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Overview
Welcome to UNB Libraries' (Saint John) guide to Nurs 3112, Family Systems Nursing. The purpose of this guide is to help you find resources related to this course and enhance your learning.
How you want to begin your research depends on your topic and your knowledge. If your topic is brand new to you, you might want to start with book based material. The data and information in books, at least, in non-fiction, academic books, generally differs from that found in articles. It is presented at length but tends to be presented in less depth and with less specificity. Book content may be less "cutting edge" and more likely to present standard, and accepted information. Journal articles often present more controversial content and preliminary research results which require more testing before they are accepted.
For students, books are a logical starting point for research because they often introduce several relevant topics around a broader subject while articles often deal with a single, very specific topic with an assumed context -- that is, articles may assume an audience with a high level of subject knowledge.
Once you have some background on your topic which may help you think critically about related information and data, you will be ready to plunge into journal articles, grey literature, and beyond. Enjoy the search!
In this guide, you will find links leading you to reference materials (dictionaries, specialized encyclopedias, handbooks ...), books (both online and in print), databases (containing full-text journals, full-text articles, and linked material), and more. That said, not everything you will need will be here. Remember, you can always visit a library and ask a librarian for more help.
For an overview of family systems nursing and examples of this process in action, you might consider:
Family Systems Nursing Re-examined, Janice M. Bell, Journal of Family Nursing 2009 15: 123, DOI: 10.1177/1074840709335533
Positive Effects of a Nursing Intervention on Family-Centered Care in Adult Critical Care, Marion Mitchell, et al. Am J Crit Care, November 2009 18: 543-552, DOI: 10.4037/ajcc2009226
A family systems nursing intervention model for paediatric health crisis, Patricia Short Tomlinson, Cynthia Peden-McAlpine, and Suzan Sherman, Journal of Advance Nursing, DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2648.2011.05825.x
The Integration of a Family Systems Approach for Understanding Youth Obesity, Physical Activity, and Dietary Programs, Heather Kitzman-Ulrich, et al. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 2010 13: 231-253, DOI: 10.1007/s10567-010-0073-0
In addition to this guide for Nurs 3112, you might also wish to explore:
Chronic Health Challenges, Nurs 2135, UNB Libraries
Nursing Guides, UNB Libraries
Psychology Guides, UNB Libraries
Find Articles
For those interested in family systems nursing, there are both licensed bibliographic databases, listed in Key and Additional Resources below, as well as major open access databases such as PubMed, a US government database.
These databases will be especially useful when you are beginning a research project and looking for information on a topic.
For a list of all databases provided by UNB, please see Articles & Research Databases.
There is a significant collection of full-text, public access periodicals available at PubMedCentral and a number of public access, individual periodicals for those interested in medicine, nursing and related fields.
There is also a wide variety of licensed, individual periodical titles available for those in the UNB/STU community of users who are interested in nursing and related disciplines.
The titles below offer a sample of those which may contain material specific to family systems nursing:
Annals of Family Medicine, public access
Contemporary Family Therapy, licensed resource
Dimensions of Critical Care Nursing, licensed resource
Families, Systems, & Health, formerly Family Systems Medicine, licensed resource
Families, Systems and Health: The Journal of Collaborative Family HealthCare, licensed resource
Family and Community Health, licensed resource
Family Process, licensed resource
Family Relations, licensed resource
Journal of Advanced Nursing, licensed resource
Journal of Family and Community Medicine, public access
Journal of Family Nursing, licensed resource
Journal of Family Therapy, licensed resource
Journal of Nursing and Healthcare of Chronic Illness, licensed resource
Social Science and Medicine, licensed resource
Reference Sources
Dictionaries, encyclopedias, handbooks, guides, and standards for the field of nursing and health sciences can be found by checking Quest (the library catalogue), the online Reference Materials collection, or the reference sections of the Nursing Guides, UNB Libraries.
Licensed reference materials include:
Black's Medical Dictionary, licensed resource
Mosby's Dictionary of Medicine, Nursing, & Health Professions, licensed resource
Taber's cyclopedic medical dictionary, licensed resource
Diseases: A Nursing Process Approach to Excellent Care, licensed resource
Lippincott Manual of Nursing Practice, licensed resource
Handbook of Pathophysiology, licensed resource
The Wiley-Blackwell Handbook of Family Psychology, licensed resource
The Blackwell companion to medical sociology [electronic resource], William C. Cockerham, licensed resource
Family practice guidelines [electronic resource], Jill C. Cash, licensed resource
Some public access reference materials for nursing are also available online, including:
Health Promotion Glossary, WHO/HPR/HEP/98.1, public access
Medical Encyclopedia, MedlinePlus, public access
Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy, public access
[Guidelines relating to chronic diseases or conditions], National Guideline Clearinghouse, public access
Ontario Public Health Standards: Guidance Documents, Government of Ontario, public access
Family Systems Stressor-Strength Inventory (FS3I), Karen B. Mischke and Shirley M. H. Hanson, public access
An Evidence-Based Prevention Resource for Nurse Practitioners, Tricia Trinite, Carol Loveland-Cherry, and Lucy Marion, The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, 2009, public access
Nursing in the Community: A Literature Review, National Health Service, Scotland, 2006, public access
Find Books
UNB WorldCat searches the WorldCat database and offers up-to-date availability information for material held by UNB Libraries. WorldCat contains more than 130,000,000 bibliographic records (including books, journals, videos, music ...) referring to the holdings of libraries world wide. WorldCat also includes selected journal articles and internet resources.
University users may wish to try a family nursing subject search for book material through WorldCat.
University users may wish to try a nursing assessment subject search for book material through WorldCat.
For handheld access, try UNB WorldCat Mobile. Please note that mobile interfaces and apps may NOT provide all the functionality of other types of web-based access.
Members of the UNB/STU community of users may access individual electronic titles such as:
Nurses and families [electronic resource] : a guide to family assessment and intervention, Lorraine M. Wright, licensed resource
Nursing and family caregiving [electronic resource] : social support and nonsupport, Anne Neufeld and Margaret J. Harrison, licensed resource
Nursing excellence for children and families [electronic resource], Martha Craft-Rosenberg, licensed resource
Middle range theory development using King's conceptual system [electronic resource], Christina L. Sieloff, licensed resource
As well, collections of electronic materials are available, such as:
ebrary Collections, including Canadian public policy materials relating to nursing; and
Books@Ovid
Many internet sites offer full-text, public access books and book-length works either as collections or as individual linked titles. Examples of such sites of interest to nursing and health sciences include:
Health and Medicine, National Academies Press
Bookshelf, NCBI, NLM
Health, Electronic Publications, Depository Services Program, Canada
Public access, individual titles include:
Toward an Integrated Science of Research on Families: Workshop Report, Steve Olson, Editor; Committee on the Science of Research on Families; Institute of Medicine and National Research Council
Systems thinking for health systems strengthening, Don De Savigny, WHO
Health and Behavior: The Interplay of Biological, Behavioral, and Societal Influences, Committee on Health and Behavior: Research, Practice and Policy, Board on Neuroscience and Behavioral Health, 2001
Family structure, child outcomes and environmental mediators: an overview of the Development in Diverse Families Study, Sarah Wise, Research Paper No. 30, Australian Institute of Family Studies, January 2003
Evaluating Family Health Nursing through Education and Practice, Colin Macduff and Bernice J M West, Scottish Executive Social Research, 2003
Find Internet Sites
Internet accessible, open resources relating to family systems nursing include:
Entrez Search and Retrieval System, NLM
MedlinePlus Health Information, National Library of Medicine and National Institutes of Health
Canadian Research Information System
Canadian Best Practices Portal, Public Health Agency of Canada
Health Promotion, Public Health Agency of Canada
Health Council of Canada
AHRQ Health Care Innovations Exchange, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, US
Effective Health Care Program, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, US
Family Health, CDC, US
Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, CDC, US
Australian Institute of Family Studies, Commonwealth of Australia
Bowen Center for the Study of the Family
Citing Your Sources
Citations are a natural by-product of a good literature or bibliographic search -- they come from the results your search produces. They may be found, collectively, in bibliographic databases and citation indexes. They may be derived from statistical databases and other data collections. They may make reference to individual books, periodicals (journals, magazines and newspapers), working papers, and technical reports. They may be gathered from compilations such as bibliographies or appear in lists of works cited and references. Citations may also be produced in reference to material you read or heard, to images you discover, and to all kinds of electronic files which are displayed, read, played, or otherwise accessed.
To structure citations appropriately it helps to have a good guide. There are several standard guides from which you may choose. In university, choosing the "best" one will depend on the requirements of the assignment, the nature of the contents and the preferences of the individual professor. Some guides emphasize a particular discipline, some are cross-discipline and some may emphasize a particular form of material. The material listed below may help you:
Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, HWK-REF BF76.7 .P83 2010
APA style guide to electronic references, licensed resource
APA Style, American Psychological Association
Citing Medicine: The NLM Style Guide for Authors, Editors and Publishers, NLM
Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals, sometimes called Vancouver style, International Committee of Medical Journal Editors
Sometimes you will find a citation which uses an unfamiliar abbreviation or acronym in place of the full periodical title. The National Library of Medicine has a search engine which may help.
NLM Catalog: Journals referenced in the NCBI Databases