Table 1

Search strategy.

Keywords used: (Pain) AND (Scale OR assessment OR measure) AND (Elderly OR residents ORgeriatric OR nursing homes OR cognitive impairment OR dementia OR Alzheimer)

Source
Hits (N =)
Selection based on reading abstracts (N =)
Final selection based on publications (N =)

Databases
Psychinfo 191
29
31

Medline 977
70*


CINAHL*** 219
17**

Abstracts
8
5
5
Citation/reference screening
37
17
15
Unpublished manuscripts
6
3
3




Total

141
54

* N = 19/70 overlapping with the Psychinfo search

** N = 15/17 overlapping with the Psychinfo and Medline searches

*** Because of the large number of publications found using CINAHL, our search of this database was limited by using the keyword 'nursing'

Zwakhalen et al. BMC Geriatrics 2006 6:3   doi:10.1186/1471-2318-6-3