A blog about information technologies in the biomedical sector

We have known for some time that vitamin D insufficiency is a risk factor for developing Multiple Sclerosis and we would like to know whether vitamin D levels influence the disease course of those who already have Multiple Slcerosis and what are the scientific articles dealing with the subject. This use case nis inspired by an article seen on ScienceDaily.

1. We first search for Low Vitamin D in novoseek. There are 8,916results in Pubmed and 3,714results in Free Full Text up to date.

2. We are interested in low Vitamin D Levels so we click on “Vitamin d” from the “Pharmacologicl Substances” category in sidebar to add it to the current search and make it more specific. We now have 4,584 results in Pubmed up to date.

3. Now, we need to look up for Multiple Sclerosis disease-related articles. In order to do so, we will check if it appears in the diseases category in the left sidebar. We need to click on the “more” link to see all the diseases related to the current search. Multiple Sclerosis diseases does not show up so we have to think of another search strategy.
4. The other way of searching for “multiple sclerosis”. It consists of typing in the search box: low vitamin d and “multiple sclerosis”. Typing the term “multiple sclerosis” between brackets will tell the system to look only for these two terms when they are mentioned together. We press search and we now have 61 results in Pubmed.

Note: in order to make the search even more specific and relevant, we can click on the “multiple sclerosis” filter that now appears at the top of the related concepts list in the Diseases category.
5. Last search term to be added to the current search consists of adding “children”. This will help us consult solely articles related to humans. You can either add and children in the search box or look in the sidebar where the category Organisms appears and add Homo Sapiens (showing up in 4th position) to the search. We now have 34 results in pubmed. 
   

Those articles found in a few steps in Pubmed are satisfactory and help start working on knowing if Low Vitamin D Levels Associated With Greater Risk of Relapse in Childhood Multiple Sclerosis.

At novoseek, we are determined to making your daily searches for biomedical literature a better, easier and quickier experience. (and this is why we use to write tips, use cases and improve novoseek)

For that reason, we have created a handy my novoseek guide for the members to enjoy the features of my novoseek at its best. If you haven’t signed up yet for a free account on novoseek, feel free to sign up now.

Feel free to download it and see what it has to offer you.

This is the first version so please tell us what other information you would like to read in it.

There is one handy tool in novoseek that helps you create email alerts to keep updated and be notified of new papers in which may appear the query previously entered. Indeed, my novoseek users can easily create email alerts any of the searches they perform on novoseek biomedical search engine. These email alerts can be created after a search has been performed and they can be easily edited from your personal account on novoseek. There are a lot of possible uses: simple search for a biomedical concept (eg: a disease such as “asthma“), complex searches that require the use of filters and may require more time to achieve (eg: “Methacholine & Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in Clinical Trial articles in Pubmed“), for a journal you are reading regularly (eg: “Journal of the American Geriatrics Society“) or for an author relevant in your field (eg: “Collins, Francis S.“).

1. First, save the search you have performed.

In order to create email alerts, you must first perform a search. When the search results are satisfying and you want to create an email alert accordingly, simply click the “save search and create alerts” button at top of results page. A box pops up and offers you to custom the name for this saved search and to save it.


If you haven’t signed up for a free account on my novoseek or aren’t yet connected, feel free to do so in a few clicks.
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2. After saving the search, novoseek offers you to create an email alert for this very search. Click the “create alert” button.

3. Adjust the sending parameters

You are taken to your personnal account on novoseek in the “alert details” category where you can fine tune the alert details.



The parameters allow you to receive email alerts as follows:

• Once a month, and specify on which day
• Once a week, and specify on which day
• Every Day
• The format: HTML or text
• The report format: Title, Short Fragment Text, Sentences or Abstract, depending on the amount of information you want to read in your inbox
• The number of items you want to read in every email alert
• Specify if you want to receive an email even if there is no new articles for your search query
• The corpus you want the articles to be searched in: Pubmed, Free Full Text or U.S. Grants





4. Create email alerts and managing them allow you to consult your existing alerts anytime and adjust their parameters from your personal account on novoseek.

Simply go to the My saved search and alerts panel on your account. From there, you can modify the names of your saved searches as well as adjusting parameters by clicking on the clock image .

Want more Tips to improve your searches in novoseek? Need more help? Just feel free to leave a comment below!

For more than one year, we have watched and learned from your search habits in order to deliver the best experience while searching for scientific articles. We have shared use cases, tips, resources, news, events, surprises and more on our blog. You can be sure that we will keep doing so! We’ve also been drawing your attention to our Facebook Like Page where we share valuable information, and news with our user community.

Today we’d like to thank these “fans” with a special update that might change their search experience for scientific articles forever. Drum rolls please…

In order to discover this surprise, you just have to “like” the novoseek’s Facebook Page once you are in the Surprise Tab and reload the page. For those who are already fan, enjoy the surprise!

What do you think of that?

The Earth Day turns 40 this year. These idea and movement started over a diner, and they have now become a global action day which concern everybody. The Earth Day is a great opportunity to get involved in making the world better. This is as simple as planting a tree, riding a bus instead of your car, taking your kids to Disney’s last movie Oceans, install solar panel on your roof get a convection oven or tracking your energy usage online… I am sure that you will find what to do today on this special day. Beyond one’s involvement for Earth Day, there is all the scientific efforts that are made to improve life on Earth and face the new challenges on Earth. We thought it would be a good idea to share with you 10 Open Access (Free Full Text) articles interesting to read on the Earth Day 2010.

1. Air Pollution: Salt Mist Is the Right Seasoning for Ozone. by Portera Carol in Environmental Health Perspectives
   PMCID: 2453175
2. Room to Grow: Incentives Boost Energy-Efficient Homebuilding. by Schmidt, Charles W. on Environmental Health Perspectives
   PMCID: 2199292
3. Terra Cognita: Using Earth Observing Systems to Understand Our World. by Schmidt, Charles W. on Environmental Health Perspectives
   PMCID: 1277880
4. Cars, corporations, and commodities: Consequences for the social determinants of health by Woodcock, James and Alfred, Rachel in Emerging Themes in Epidemiology
   PMCID: 2289830, DOI: 10.1186/1742-7622-5-4
5. Perchlorate: Health Effects and Technologies for Its Removal from Water Resources. by Srinivasan, Asha and Viraraghavan, Thiruvenkatachari in International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
   PMCID: 2681191, DOI:10.3390/ijerph6041418
6. Indirect Potable Reuse: A Sustainable Water Supply Alternative. by Rodriguez, Clemencia; Van Buynder, Paul; Lugg, Richard; Blair, Palenque; Devine, Brian; Cook, Angus, and Weinstein, Philip; in International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
   PMCID: 2672392, DOI: 10.3390/ijerph6031174
7. Population policies, programmes and the environment. by Speidel, J. Joseph; Weiss, Deborah C.; Ethelston, Sally A., and Gilbert, Sarah M. in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
   PMCID: 2781834, DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2009.0162
8. The ecosystem-service chain and the biological spanersity crisis. by Mooney, Harold A. in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
   PMCID: 2842713, DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2009.0223e
9. Environmental Remediation and Conversion of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) into Useful Green Products by Accelerated Carbonation Technology. by Lim, Mihee; Han, Gi-Chun; Ahn, Ji-Whan, and You, Kwang-Suk in International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
   PMCID: 2819785, DOI: 10.3390/ijerph7010203
10. Is It Easy to Be Urban? Convergent Success in Urban Habitats among Lineages of a Widespread Native Ant. by Menke, Sean B.; Booth, Warren; Dunn, Robert R.; Schal, Coby; Vargo, Edward L., and Silverman, Jules 1 in PLoS ONE
    PMCID: 2820551, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0009194
11. Development of a biomechanical energy harvester. by Li, Qingguo; Naing, Veronica; Donelan, J Maxwell; in Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation
    PMCID: 2709631, DOI: 10.1186/1743-0003-6-22

These articles were found features of novoseek such as combinations of keywords, filters or advanced search. I also took good care to tag the articles in a “EarthDay” tag in my my novoseek account so I can retrieve them anytime as it is shown below.

Now tell us: What are your picks for 2010 Earth Day among novoseek’s Free Full Text articles? Share them with us!