CBE 4404a / ES 9544: Pharmacuetical Manufacturing Process

This page contains information and links to resources relevant to the CBE 4404A / ES 9544 library instruction session:

1. Effective search strategies
2. Some useful books  
3. Drug information resources
4. Finding patents 
5. Interlibrary loans 
6. Managing citations

Effective search Strategies

Basic Searching Skills tutorial

Advanced Searching Skills tutorial material

Search Strategies:

• Select keywords from your research topic
• Find synonyms or related terms for each of the keywords you identified above
  An online dictionary (like Merriam-Webster Dictionary or The Free Dictionary ) can help; the database of EI Compendex has its own thesaurus. 
  Also consider:
          variant spellings (eg.  British versus American);
          singular and plural forms; 
          truncation of terms (e.g. structur* will find structure, structural, structuring, etc.);
          quotation marks for exact phrases (e.g. “green building”)
• Use Boolean operators to connect your keywords (AND, OR, NOT)
  AND - narrow a search by combining terms; retrieve documents that include both the search terms; combine different concepts   
  OR - broaden a search to include documents that contain either of the terms; combine synonyms and related terms of a concept
  NOT - narrow a search by excluding certain search terms
  e.g. A search topic includes concept A, B, and C. For each concept, you find 3 keywords (synonyms or related terms).
  Concept A:  A1, A2, A3
  Concept B: B1, B2, B3
  Concept C: C1, C2, C3
  So your search plan will be:
  (A1 OR A2 OR A3) AND (B1 OR B2 OR B3) AND (C1 OR C2 OR C3)
• Select search tools (library catalogue, databases, etc.)
• Conduct your search
• Review your search results and revise your search
  too many answers - narrow your search by using more specific search terms or combining more relevant concepts
  not enough answers - broaden your search by using more general terms or removing one or more concepts

Search Strategy Worksheet (click for the document)

Some useful books at Taylor Library: 

Library catalogue

• Handbook of pharmaceutical excipients 
• Textbook of drug design and discovery 
• Drug actions and interactions
• Wilson and Gisvold's textbook of organic medicinal and pharmaceutical chemistry
• Medicinal chemistry [electronic resource] 
• The practice of medicinal chemistry [electronic resource]
• Development of vaccines [electronic resource] : from discovery to clinical testing
• Guide to drug development: a comprehensive review and assessment [electronic resource]
• Strategies for organic drug synthesis and design [electronic resource]
• Drug discovery and evaluation : safety and pharmacokinetic assays
• New drug approval process [electronic resource]  

Drug Information resources:

• DynaMed: evidence-based, clinical reference tool
• UpToDate: clinical reference tool
• NLM Drug Information Portal:  covers drugs from clinical trials through FDA approval
• ChemIDPlus: chemical substance records
• US Food and Drug Administration (FDA): drug safety and regulatory information
• Health Canada Drugs & Health Products: access to advisories, warning and recalls
• AccessMedicine: from McGraw-Hill is a repository of medical knowledge relating to internal medicine, cardiology, genetics, pharmacy, diagnosis and management, basic sciences, patient care, and more.
• SciFinder Web: access to scholarly articles, conference papers, patents and chemical properties 

Finding Patents:

• Sources for Patents

     Books for you to understand patents:

• Filing Patents Online: A Professional Guide
• Patent Fundamentals for Scientists and Engineers 

Interlibrary Loans:

• RACER

Managing Citations:

• RefWorks
  - For managing citations & formatting bibliographies
  - Online help and online tutorial includes all the basics
  - See the instructions for importing references into RefWorks from several databases
• Write-N-Cite
  - A software for users to cite references in writting papers from RefWorks
  - See the online tutorial (#11 Inserting Citations and Creating Bibliographies with Write-N-Cite) to learn how Write-N-Cite works

Need Library Research Help?

 Please contact Shiyi Xie or Taylor Library Researh Help Desk for further help.