Lesson 5-1: Refining a Search (Part 1)
Objectives
- Understand why the Dialog Bluesheets are important documentation
- Use the Dialog Bluesheets to find field tags
- Search using suffixes
Introduction
Chris —
Thanks for the info on what scientists are doing with coral. I've also heard that coral is not the only marine creature being used in medicine. Can you find anything for me on the marine sponge being used in the treatment of cancer?
Thx,
Brian
Dialog Bluesheets
We can certainly get Brian the information he wants, but let's take a look at Dialog's documentation first to see how we might further refine our search strategies.
The Dialog Bluesheets are an important piece of Dialog documentation. The Bluesheets
provide a road map or guide for every database on Dialog.
They also include detailed instructions on search techniques for the
special features of each database. 
We looked at a description of the MEDLINE database from the File 155 Dialog Bluesheet in Lesson 1. Now, we will look more closely at other parts of the Dialog Bluesheet for File 72, EMBASE.
Dialog identifies and labels each part of a record, such as the title and the author, with a two-character field label or field tag. We can use these field labels as part of our search to instruct Dialog not only what terms to look for, but exactly where in the document our search terms are to be found.
Every single word of the subject-related fields (title, descriptors, text of an article, etc.) is stored in what is called the Basic Index. The Basic Index fields are what Dialog searches by default when we do not give Dialog any specific instructions about which fields to search.
Go to the next page to see the Basic Index of the Dialog Bluesheet.
