You then substitute root surface caries for caries and narrow the field to 24 articles. Applying the publication type limit, you find that 2 are randomized controlled trials and one 7 appears to be most related to your original question, so you decide to obtain a hard copy of the paper. Reviewing an abstract is insufficient to assess the validity of a clinical study. Simple critical appraisal techniques will help you to decide if the results of the study are believable and if they can be applied to your patient. These decisions cannot usually be made on the basis of the abstract.
Dentists practising in hospitals or academic centres have ready access to the biomedical literature.
For others, a number of resources are available for accessing documents. In some cases, registration, subscription or other types of fees may be required by the publisher. The NLM sites offer the Loansome Doc service, whereby full-text articles can be ordered electronically through the National Network of Libraries of Medicine. Registration is required and variable local fees are applied. The CDA Resource Centre subscribes to more than 250 dental journals.