Table 3.

Steps to performing PubMed search (the details of each step are further elucidated in Table 4).

Steps	Description	Example
1	Formulate the relevant research question	Are antibiotics efficacious in management of sore throat? PICO format: Patients: Individuals with sore throat Intervention: antibiotics administration Control: Did not receive antibiotics Outcome: Efficacy in reducing symptoms
2	Identify the concepts and associated keywords
2a	Identify the concepts	Concept 1: antibiotics Concept 2: sore throat
2b	Identify the key words associated with each concept	Identify the keywords associated with concept 1: “antibiotics”; for example: antibiotic OR anti-bacterial agents OR antimicrobial agents Identify the keywords associated with concept 2: “sore throat”; for example: Pharyngitis OR Nasopharyngitis OR Tonsillitis OR “inflamed throat”
3	Prepare for PubMed search
3a.	Add MeSH terms for each concept	MeSH term for Concept 1: MeSH term for antibiotics: “anti-bacterial agents"[MeSH Terms] MeSH term for Concept 2: MeSH term for sore throat: “pharyngitis"[MeSH Terms]
3b.	Add the Boolean Operators, truncations where applicable and then add double quotes across multiword phrases	For example for concept 1: antibiotic∗ OR “anti-bacterial agent∗” For example for concept 2: Pharyngit∗ OR Nasopharyngit∗ OR rhinopharyngi∗ OR Tonsillit∗ OR “inflamed tonsil∗”
3c.	Merge the keywords and MeSH terms for each concept	Concept 1: antibiotic∗ OR “anti-bacterial agent∗” OR “anti-bacterial agents"[MeSH Terms] Concept 2: Pharyngit∗ OR nasopharyngitis OR rhinopharyngitis OR tonsillitis OR “inflamed throat” OR “inflamed tonsils” OR “infected throat” OR “infected tonsils” OR “sore throat” OR “pharyngitis"[MeSH Terms]
3d.	Perform search for individual concepts and then merge the two concepts using AND	(antibiotic∗ OR “anti-bacterial agent∗” OR “anti-bacterial agents"[MeSH Terms]) AND pharyngitis OR nasopharyngitis OR rhinopharyngitis OR tonsillitis OR “inflamed throat” OR “inflamed tonsils” OR “infected throat” OR “infected tonsils” OR “sore throat” OR “pharyngitis"[MeSH Terms]