Guides: MEDLINE, PubMed & Medical Subject Headings (MeSH): Refining Search Results

Example: PubMed Filters

Refining Search Results: Video

The Filters Sidebar

Filters allow you to narrow your search for more relevant results.

Filter options appear to the left of your search results.
Click on a filter to apply it to your search. To deselect it, click on the filter name again.
To clear all of your selected Filters, click Clear all, found at the top and bottom of the sidebar

More Filter options

Only the most popular filters and filter categories display by default.

Click the Show additional filters link (located at the top and bottom of the column) to see more category options. Then check off the categories you want to display.
Click "more..." (found at the end of some category lists) to select additional filters. Then click the filter on the search result page to apply it.

Filters (From the NLM PubMed Tutorial)
Reviews PubMed's Filter categories and Filter options.

Warning about Filters

1. Many Filters eliminate the newest articles. Notice that when you applied Review or Randomized Controlled Trial filters, your search results included only citations which have been indexed for MEDLINE.

Some Filters are MeSH terms and their use limits retrieval to indexed MEDLINE records. These eliminate the newest citations: 'PubMed - as supplied by publisher' and 'Pubmed - in process'.

Instead of memorizing which filters eliminate new records, simply scan your results for "as supplied by publisher" and "in process" records before you apply filters. Notice if these newer articles are excluded from your results. If they are excluded, you may want to remove the filters later and check for unindexed citations that look important.

2. Be sure to clear filters when you no longer need them. Filters remain in effect until removed. Click Clear all at the top or bottom of the list of filters, or click an active filter link to deselect it.