Figure 1
Number of articles on OSH topics in PubMed, per year, searching with a string of 13 OSH-related Medical Subject Headings (Mesh) terms [8].
Table 1
Categories of classic medical questions using COVID-19 pandemic as an example
| Diagnostic questions: | Accuracy of rapid tests for COVID-19 in health care workers without symptoms |
| Etiologic questions: | Potential work-related exposure of receptionists facing (suspected) COVID-19 patients |
| Intervention questions (therapy, prevention, education) | Effectiveness of FFP2 face masks in physiotherapy to prevent COVID-19 infection |
| Prognostic questions | Prediction of the (long-term) course of disability in COVID-19 pneumonia, for elderly manual workers |
| Descriptive epidemiological questions | Prevalence of post-traumatic stress disorders in emergency workers treating COVID-19 patients |
| – Patient or population | “workers” or “sewage workers” |
| –Intervention or Exposure | “sewage” |
| –Comparison | ––––– |
| –Outcome | “occupational diseases” |
Figure 2
Screenshot of first three out of 48 titles in a PubMed search on occupational diseases in sewage workers (April 2020).
Figure 3
Search pyramid used in the Amsterdam University Medical Centre, adapted by the authors [17].
Table 2
Examples of quality websites for OSH.
| Dermatology | DermNet (New Zealand) | https://dermnetnz.org/ |
| Infectious diseases | GLEWS + (outbreaks) | http://www.glews.net/ |
| Chemical substances | Hazmap | https://haz-map.com |
| ATSDR [33] | https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/substances/index.asp | |
| Risk assessments | OIRA (EU) | https://oiraproject.eu/es |
| OSH questions | OSH Answers (Canada) | https://www.ccohs.ca/oshanswers/ |
| Education | ||
| OSH education in all schools | ENETOSH | http://www.enetosh.net/ |
| Medical students | EMUTOM | http://www.emutom.eu/ |
| OSH professionals | LDOH e-library | https://library-education-osh.ldoh.net/ |
| Occup. Hygiene professionals | OHTA, IOHA | http://www.ohlearning.com/ |
| OSH education, general | Geolibrary (Occup.) | http://www.geolibrary.org/ |
Figure 4
Cochrane Work website (http://work.cochrane.org).
Table 3
Examples of resources (search engines and databases) relevant for OSH searches.
Free-of-charge resources
|
Resources that require a fee
|
Table 4
Search strings (filters) and strategies for MEDLINE on OSH topics.
| For the prognosis of work ability | A search strategy to identify studies on the prognosis of work disability: A diagnostic test framework [39] |
| For agricultural workers’ diseases | PubMed search strings for the study of agricultural workers’ diseases [40]. |
| For putative occupational determinants of a disease | Search strings for the study of putative occupational determinants of disease [41]. |
| For return to work | Precision and recall of search strategies for identifying studies on return-to-work in Medline [42]. |
| For the occupational origin of diseases | Developing search strategies in Medline on the occupational origin of diseases [43]. |
| For chronic diseases and work participation | Searching bibliographic databases for literature on chronic disease and work participation [44]. |
| For occupational health intervention studies | A search strategy for occupational health intervention studies [45]. |