Friday, October 28, 2005

1684 Why you just may need a librarian to help you with that search

Spelling. Yup. Even researchers and doctors can't agree on how to spell the little buggers. I used to be a whiz at bovine viral diarrhea virus because I knew all the British and American spelling and name variations. I've forgotten all that now since I retired 5 years ago, but I know it could make a difference of finding 75 articles or 175. So pay attention.

"Historic change in the spelling of these names is the primary reason they are published and cited in PubMed with different spellings. However, even disregarding historic taxonomic variants, ≈14.8% of Tropheryma whipplei, 14.3% of Acinetobacter baumannii, 12.3% of Coxiella burnetii, and 1.9% of Coccidioides citations are spelled incorrectly in PubMed. These relatively large percentages may mean that relevant literature is overlooked in searches."
Spelling of emerging pathogens, Emerging infectious diseases, Volume 11, Number 11—November 2005. This is the journal (free, on-line) to check about avian flu, if you are so inclined to need new things to worry about in the middle of the night.

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