Tip: Use the Clipboard
It can be helpful to use the Clipboard feature when using Similar Articles to help you keep track of items that you have already seen. It acts as a temporary 'scratch pad'. To use the Clipboard, click Send to at the top of the page and select Clipboard.
Clipboard items are deleted after 8 hours of inactivity. To save results long term you can use PubMed Collections.
Expanding your search
If you are finding too few relevant references then you may need to look at expanding your search.
You can use the following features to help you identify further articles which may be of interest:
You can also experiment with broadening your search terms and adding synonymous terms into your search strategy.
Of course, it may just be that there is very little written on your topic! Ask a librarian for advice if you require further help with your search.
Similar Articles
When looking at the abstract page of a record, you may see that PubMed suggests Similar Articles to the article that you are looking at.
PubMed uses a word-weighted algorithm to compare MeSH headings and words from the Title and Abstract of each citation in PubMed. The best matches found by this algorithm for each citation are then stored and recommended as Similar Articles.
Some citations will not yet have Similar Articles links because they have not yet gone through the algorithm process. For more information see PubMed's detailed guide to how Similar Articles are computed.
Cited reference searching
Cited reference searchingPubMed offers cited reference searching which can be a useful way of expanding the list of references you have found, by finding more recent articles that have cited the article you are looking at. You can view Cited By links by looking at the bottom of a reference when your results are displayed in abstract view. The full record of an individual article also contains a list of Cited by articles.
Important: Cited by information is generated using data submitted by publishers and from NCBI resources such as PubMed Central. If you need to undertake a more comprehensive citation search or citation analysis then we recommend using a specialised citation database such as the following:
- Scopus This link opens in a new windowThe world’s largest abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature. Contains over 46 million records, 70% with abstracts, and also includes over 4.6 million conference papers. NOTE: Click "Institutions" icon in right corner. Change organization to Washington University in St Louis John M Olin Library, Danforth Campus.
- Web of Science (1900 - ) This link opens in a new windowScience, social science, arts, and humanities citations for scholarly literature. Access the world’s leading scholarly literature in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities and examine proceedings of international conferences, symposia, seminars, colloquia, workshops, and conventions. The Libraries subscribe to Science Citation Index Expanded (1900-present), Social Sciences Citation Index (1970-present), and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975-present).