A systematic review requires the researcher to construct comprehensive search strategies and search all the medical, nursing, and healthcare databases, printed indexes and even manually scan journals and reports that have not been indexed, to find all the available literature on the topic. Effective Health Care Bulletin and Effectiveness Matters are both produced by the NHS Centre for Reviews and Dissemination at the University of York. Effectiveness Matters is a four-page bulletin aimed at general practitioners, whereas Effective Health Care Bulletin is much more detailed, listing all the references used in the review and their results. There is a vast range of indexes and databases available which will give you references to primary journal articles. Indexes are usually printed and provide author and subject indexes.
Databases are often computerised versions of printed indexes.
The computer format makes it possible to search in other fields besides the author and subject e.g. journal title, words or phrases in the title or abstract. It is very useful for finding information on social issues that affect health e.g. unemployment. It is compiled in Britain so the indexing terminology and spelling is British, but the journals indexed are international English language journals. It makes it quicker to find specific information, than searching manually through the journals. It is unique in its coverage of British nursing and midwifery journals.