PubMed on Tap
Access PubMed on Handheld, Wireless Devices!
Do your clinicians use wireless PDAs? Do they want quick access to MEDLINE at the bedside or conference room? If so, they may be good candidates to help NLM evaluate PubMed on Tap, a new Web application which targets mobile health care professionals by facilitating access to NLM databases and medical information at the point of care.
PubMed on Tap provides a way to search PubMed/MEDLINE, read abstracts from a set of 120 core clinical journals, and access the ClinicalTrials.gov database. To use PubMed on Tap, you need a PDA with Palm 4.0 OS or higher and a wireless Internet connection. You can download the application at http://archive.nlm.nih.gov/proj/pmot/pmot.php. This site also provides a Flash demo, the user manual in both Word and PDF formats, and a public forum for discussing your reactions to PubMed on Tap. Through the public forum, you can also interact with the developer.
PubMed on Tap is designed to facilitate focused retrieval of MEDLINE citations. After selecting the "Search MEDLINE/PubMed" link from the home page, you will see a screen that allows either unrestricted PubMed searching, or limiting searches with the Systematic Reviews or Clinical Queries filters. The "Related Articles" link is also included as a search option. In addition, the latest version of PubMed on Tap, released on October 23, 2003 features several new enhancements, including the Publication Types and several other searching limits, the ability to cluster search results by journal subject, and the ability to email individual citations.
The "Read new Journals Abstracts" link on PubMed on Tap's home page leads to a screen that allows viewing of abstracts from journals comprising PubMed's core clinical journals. Twenty-eight of the journal titles are included in a pull-down menu. To see abstracts from a title which is not included in the pull-down list, enter any part of the journal name or NLM title abbreviation into the search box on the lower portion of the screen, and then click on the "Search journal title" button. The most current abstracts will appear at the top of the display list.
The "Feedback" link from PubMed on Tap's home page leads to a checklist and series of questions about PubMed usage on PDAs. A text box is included for additional comments. NLM is very interested in feedback from potential evaluators. Chief residents or similar populations may provide fertile ground for recruiting volunteers to test and evaluate PubMed on Tap. Input from testers will strongly influence the selection of the next features, such as additional NLM databases, to be implemented in future releases.
All of us at PSRML are very interested in your reactions to PubMed on Tap, so please let us know what you think about it. Alan Carr