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Wirral University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust

Resources to support activities or groups

Below we have compiled valuable resources to support activities or groups. 

Links to these resources can be found in the 'Related Links' section to the left of the page. For ease of location these have been alphabetised.

If you would like to see web pages for each group or type of activity, please use the links at the top of this page.

Resources to support Audit activities

Below we have compiled a selection of key resources for staff, students, managers and researchers engaged in Audit activities.

All links to these resources can be found in the 'Related Links' section on the left of this page.

If you would like to suggest additions to this selection, please contact us. 

Healthcare Databases

Dependent on the nature of the audit

Healthcare database

Area

Access

AMED

Select Healthcare Databases Advanced Search

Allied Health related topics

See links in the related links section. 

British Nursing Index and CINAHL

Select Healthcare Databases Advanced Search

Healthcare and drugs topics

See links in the related links section. 

HMIC

Select Healthcare Databases Advanced Search

Management, Service Development, Governance and compliance related topics

See links in the related links section. 

MEDLINE

Select Healthcare Databases Advanced Search

Medical, Clinical topics

See links in the related links section. 

PsycINFO

Select Healthcare Databases Advanced Search

Psychological and Leadership aspects

See links in the related links section. 

 

ProQuest Hospital Collection

Pubmed

 

Clinical Decision Making and Evidence Summary Tools

UpToDate:  (available to WUTH staff only) provides evidence based summaries of clinical topics covering more than 20 specialities, as well as nearly 1,500 patient information topics, and more than 27,000 graphics, tables and videos available to download into presentations.  Use UpToDate as a starting point to gain a comprehensive overview of your topic.

Please note that Up to Date is an American resource. This is particularly important when using information on licensed indications, doses and treatment pathways. For UK advice please refer to the Medicines Formulary, the BNF or contact Medicines Information. OpenAthens details are required to access the BNF.

Please contact library staff for details if you need any help in creating or using your OpenAthens account.

Use UpToDate as a starting point to gain a comprehensive overview of your topic. Those who are not familiar with the system can find the UpToDate user guide in the related links section of this page.

 

ProQuest Hospital Collection: Offers an extensive range of health and social care publications and evidence-based resources.

PsycARTICLES: Search full-text articles from leading psychology journals.

If you need any further help please contact the library

 

Systematic reviews

The Cochrane Library: Highest quality evidence including ‘gold standard’ systematic reviews

Turning Research into Practice (TRIP): Clinical search engine

 

Guidelines

NICE guidelines - Provide nationally recognised medical guidelines.

 

Statistical information

NHS Digital: Design, develop and operate the national IT and data services that support clinicians at work, help patients get the best care, and use data to improve health and care.

 

Evidence Alerts

Dependent on the nature of the audit

Please see the full list of specialist Horizon Scanning and Current Awareness Bulletins available

 

Training

Further details about Finding the Evidence and Introduction to Critical Appraisal training.

 

Services

Literature searching service

Document and book supply

Our Specialist Services

Journal Club support service

 

Useful Websites

NICE Evidence Search: Latest published research including guidelines, reports and care pathways

CASP critical appraisal checklists: Checklists to enable you to appraise research studies in a systematic and straightforward way.

National Audit Office: The National Audit Office (NAO) is the UK’s independent public spending watchdog.

NHS England: Leaders of the NHS service in England, their site provides access to a range of information useful to Audit. 

Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership (HQIP): HQIP aims to improve health outcomes by enabling those who commission, deliver and receive healthcare to measure and improve healthcare services.  

Commissioning for Quality and Innovation (CQUINS): This document sets out the Commissioning for Quality and Innovation (CQUIN) scheme for 2020–2021.

Patient UK: Provides patient focused information and access to patient statistics. 

Remember to check the websites of the professional bodies relevant to the subject of your audit

 

Examples of library impact

LKS has provided literature search support for audit(s) on the following topics:

  • Robotic hysterectomy versus total laparoscopic hysterectomy - benefits / risks
  • Metformin related B12 deficiency and proposal for guidelines to treat.
  • 1. In patients needing Specialist Palliative Care*(P), do Bisphosphonates (I) improve cancer related bone pain (O) compared with usual treatment* (C)? 2. In patients needing Specialist Palliative Care* (P), does Denosumab (I) improve cancer related bone pain (O) compared with usual treatment* (C)? Population: patients with advanced cancer, requiring support from specialist palliative care. Usual treatment: Non-pharmacological and pharmacological pain management e.g. opiates, NSAIDS
  • National standards for colorectal surgery outcomes - 30 & 90 day mortality, readmission and return to theatre
  • the use/effectiveness of MEWS score in critically ill patient
  • Capillary Refill Time as an assessment of circulatory status in the critically ill
  • Working with people with dementia and their carers
  • Health care professional’s attitudes towards cancer patients who smoke
  • Patient satisfaction of a nurse led telephone follow up service for prostate patients
  • Awareness of CASP tools for critical appraisal skills programme tools among foundation doctors
  • The role of MRI in assessing response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy in breast cancer. As compared with the actual pathological response (ie if MRI shows a good response of the tumour to chemotherapy, does this correlate with the actual response seen when the tumour is resected and analysed by the pathologists?)
  • current and new practices/developments regarding radiotherapy induced skin reactions
  • Does follow up of isolated displaced or minimally displaced radial head or neck fracture affect long term outcomes in skeletally mature patients presenting to the emergency department

Please contact us to find out more.

Resources to support quality activities

Below we have compiled a selection of key resources to support quality assurance activities.

All links to these resources can be found in the 'Related Links' section on the left of this page.

If you would like to suggest additions to this selection, please contact us. 

The CASP Checklists: Can be used to assess the quality and usability of a variety of evidence types. Please see the link to this resource in the related links section. 

Discern: A valid and reliable tool for assessing the quality of written information on treatment choices for a health problem. 

Understanding Health Research: A tool for making sense of health studies​

Resources to support research activities

Below we have compiled a selection of key resources to support research activities.

All links to these resources can be found in the 'Related Links' section on the left of this page.

If you would like to suggest additions to this selection, please contact us. 

 

Developing Searches

Critical appraisal: We can train you to recognise different study designs and to identify the strengths and weaknesses of research studies.

Locate books and journals: We can help you find books and journals in your subject area and provide a document supply service.

See what other people in the Trust are publishing: Journal articles published by WUTH staff are posted on the Library Blog.

To Sign up for evidence updates please visit our KnowledgeShare service page.

 

National Institute for Health Research Journals

Efficacy and Mechanism Evaluation: Evaluations of new treatments, including those intended to prevent disease, coveringtherapeutics (small molecule and biologic), psychological interventions, public health, diagnostics, and medical devices


Health Services and Delivery Research: Research includes quality, access and organisation of health services, costs and outcomes, and implementation


Health Technology Assessment: Evaluations of health technologies, including interventions to promote health, prevent and treat disease, and improve rehabilitation and long-term care


Programme Grants for Applied Research: With particular emphasis on conditions causing significant disease burden. Research includes the promotion of health, prevention of ill health, and optimal disease management (including safety and quality).


Public Health Research: The research is multi-disciplinary and broad, covering a range of interventions that improve public health.

 

Analyse your data: The McArdle Library loans digital transcription kits to help you record and transcribe interviews.

 

Publishing Research

Think. Check. Submit. -provides researchers with the tools they need to decide which publishing venue is the most appropriate for their work. Think.Check.Submit. encourages researchers to look out for the characteristics displayed by predatory publishers and use the checklist of questions to evaluate publishers when considering where to submit their research.

 

 

Useful websites

WUTH Research and Development team: local support and advice for researchers

Research and Development Info: general advice on research, training and funding.

Research Design Services: free advice on research design to researchers in the North West who are developing proposals for national, peer-reviewed funding competitions for applied health or social care research

NHS R&D Forum: a network for those involved in managing and supporting R&D in health and social care

National Institute for Health Research (NIHR): Department of Health organisation that provides details of funding information, research guidance, news, jobs and publications

National Research Ethics Service (NRES): facilitates and promotes ethical research and also protects the rights and safety of research participants 

RD Learning: information on post qualification training courses offered by Higher Education Institutions, Research Networks and Professional bodies, all with an emphasis on research

Medical Research Council: publicly funded organisation supporting research in medical sciences

Wellcome Trust: global charitable foundation supporting biomedical research and the medical humanities

Cancer Research UK, Cancer Stats: Cancer incidence, mortality and survival statistics for the UK and around the world

North West Cancer Intelligence Service: intelligence data, information and resources relating to cancer services in the region

CASP critical appraisal checklists: checklists to enable you to appraise research studies in a systematic and straightforward way.
Discern: A valid and reliable tool for assessing the quality of written information on treatment choices for a health problem. 

Understanding Health Research: A tool for making sense of health studies​

Did you know that there are people who can help you to design your research, write your protocols and help you to seek funding?

The National Institute for Health Research Design Service for the North West provides all these services at no charge.

Publishing research and being Open

BMJ- Guidance for newly qualified doctors: Writing for publication is a guide published by BMJ. It is useful for those new to publishing and especially junior doctors. 

An introduction to open access: An introduction to Open Access from JISC (the UK higher, further education and skills sectors’ not-for-profit organisation). This is a useful introduction to what Open Access actually means and the difference between gold and green Open Access.

Licensing types examples: A helpful guide to the different Creative Commons licenses and what they mean. 

Sherpa: Sherpa Romeo explains publisher policies for how you can share different versions of your research papers (normally divided into the submitted version i.e. before peer review, the accepted manuscript i.e. after peer review but before publisher typesetting, and the published version). This resource helps to inform where you publish your work by highlighting what permissions you retain.

Funders and their policies (some of these are on the page already, but the organisation rather than the funding specifically)

MRC

NIHR 

Wellcome Trust

 

Data and Impact

DCC (Data Curation Centre): Good Research Data Management is a key part of any research project in order to ensure longevity, making data reproducible and the ability to share your research data behind your publications. This helpful guide from the DCC (Data Curation Centre) helps you to consider the key aspects of managing your data successfully. 

Free digital badges: Free digital badges from Altmetric that show the reach and influence of your published research.

ORCID: ORCID is a free identifier for researchers (especially useful if your surname is quite popular).

Re3Data: Re3Data collates research repositories on different specialisms.

 

If you are thinking about writing for publication there are resources, hints and tips and details of useful articles to help you.

Resources to support writing for publication

Below we have compiled a selection of key resources to support writing for publication.

All links to these resources can be found in the 'Related Links' section on the left of this page.

If you would like to suggest additions to this selection, please contact us. 

 

Online Resources

BMJ, Guidance for Newly Qualified Doctors - Offering opportunities and guidance for new authors to write for publication. 

Elsevier, 11 Steps to Structuring a Science Paper Editors Will Take Seriously - This is a good breakdown of steps to help you achieve publication.

The Pharmaceutical Journal, How to write a Research Article to Submit for Publication - This article aims to provide pharmacists and healthcare professionals who are undertaking research with an understanding of how to produce a research article for publication, as well as points to consider before submission to a peer-reviewed journal.

Graduate Connections, Twenty Steps to Writing a Research Article - 20 steps that break down the process of moving from idea to published manuscript. 

Journal of Clinical and Diagnostic Research, How to Write Articles that Get Published - This article presents a review of the selected articles on writing and publishing in biomedical journals and aims to provide beginners the basics of effective scientific writing, and tips on successful publishing.

 

Physical Resources

A full set of physical resources that can help with writing for publication can be found on our library catalogue.