  The aim of the study was to assess and compare established search systems and
approaches by using the search goal of identifying the first (as in oldest)
nursing-related document, with reference to the first Swedish-affiliated
document, in Scopus, Web of Science, and PubMed (Medline). In doing so, the
objective was to provide concrete examples and illustrate how search systems
and field code searches versus classification-based searches differ. The Scopus
database, Web of Science database aggregator, and the PubMed (Medline) search
engine were used for evaluations. Two different search strategies were compared
in each database: one guided by field codes (i.e., text-based), and one guided
by pre-existing categorizations within database infrastructures. Findings
highlight several factors that are important to consider when formulating and
executing a search strategy. The findings illustrate important aspects of
search systems and search approaches, namely the publication year,
delimitations related to a country or region, and features related to a subject
or research area. The findings also highlight the importance of prioritizing
between different ideals in retrieval. For example, is it more important to
reach the oldest records (publication year), to identify as many records as
possible (exhaustiveness), or to make sure they are as subject-relevant as
possible (e.g., in terms of authors belonging to the same field)? Secondly,
researchers using bibliometric methods to analyze research literature should be
more transparent when reporting searches, as different search systems and
search approaches yield varied numbers and quality of records. While most
bibliometric researchers strive to combine different approaches, this is not
always made clear in reporting.
