Great Diseases: Metabolic Diseases

Your school or local public library is always a great place to start when looking for resources to search for science and health information. Ask your local librarian for help!

All of the following links are to public, free, full-text resources. You do not need to belong to, or have access to a library to search these resources or download the articles. You are also welcome to search Google Scholar, but be aware that you may not be able to access the full-text of many of the items you find.

General Science and Health Resources

Expert

• PubMed Central - PMC is a free full-text archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature
• Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) - DOAJ is an online directory that provides access to quality free, peer-reviewed journals
• Google Scholar - Google Scholar provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature, though it may not be freely accessible
• Drug Information Portal - Gives users a gateway to selected drug information from the U.S. National Library of Medicine and other key U.S. Government agencies

Consumer Health

• MedlinePlus -  MedlinePlus offers reliable, up-to-date health information, anytime, anywhere, for free to patients and their families and friends
• Healthfinder.gov - Resources on a wide range of health topics selected from approximately 1,400 government and non-profit organizations to bring you the best, most reliable health information on the Internet
• Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) - Provides expert and consumer health-related information on all areas of health and disease

Nutrition and Nutritional Diseases Specific Resources

Expert

• Academy of Nutrition & Dietetics Position and Practice Papers - A position paper is a critical analysis of current facts, data, and research literature. A practice paper is a critical analysis of the current research literature that addresses a practice topic to translate science to practice.
• NIH: Office of Dietary Supplements - Reliable information about the use, effectiveness, safety, and quality of dietary supplements.
• National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine: Research - Researched information about the efficacy and safety of complementary and alternative medicines

Consumer Health

• National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine: Health Topics - Consumer health information on a wide-variety of CAM topics, many o which revolve around supplements, vitamins and minerals
• Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion - Works to improve the health and well-being of Americans by developing and promoting dietary guidance that links scientific research to the nutrition needs of consumers.
• Food and Health Communication: Food and Health - Dedicated to creating stunning, evidence-based education materials for passionate health educators who want to make a difference in their patients’ and students’ lives.
• Specific Diseases
• Celiac Disease Foundation: Research - Consumer health reviews of current research in CD
• Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America: Patient Brochures - Free educational brochures and fact sheets that provide current information and treatment options
• Diabetes Public Health Resource -  Image collections and clipart, fact sheets, brochures, reports, guidebooks, and other products

The following terms are some that you may not find or think of on your own related to the topics available for your research project. These should be considered IN ADDITION to the terms in the topic descriptions.

You can put these in the MeSH Thesaurus and see what they mean to see if they might relate to your research. You do not have to use them - test them out, see what you get, and decide to keep them or not.

• primal diet
• cholecalciferol
• ergocalciferol
• antigens
• BMI
• Vitamin B9
• prenatal care
• diet (not a specific type, but how someone eats in general)
• microbiota
• bone density
• milk proteins
• casein
• soybean proteins
• muscle strength
• performance enhancing drugs
• common cold
• ADHD
• coloring agents
• sweetening agents
• gynecologic diseases

Boston Public Library

The BPL has some databases with full-text health information. To access these, you will need a BPL card and an electronic PIN. You can set these up at the BPL in Copley Square or any BPL Branch location.

You can see the list of electronic access resources they have from this web page. I recommend speaking with a librarian to get advice on which resources would be best for your particular topic, but you may want to try:

• Health & Wellness Resource Center
• Health Reference Center Academic
• Nursing Resource Center

Minuteman Library System

The MMLS also pays for specialized full-text resources. You will need proof of residency in any town with a library in the system (Newton, Somerville, Cambridge, and many more) in order to get a card with an access code on the back.

I recommend going to your specific library and speaking to a librarian, since some libraries have access to databases other libraries in the system do not. A brief list of some databases that all MMLS patrons can access include:

• Science in Context
• Nursing and Allied Health Collection Resource Center
• Health Reference Center Academic
• Health and Wellness Resource Center
• Expanded Academic ASAP

You can usually access these by going to the library homepage and finding the link for databases.