LibGuides: Search Help: Common Search Problems: I'm finding too much

Intro

You've run your search and no matter what you do, your searches are retrieving hundreds of thousands of results, and you're overwhelmed. Here are some quick tips:

Add another concept to your search, or use a more specific concept
Use your database's filter menu to apply a date, subject, publication type, or other filter
Use the NOT operator (caution! use sparingly)
Check your search strategy for errors
Refine your research question

Add Another Concept

Add another concept into your search to narrow it down, or use a more narrow/specific concept.

For example, say you were searching on alternative and augmentative communication devices for use by students with autism, and you were particularly interested in whether speech generating devices could benefit this population.

A search in CINAHL for (autism OR autistic) AND alternative or augmentative communication returns 2,800 results, many of which are too general to be useful.

However, changing the search to be more specific, like (autism OR autistic) AND speech AND (output or generat*), returns only 91 results, and many are far more relevant.

As another example, say you were interested in whether community pharmacists could provide education to rural diabetes patients to improve the long-term self-management of their condition.

A search in PubMed on (pharmacy or pharmacies or pharmacist or pharmacists) AND (diabetes or diabetic) AND management returns about 13,700 results.

However, changing the search to (pharmacy or pharmacies or pharmacist or pharmacists) AND (diabetes or diabetic) AND management AND rural returns only 125 results.

Apply a Filter

Use the "filter" menu on your database's results page to narrow down the results.

For example, if you are searching in PubMed, do you want to apply the systematic review and meta-analysis Article types filter to narrow your results to only the best available evidence?
If you are in CINAHL, do you want to review the Subject filter to limit records to only those tagged with a certain subject indexing term?
In either PubMed or CINAHL, do you want to try applying the Age filter to get only records related to a certain age group?

In Pubmed, use the article types filter on the left side of the page to narrow to systematic reviews and meta-analyses.

Use the NOT Operator

Are your results full of the same irrelevant topics popping up over and over again? Use the NOT operator to subtract records that are from a totally irrelevant area.

For example, a search on the word "nursing" will bring back records on "nursing mothers," e.g. records related to breastfeeding. Add NOT mothers to the end of your search to remove them.

BEWARE! Using the NOT operator can remove good results from your search too, so use it sparingly.

Check Your Search Strategy

Check your search strategy for errors! If you're doing a Boolean search, did you use OR when you meant to use AND? Accidentally using OR instead of AND will cause your search to be broad, when you meant it to be narrow. For more information, see the tutorial on AND and OR in this guide.

Refine Your Research Question

It could be that your subject is common and well-researched in the field. In this case, do you want to refine your research question? Talk to your professor about good ways to do this.