Introduction: Nursing is the largest professional work-force in the UK National Health Service, and nurses deliver most of the hands-on patient care in the UK and many other countries. It is essential therefore, that nurses are engaged in the drive to identify evidence-based health care, and that the nursing evidence-base is identified. This paper will describe work undertaken to identify RCTs in the nursing specialist literature.

Objective: To develop search strategies for the identification of RCTs in nursing, and to identify as high a proportion of RCTs in the nursing literature as possible. To explore the feasibility of developing nursing as a field within the Cochrane Collaboration.

Results: Preliminary searching using a combination of electronic and handsearching has so far identified over 400 RCTs and 25 systematic reviews in the nursing specialist literature. The sensitivity of Medline searching for RCTs is as low as 36% for some nursing journals. Aspects of nursing most often evaluated in nursing RCTs appear to be related to patient education and information giving, midwifery/neonatal care, nurse education, perioperative care, pain, and reducing anxiety.

Discussion: There is clearly a large body of randomized controlled trials published in the nursing specialist literature. It is essential that these trials are identified and reviewed within the multiprofessional Cochrane Reviews. The challenge now is to engage the nursing profession in the Cochrane Collaboration and particularly in the review process itself, to ensure that where appropriate, Cochrane Review Groups have a nursing dimension.