or cobalamin* or cyanocobalamin* or hydroxycobalamin* or riboflavin* or vitamin g or biotin or vitamin h or niacin or thiamin* or adenine or pantothenic acid or pantothenate or folic acid or folate or vitamin m).mp.

However, PubMed does have a Pharmacological Action for Vitamin B Complex, which might be useful as well.
Mesh: "Vitamin B Complex"[Mesh] OR "Vitamin B Complex"[Pharmacological Action] OR "Vitamin B Deficiency"[Mesh]

Vitamin C:

Mesh: "Ascorbic Acid"[Mesh] OR "Ascorbic Acid Deficiency"[Mesh]

Watch out for this one in Ovid. The mapping is broken and it maps to Vitamin D instead of Ascorbic acid. This has been reported to Ovid, but so far they have not been able to fix it. In PubMed it maps just fine.

keywords: "vitamin c"[tiab] OR "ascorbic acid"[tiab] OR ascorbate[tiab] OR ascorbium[tiab]

Vitamin D:

Mesh: "Vitamin D"[Mesh] OR "Vitamin D Deficiency"[Mesh]

"vitamin d"[tiab] OR cholecalciferol*[tiab] OR ergocalciferol*[tiab] OR dihydrotachysterol*[tiab] OR hydroxycholecalciferol*[tiab] OR "25 hydroxyvitamin d2"[tiab] OR "25 hydroxyvitamin d 2"[tiab]

Vitamin E:

Mesh: "Vitamin E"[Mesh] OR "Vitamin E Deficiency"[Mesh]

keywords: "vitamin e"[tiab] OR tocopherol*[tiab] OR tocotrienol*[tiab]

Vitamin F:

Mesh: "Arachidonic Acid"[Mesh]

keywords: "vitamin f"[tiab] OR "arachidonic acid"[tiab] OR arachidonate*[tiab] OR "eicosatetraenoic acid"[tiab] OR eicosatetranoate*[tiab]

Vitamin K:

Mesh: exp Vitamin K/ or exp Vitamin K Deficiency/

Once again, Ovid for the truncation:

keywords: (vitamin k* or phytomenadione* or menaquinone* or menadione* or phytonadione* or phylloquinone*).mp.

If you really need to use PubMed:
Mesh: "Vitamin K"[Mesh] OR "Vitamin K Deficiency"[Mesh]

keywords: "vitamin k"[tiab] OR "vitamin k 1"[tiab] OR "vitamin k1"[tiab] OR "vitamin k 2"[tiab] OR"vitamin k2"[tiab] OR"vitamin k 3"[tiab] OR"vitamin k3"[tiab] OR phytomenadione*[tiab] OR menaquinone*[tiab] OR menadione*[tiab] OR phytonadione*[tiab]

Vitamin U:

This one would be better in Ovid as well, for adjacency:

keywords: (vitamin u or methymethionine).mp. or (methylsulfonium adj3 methionine).mp. or (methylsulphonium adj3 methionine).mp.
Mesh: exp Vitamin U/

But if not, PubMed can do this for you:

Mesh: "Vitamin U"[Mesh]
keywords: "vitamin u"[tiab] OR "methymethionine"[tiab] OR ("methylsulfonium[tiab] AND "methionine"[tiab]) OR ("methylsulphonium[tiab] AND "methionine"[tiab])

In the ambulatory / outpatient setting

exp Ambulatory Care/ or exp Ambulatory Care Facilities/ or exp Ambulatory Surgical Procedures/ OR exp Outpatients/

(office based or clinic based or ambulatory or outpatient* or out patient* or surgicent* or day clinic or day clinics).mp.

(surg* adj2 cent*).mp.

An additional strategy is to use the authors' address/affiliation/institution field to identify the setting. This is not as accurate and should be done with articles remaining after the above searches. After all, a researcher may work for a university but do their research at a hospital, for instance.

However, you can search: (hospital or medical centre or medical center).in. and then use NOT to remove those from the list. Go through the remaining articles and look at the addresses to see if any are in a recognisably ambulatory setting. Good luck!

Truncate all drug brand name searches

If you search a drug brand name, be sure to truncate the end. Sometimes the brand name will appear with the TM symbol at the end, and if you search without truncation, you will miss those.

e.g. suboxone*[tiab] will find slightly more results than suboxone[tiab]

Watch out for advil*, though - there is a thing called advillin.