WCSU Libraries

INFORMATION AND HEALTH LITERACY

If you are completely new to the library and research, we strongly recommend that you complete WCSU Libraries' TIP Tutorial, an online tutorial for information literacy and library-related skills. An online tutorial focused on evaluating internet health resources is available through the National Library of Medicine.   Health literacy requires knowing how and where to find authoritative current health information.  Health literacy is defined in Health People 2010 as: "The degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health decisions".  October has been designated as Health Literacy Month.

USE WCSU DATABASES TO ACCESS CURRENT, AUTHORITATIVE HEALTH INFORMATION

Information on community health education can be found in many different kinds of sources. Online information, retrieved from authoritative databases and publications, is most valuable because of its currency. It is critical to access the most recent information, as knowledge, policies, and legislation in the field of health change are constantly changing.

Below are some of the databases that you will find most useful for your research. They are grouped by subject orientation.

DON'T FORGET TO USE DATE LIMITS WHEN YOU SEARCH!

Medical and Allied Health Journal Articles, Professional/Consumer Information and Statistics 

• PubMed
  • Open access medical database which provides bibliographic information in MEDLINE, OLDMEDLINE, as well as allied health journal literature. Includes documents dating back to the 1950s as well as very current information; some full text through WCSU Libraries available. Managed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM). Premier medical database.
  • On the full article display, click on the "@WCSU" demarcation to find out if we provide the item in full text.

• Health and Wellness Resource Center
  • Online, searchable access to consumer health information.
  • Access to scholarly literature in medicine and allied health fields.
  • Reference sources in allied health (encyclopedias, dictionaries, etc.)

• Health Reference Center Academic (Ebscohost)
  • FULL TEXT access to periodicals, reference books, pamphlets and news.
  • Useful source for definitions, clinical data, drug information, consumer health information.

• Clinical Pharmacology (Ebscohost)
  • Contains current drug monographs for all U.S. prescription drugs, hard-to-find herbal and nutritional supplements, over-the-counter products and new and investigational drugs.
  • Drugs may be searched by their generic or brand names.
  • Patient education materials are also available.

• PsycArticles (Ebscohost)
  • FULL TEXT access to articles and literature related to mental health issues.

Health Education in the News/Health Policies and Legislation

• Danbury News-Times

• LEXISNEXIS
  • Premier source for regional and nationwide news coverage of public/community health issues. 

• CQ Researcher
  • Offers coverage of important health issues; as well as in-depth background and analysis.

General/Multidisciplinary Databases

• Academic Search Premier (Ebscohost)
  • Contains FULL TEXT of articles in allied health and health education.
  • Covers literature in many fields; ideal for interdisciplinary topics or approaches.

• Expanded Academic ASAP
  • Contains FULL TEXT of articles in health disciplines.
  • Relevance search option allows you to simply enter keywords, phrases or questions ("natural language" searching)

Health Education

• ERIC (through Ebscohost)
  • Premier source of articles and publications on health education.
  • Provides direct link to full text if available.
  • Search along with other Ebsco databases, such as Academic Search Premier, using the Ebsco Combined Databases feature, to retrieve more fulltext articles

USE INTERNET RESOURCES FOR GOVERNMENT AND NON-PROFIT/ADVOCACY ORGANIZATION INFORMATION

Please see your syllabus for a more extensive list of web resources

Community Health & Health Education

• Danbury Public Library (search online catalog for topics of interest)
• Danbury Community Network
• City of Danbury
• Department of Public Health, State of Connecticut
• U.S. Census Bureau
• National Center for Health Statistics
• World Bank
• National Cancer Institute
• National Health Information Center
• National Commission for Health Education Credentialing
• Healthy People 2010 Objectives

Drug Studies

• NIDA: National Institute on Drug Abuse
• NIDA for Teens
• SAMHSA: Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration
• National Clearinghouse for Alcohol and Drug Information
• DAWN: Drug Abuse Warning Network
• Healthy Youth!/Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System
• Connecticut Clearinghouse
• Core Institute

Locate authoritative information on the Web by using the following directories and search engines.

• WCSU Libraries Guide to HPX Web Resources

• Infomine: Scholarly Internet Research Collections

• Google Scholar

• Librarians Index to the Internet

• FedWorld: Search Engine for Government Information

ACCESSING BOOKS & MULTIMEDIA

For broad and comprehensive overviews of health and health education topics; ALWAYS limit searches by date to access recent publications.

• CONSULS (CSU Libraries' combined catalog)

Books at CCSU, ECSU, SCSU can be delivered to WCSU using the CONSULS "Request Book" feature (accessible from book record display screen, using your library PIN code). Note that there are direct links from government document holdings information to corresponding websites.

• Other Library Catalogs

Books from any other library can be delivered to WCSU using Interlibrary Loan.

DOCUMENTATION

Guides to citation formats and paper presentation. Not substitutes for the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (APA), which can be found in Haas at the Reserve desk (call number BF76.7 .P83 2001).

• APA Writing Links (http://www.psych-central.com)

• Electronic Reference Formats (from the APA - http://www.apastyle.org/elecref.html)

REMOTE ACCESS

You can access any of the above resources from home, by pointing your browser to http://library.wcsu.edu/. However, to access the journal databases, you will need to be an authenticated WCSU user with:

• Internet Service Provider
• Browser (MS Internet Explorer, Netscape, Mozilla Firefox)
• Library PIN

Jenny Innes
Public Services Librarian
innesg@wcsu.edu
203-837-9141
10/07