Skip to Main Content

MHA 801 Professional Development Seminar 1 (Professor Armbrust): Acquire

This library tutorial will help you to successfully complete your critical appraisal assignment.

Some Housekeeping

Now that you have developed a PICO question, the next step in the EBP/EBHM process is to acquire the evidence. The resources on this page will walk you through the types of available evidence, as well as how to use the DMU Library's tools to locate the article needed for your critical appraisal assignment. Some key things:

  • You can access the library 24/7 from any device. 
  • When you're off campus and are trying to access a library resource (ebook, peer-reviewed journal article, etc.), you'll be prompted to enter your DMU credentials (same as what you use to log into D2L) to verify you're a member of the DMU community and therefore able to access library services. 
  • Access our resources through links found on the library website:

1. Levels of Evidence

Your assignment will ask you to identify where on the evidence pyramid the article you find falls. 

2. Primary Literature & Peer Review

*Please note that the DMU Library homepage has changed slightly and that databases can now be found under Collections A-Z:

Collections A-Z Link

You may have heard that much of the primary literature is peer reviewed. View the video below for more on what exactly that means.

How do articles get peer reviewed? What role does peer review play in scholarly research and publication?

NCSU Libraries. (2014, April. 1). Peer review in three minutes [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rOCQZ7QnoN0&t=1s

3. Acquiring the Evidence

This video offers a step-by-step demonstration of how to locate a peer-reviewed article from the primary literature using library tools when given a partial citation. 

Bonus: Additional Resources & Tips for Finding Articles

To locate the primary literature, you can try our Discovery service as described in the first part of video 3, as this allows you to search all of the library article citation databases at one time. Or you can search one of the databases listed below.  Please contact the library if you need assistance locating the appropriate database for your research needs. 

Important: When using the Ebsohost or ProQuest databases, remember to limit your searches to "peer reviewed".  PubMed journals are almost exclusively peer reviewed so you don't need to worry about your results in this database.

To Think About

There's a major emphasis on peer-reviewed literature in the health sciences. Can you think of some benefits and limitations of the peer review process? 

Traditionally, peer-reviewed articles have been kept behind a paywall. Why, from a healthcare administration perspective, might it be important to try to change that?

Which perspectives might be missing if we rely only on primary resources to explore a topic or seek solutions to a public health problem?