Lister Hill Letter
Newsletter of the Lister Hill Library of the Health Sciences at UAB

September/October 2001

LHL Research Tips: Using PubMed's Cubby Feature

If you have an ongoing research or clinical interest in a particular topic, you may find it useful to store a search strategy in PubMed for future use.   Using the "Cubby" feature, your search strategy can be saved and stored then run again at anytime.
     To set up a saved search, you must register a user name and password in Cubby from the left sidebar in PubMed.  Enter your topics to define the search parameters you need, then click on Cubby to store the search.  Up to 100 searches can be stored per user with unique names you provide.
     To run your search, log into Cubby and select the saved search you wish to run.  To see what articles have been added to PubMed since you last ran the search, click on the "What's New for Selected" option.   Other tips for using Cubby include:

Complex searches with field delimiters and Boolean operators are ideal to
 save because you won't have to enter the strategy again
Limits can be saved as part of the search, just set them before you save the
 strategy
Be specific about names given to searches to make them easy to distinguish
 between
To use Cubby, your browser must be set to accept cookies
Searches with set numbers (i.e. #3 AND #4) cannot be saved
It is best not to include any date ranges in a saved search

If you have questions about using the Cubby feature or would like a librarian to help you set and store your strategy, contact the Information Desk by phone (934-2231) or by e-mail.