Workshop on Searching Medical Literature
Wednesday, 11 November 2026
9am to 2.30pm
Itqan Clinical Simulation and Innovation Center, Doha, Qatar
Course Director and Lecturer:
Fikri M. Abu-Zidan, MD, FACS, FRCS, PhD, Dip Applied Statistics
Department of Surgery
College of Medicine and Health Services
United Arab Emirates University, Al Ain, UAE
Audience: This workshop is for clinicians who perform clinical research (maximum 30 participants).
Workshop objectives:
- Plan a search strategy that can answer the research question.
- Recognize the strength and weakness of different search engines.
- Learn to write a PICO and define the search strategy that fits it.
- Learn tips and tricks of searching PubMed and applying it.
- Appreciate the difference between Free text and Thesaurus search and when to use it.
- Train the participants on using appropriate Boolean concepts
- Have a chance to have hands-on exercise that enforces learning.
PROGRAM:
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8.30am to 9am
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Registration |
I: Sources of Information
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9am to 9.20am
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Why are we here? (Learning objectives)
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9.20am to 9.40am
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Where to start
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9.40am to 10am
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Sources of Medical Information
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10am to 10.20am
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Searching the Internet
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10.20am to 10.40am
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Q&A
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10.40am to 11am
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Coffee break
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II. Building and Searching your PICO
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11am to 11.20am
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Formulating your PICO
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11.20am to 12pm
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PICO Exercise
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12pm to 12.20pm
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Building your strategy
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12.20pm to12.30pm
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Q&A
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12.30pm to1.30pm
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Lunch break
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III. Searching PUBMED
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1.30pm to 1.50pm
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Free Text and Thesaurus
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1.50pm to 2.15pm
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Searching PubMed
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2.15pm to 2.30pm
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Evaluation and Feedback
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