A Review of the Three Types of Biomedical Literature and the Systematic Approach to Answer a Drug Information Request

The pharmacist is relied upon to provide drug information on a daily basis for patients and health care professionals. Performing drug information tasks requires the ability to efficiently search, critically analyze, and objectively evaluate the biomedical literature. Pharmacists and pharmacy students need to understand the biomedical literature and an organized method to answer drug information questions. Therefore, the tertiary, secondary, and primary literature resources are defined and examples are presented. In addition, the modified systematic approach to answer a drug information request is reviewed. Understanding the different types of literature and applying the systematic approach assists practitioners in efficiently supplying drug information. The purpose of this article is to assist the pharmacist and pharmacy student in determining the strengths and limitations of the various types of literature and applying the systematic approach to a drug information inquiry.