PHE 541 Media Advocacy & Public Health: Find Books
What is a subject heading?
Subject headings are a formalized way of of searching library catalogs. The right subect heading can help you get to information more quickly.
For example, nutrition can be described using the following terms:
- nutrition
- diet
- eating habits
You could search the library catalog for all those keywords. Or, use one subject heading to find all of the library's materials about nutrition, e.g. search using just the term "nutrition."
Who determines subject headings? The Library of Congress. Copies of the complete set of the Library of Congress Subject Headings are available at the Reference Desk.
Browse for Books
Sometimes browsing the library stacks can help you find books you didn't even know you were looking for. The following are good areas to peruse.
HV: Social pathology, social and public welfare, criminology
QM: Human anatomy
QP: Physiology
R: Medicine
RA: Public aspects of medicine
RC: Internal medicine
RM: Therapeutics, pharmacology
RS: Pharmacy and materia medica
RT: Nursing
Maps of the library are available at the 2nd floor Reference Desk, elevator lobbies, and also online.
eBook Collections
We collect eBooks whenever possible. Records for eBooks look like this:
We also have a number of eBook collections that you can browse. They are listed below.
- NCBI Bookshelf
This link opens in a new window
Provides free access to texts in life science and healthcare from the National Center for Biotechnology Information. Covers the health sciences, biology, cell sciences, molecular biology as well as public health, health policy, and health education. - ProjectMuseContains full text books from scholarly publishers in the areas of politics and policy, as well as full text articles from humanities and social sciences journals.
- Business Expert Press Digital LibraryCollects applied, concise ebooks on a wide range of business topics including management, accounting, supply chain, international business, and entrepreneurship.
- Oxford Handbooks OnlineContains full text Oxford University Press handbooks on topics in the fields of business, management, philosophy, political science, and religion. Handbooks provide overview, background, historical synthesis and reference lists.
Find Books by Subject
After you execute a search in the Portland State Library catalog, click on the "books" facet to limit your search results to only books. Click on "eBooks" to limit your results to eBooks.
After you find a useful book, scroll down to the "Details" heading to find the book's "Subjects." Here you'll find a list of related subjects that you might consider adding to your search. You can also click on a subject link in the record, e.g. clicking on "Community health services" would bring up a list of all the Library's books, journals, etc. on that topic.
| Aging | Dietetics | Epidemiology | Exercise |
| Environmental Health | Gerontology | Global Health | Health |
| Health Education | Health Policy | Health Promotion | Human Physiology |
| Mental Health | Nursing | Nutrition | Physical Fitness |
| Physical Therapy | Public Health | Public Health -- Social Aspects | Well-Being |
To modify your search to include a useful subject, first go to the Advanced Search.
Here you can type in your desired subject and be sure to specify you want to search the "in subject" field.
