KU Medical Library: Medical Google

and Google Scholar can be useful for finding medical information and biomedical research. While the KU Library's research databases are better tools overall for research articles, Google Scholar can be a useful addition–especially for finding full-text articles. Google can also be helpful for finding information relating to health statistics, guidelines, and consumer health information. Understanding how to fully utilize Google and Scholar will ensure you can find accurate health information.

It is also beneficial to understand the limitations of Google and Scholar, too. Because they are familiar and easy-to-use, many people rely too heavily or even exclusively on them, ignoring research tools like PubMed and Embase.

Strengths and Weakness of Google and Scholar

Strengths (+) of Google and Scholar include:

• Access to many full-text articles (Scholar especially)
• Easy to use
• Links to a lot of information

Drawbacks (-) include:

• Links to article abstracts often go to publisher websites that want you to pay for full-text articles
• Easy to use does not necessarily mean to easy to find good results
• Links to a lot of information, much of which is not useful and can also be incorrect or biased
• Search options are extremely limited
• Citation exporting is poor quality

This guide will help you learn to search Google and Scholar to find medical information more fluently. Remember, too, there are many library online resources and databases that offer benefits that Google and Scholar do not. You also have access to librarians who are happy to help you in person, online, or via email--something you will not get with Google!