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I've divided this page into two sections. The first provides you with
some
tips on searching for material on Medline, and the second provides
links
to other Australian and overseas
web resources, including some full text material.
You will find
material
on mental disorders in old age on my mental
health/psychiatry page.
Searching Medline
Remember that Medline has a Thesaurus of terms - MeSH
(Medical
Subject Headings), a controlled vocabulary used for indexing articles
in
Medline. MeSH terminology provides a consistent way to retrieve
information
where authors may use different terminology for the same concepts.
You will find material on aged health issues in Medline,
but you
will need to be aware of the thesaurus (MeSH) terms used to search for
this group of people.
Sometimes you will find the age factor as part of the term - for example Health Services for the Aged,
while at
others you will need to add the age category to the name of a
health problem.
One of Medline's great advantages is its list of age groups
which you
can use when searching. You will find these listed in the Mesh Database.
MeSH Age Groups List
Many topics in MeSH have hierarchies of more specific subcategories or related terms. The indentations in the lists reflect the structure of the
hierarchy,
and the + signs at the end of terms indicate that there is a further
hierarchy
of terms not displayed here. Any of these terms can be searched
individually,
or you can "explode" terms to search sections of the list. If you focus
on Aged and
look at the finer subdivisions you will find
Aged, 80 and over
Frail Elderly
"Exploding" Aged will retrieve
articles
on aged generally, but will also search for the more specific
categories
of Aged, 80 and over, or Frail elderly.
Below is a simple example of a search for articles on
prevention of
falls in older people.
COMBINE
Accidental Falls (MeSH term)
Falls due to slipping or tripping which result in injury.
AND
Aged (MeSH term)
A person 65 through 79 years of age. For a person older than 79 years,
AGED, 80 AND OVER is available.
PubMed Search Formulation
accidental falls/pc[majr] AND aged[mh] NOT (adult[mh:noexp] OR middle
age[mh]
OR child[mh]) AND english[lang]
This search strategy uses the headings accidental falls
and aged.
The section in the square brackets includes
majr
- which focuses the search on articles where the subject
is
a major issue in the article. I've added a subheading to accidental
falls
- "pc" which stands for "prevention and control". Other
subheadings
I could have chosen are - economics, mortality, statistics and
numerical
data, or trends. Most MeSH terms have subheadings which can be applied
to them, and this is the range of options available for accidental
falls.
For a list of the abbreviations used for subheadings in PubMed
click
here
In this search I have chosen to exclude adults, middle age,
children
and adolescents.
NOT (adult[mh:noexp] OR middle age[mh] OR child[mh])
This is because I want to find articles which deal only with
the aged NOT
articles which deal with children or adults too. PubMed's default
setting
is to "explode" all terms, and so I've had to specify that I don't want
it to explode the term adult (as I would otherwise end up with a search
which contradicted itself by including the category Aged, and
then
excluding it). The search is then limited to articles which are in
English
or which have English abstracts.
Click here to see how it works. PubMed
search.
You can also limit searches by aged groups by performing a
search and
then applying age limit options from the "Limit" fields.
Australian Sources
Ageing and
Aged Care (AIHW)
The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare portal, which includes
links to the full text of a large number of publications dealing with
aged care.
 The
Ageing Australian Population and Future Health Costs: 1996 - 2051
Prepared by Clive Cooper and Philip Hagan, Information and Research
Branch, Portfolio Strategies Division in the Commonwealth Department of
Health and Aged Care. Department of Health and Aged Care, Occasional
Papers,
New Series No. 7, 1999.
Ageing
Gracefully: An Overview of the Economic Implications of Australia's
Ageing
Population Profile
Prepared for the Department by Peter Crowley and Greg Cutbush from
ACIL Consulting Pty Ltd. Department of Health and Aged Care, Occasional
Papers, New Series No.10, 1999.
Disability
and Ageing: Australian Population Patterns and Implications
Principal author Xingyan Wen, with Ros Maddern and Nicola Fortune.
Canberra, Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 2000. The study
is designed to provide information to assist disability
support service providers and senior policy makers faced with questions
about the likely impacts of population ageing on disability prevalence,
support services and availability of informal assistance.
eMJA:
Articles
on Geriatrics
A collection of articles on this subject from the Medical Journal of
Australia.
Health Report - Ageing
Transcripts from Radio National's Health Report, with Norman Swan.
National
Health and Medical Research Council. Publications. Aged Care
Most have full text available online.
Older
Australia at a Glance, 2007 (4th. Ed)
Jointly published by the Commonwealth Department of Health and Family
Services and the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.
Overseas Sources
Adding life to years : report of the Expert Group on Healthcare of Older People
This report was written in January 2002 by the Chief Medical Officer for The Scottish Executive Health Department (SEHD).
Administration on Aging
Center
for Communication and Consumer Services
The Center for Communication and Consumer Services is operated by the
U.S. Administration on Aging (AoA). Resources include program and
policy-related
materials for consumers and practitioners as well as demographic and
other
statistical data on the health, economic, and social conditions of
older
Americans.
Age
Data
From the U.S. Census Bureau. This site has the full text of reports
available.
AgeLine Research Database
AgeLine is a searchable electronic database produced by the American
Association of Retired Persons (AARP), containing detailed summaries of
publications about older adults and aging, including books, journal and
magazine articles, reports and videos.
An
Aging World: 2001
Kinsella, Kevin, and Velkoff, Victoria. An Aging World: 2001.
Washington
D.C., U.S. Government Printing Office, 2001 (U.S. Census Bureau, Series
P95/01-1)
AgingStats.Gov - Web Site
of the Federal Interagency Forum on Aging-Related Statistics
Includes the full text of Older
Americans: Key Indicators of Well-Being, an interagency report covering
health
status, risks, and care of older people in the United States.
eBMJ
Collected Resources : Geriatric Medicine
The full text of articles from the BMJ (British Medical Journal)
Hardin
MD : Geriatrics
& Senior Health
Links to web directories on geriatric and aged health issues.
Health
and Population Aging: A Multinational Comparison
Health and Population Aging: A Multinational Comparison, by Gerard
F. Anderson and Peter S. Hussey, October 1999. Published by the
Commonwealth
Fund. (This document can be downloaded as a PowerPoint presentation)
HealthandAge.com
From the Novartis Foundation for Gerontology, a site with information
for the public and for health care professionals, physicians and
researchers.
Healthy Aging - State of Aging and Health in America Report
This report assesses the health status and health behaviors of U.S. adults aged 65 years and older and makes recommendations to improve the mental and physical health of all Americans in their later years.
Journals
on Aging
This excellent site from Rutgers University provides details to assist
researchers and academics from various disciplines choose appropriate
journals
for submission of articles for publication.
MEDLINEPlus:
Elder Abuse
MEDLINEPlus:
Nutrition for Seniors
MEDLINEPlus:
Seniors' Health Issues
MEDLINEplus:
Seniors' Health Topics
MEDLINEplus is the National Library of Medicine's consumer health
information
portal. Lists of links are evaluated/reviewed/quality-filtered.
Merck
Manual of Geriatrics
(Internet Edition)
Editor in Chief: Mark H. Beers
Merck Manual of Health and Aging
Editor in Chief: Mark H. Beers
The National Academies Press: Topic Health and Medicine : Aging
The full text of a number of books on various aspects of ageing and health is available here.
National Center
for Health
Statistics (NCHS) - Aging Activities
Aging Activities performs research and analysis and disseminates data
on the health and health care utilisation of aging Americans.
National
Service
Framework for Older People
From the Department of Health in the U.K.
NIHSeniorHealth Health
Information for Older Adults
This website
for older adults was developed by the National Institute on Aging and the National Library of Medicine, both part of the National Institutes of Health.
Older
people (Bandolier Library)
Bandolier is a print and Internet journal about health care, using
evidence-based medicine techniques to provide advice about particular
treatments
or diseases for healthcare professionals and consumers.
Profiles
of Older Americans
Compiled annually since 1982 by the Administration on Aging (AoA) of
the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Full text is
available
from 1997.
Racial and
Ethnic Differences
in the Health of Older Americans
Racial and ethnic differences in the health of older Americans / Linda
G. Martin and Beth J. Soldo, editors ; Committee on Population,
Commission
on Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education, National Research
Council.
Washington, D.C. : National Academy Press, 1997.
Royal
Commission
on Long Term Care for the Elderly
Published by the Department of Health (U.K.) this Commission examines
the funding of long term care for the elderly.
Senior
Falls, A Tool Kit to Prevent
From the national Center for Injury Prevention and Control in the
United States.
Teaching/Training Models on Trends in Health and Aging
Developed and maintained by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) and the American Society on Aging (ASA), these modules deal with trends in health care utilization, health-related behaviors, and health care expenditures of the United States population.
Why
is Health Treatment for the Elderly Less Expensive than for the Rest of
the Population? Health Care Rationing in Germany
From the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, a working paper
by Hilke Brockmann, January 2000.
With
Respect to Old Age: Long Term Care - Rights and Responsibilities
(A Report by The Royal Commission on Long Term Care Chairman:
Professor
Sir Stewart Sutherland. The Stationery Office, March 1999). Final
Report
of the Commission.
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