What are Subject Headings?
AMED uses a thesaurus of standardised indexing terms called Subject Headings. Subject Headings are assigned to articles in order to classify what they are about and are based on the content of the article rather than the terminology used. AMED will try and match or ‘map’ your topic to the closest matching Subject Heading in their thesaurus e.g. if you search for cancer AMED will recommend the heading; neoplasms
The MeSH Hierarchy - how the headings are arranged
All the subject terms are arranged in a logical "tree" structure that originates with 16 main categories or branches. Each category is further divided into subcategories.
The major categories are:
| A | Anatomy |
| B | Organisms |
| C | Diseases |
| D | Chemicals and Drugs |
| E | Analytical, Diagnostic and Therapeutic Techniques and Equipment |
| F | Psychiatry and Psychology |
| G | Phenomena and Processes |
| H | Disciplines and Occupations |
| I | Anthropology, Education, Sociology and Social Phenomena |
| J | Technology, Industry, Agriculture |
| K | Humanities |
| L | Information Sciences |
| M | Named Groups |
| N | Health care |
| V | Publication Characteristics |
| Z | Geographicals |
Go to http://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/trees.html for a fuller breakdown of the MeSH "tree" structures.
Example of MeSH Hierarchy
Below is an example of part of the hierarchy/ "tree" structure for the MeSH heading Neoplasms. The narrower terms are indented under the broader terms.
A + sign beside a term indicates there are further, narrower terms. Simply click on the + sign to view them.
A - sign indicates all narrower terms are displayed.
The tree display allows you to:
Explode feature
Exploding a MeSH heading will:
