“Search using keywords”. This is what most guides / teachers tell students when they want them to do a literature search. Keywords are usually the important words from one’s research question, that one uses to perform a search. For a research topic like: - “Long-term risk of pneumothorax in asthmatic patients”, the keywords used to search for literature would be - pneumothorax and asthma. In databases like PubMed, one could search these as thesaurus terms (Mesh terms) to get the most relevant results. The search strategy would be : Asthma[mesh] AND pneumothorax[mesh] But, when one is doing an exhaustive search…

Recently I had a chat with a faculty from a reputed medical college. At some point he said "We do not have a qualified librarian for our library". I almost said "What"? But as I am training myself to respond and not react, I just said "Oh, okay". After our call, I thought about this. And I remembered reading an advertisement of another reputed medical college - which advertised for several posts including that of a librarian. And it mentioned that a library science qualification was not mandatory. I remember being shocked then. To me it was like asking for…

When I was a child many doctors had compounders who would make "mixtures" in a bottle, based on a note the doctors gave them. We would get the mixture and maybe powders and tablets with the prescription. I just checked online to see if there are doctors who have compounders now. Apparently some do! So can a compounder give medical advice or treat a patient?  To most people the answer is obvious - and the question is rhetorical. A firm no. And not just about doctors, but it is reasonably obvious that one needs a civil engineer to build bridges…