An evaluation of information sources for current awareness on occupational diseases

An evaluative study of a selection of primary and sec ondary information sources of potential use for current aware ness in the field of occupational diseases is presented. This study identifies the more important English language primary sources of occupational diseases research information. Re search studies in the field of occupational diseases, however, are scattered widely in the medical literature. This study com pares the usefulness of a variety of secondary sources as current awareness tools for bringing together this widely scattered information. Several secondary sources are useful but, despite considerable overlap between these sources, no single source provides comprehensive coverage of the subject field. Scanning of a number of primary sources together with several secondary sources is recommended as the best means of keeping abreast of the latest research information in this subject area.