Finding Articles
The way to find journal articles in the MSMC Library is to search one or more of our subscription databases.
The Interdisciplinary Databases page is the best place to start your search for articles.
ProQuest is an excellent multi-subject database to begin an article search. It is a collection of scholarly, popular, and newspaper articles, many in full text. It includes full coverage of the Los Angeles Times, a large collection of full text nursing journals, and an international business database called ABI/Inform.
Begin by typing key words that are relevant to your subject into the search blank.
Search tips: Separate each keyword or phrase with “and” for a more precise result. Click the box that limits the search to full text.
How to Find Full Text
If you have found a citation or abstract with no full text attached, try the following strategies.
- Some citations have links to full text articles on other MSMC databases. Remember that the most recent issues of many journals are withheld from databases for a year or more, especially in the scientific and biomedical journals.
- If there is no link to full text you can search the library catalog to see if we have a subscription to the print edition. Remember to search by journal title, not the title of the article.
- Ask a librarian!
Document Delivery Services for Journal Articles
When you cannot retrieve the full-text of an article from a database and MSMC Libraries do not carry a print edition of the journal, you may request the article from one of our document delivery services.
Please print out the article’s citation and abstract, fill in the ILL form, and give them to any MSMC librarian. You may print out an ILL form on the Library web pages.
The MSMC librarians have a number of ways to retrieve the full text of articles, including a traditional document delivery service that mails articles to the library. Please plan for this and request documents early in the research process.
