NHS Journals

The easiest way to access ejournals is via the Knowledge & Library Hub Browse option or direct via BrowZine. 

• Follow the BrowZine link for your Trust and use your NHS OpenAthens details to see all the journals you have access to. Add favourite titles to your 'My Bookshelf'.
• Log-in to the Hub to search for the journal article by title, or for the subject you are interested in.  You will be presented with either links direct to the fulltext or a simple request form to see if it is available via the university collections.
  • You can also use the Browse Journals option if you just want to browse a few favourite journals.

KCL Journals (join the KCL library to access these in the library) 

When using one of the university computers you will be able to access many of the journals in our collections directly.  This may be quicker than requesting if you have a lot of articles that are not immediately available remotely via NHS OpenAthens.

NHS staff can access a huge range of e-journal titles via NHS OpenAthens any time and from any computer.  If a title is not available via OpenAthens you can request articles from other e-journals subscribed to by King's College London via the Knowledge & Library Hub or come and access them on a university network computer in the Library.

Accessing e-journals off-campus usually requires you to log in (via NHS OpenAthens) to access full text. 

There can be some variation in how publishers and information providers refer to the logging on process. Generally the first login box you will meet will not be the OpenAthens one. Some example links to look for include:

• Institutional Login
• Log in via your institution
• Log in with Athens
• OpenAthens
• Log in via UK Access Management Federation / UK Federation

Normally you will be prompted for your Trust name but increasingly you will need to select NHS in England.

See the OpenAthens page on this library guide for details of how to register.

In some cases you may find an Open Access version of an article you are looking for on the web.  

Google Scholar can be a handy tool to check references and find related articles.  It can also frequently be a source of the full versions of journal articles.

To help you find articles you have access to we have added our journal listings to Google Scholar.

You need to be logged in with your Google account. Click on the Menu button and select Settings.  You can then access the Library Links menu.  Search for your Trust name (or the university if you want to include those links too).  Use the version that ends - Full text @ My Library.

Note LibKeyNomad (introduced on this page) can also help with seamless access from websites including Google Scholar.

LibKey Nomad is a browser extension which links you to the full-text of articles when you are searching on journal websites, wikipedia, Google, PubMed and other places on the web. You can install Nomad onto your own devices (please note this may not be possible on Trust devices) to make it easy to access the full version of journal articles you wish to read.

The extension is available for Chrome, Firefox and Microsoft Edge, Safari, Brave and Vivaldi browsers. The Chrome and Microsoft Edge links are available below:

If you are searching for a topic or subject or undertaking a literature review of the published evidence, rather than locating a specific article, you may wish to search one of the healthcare literature databases. There are databases that cover all of the professions working in the NHS.  

Databases available include Medline, Embase, EMCARE, CINAHL, APA PsycInfo, the British Nursing Index and HMIC (for health management topics).

See the Databases page on this Library Guide for more information and the Library Workshops and 1-1s page for details of sessions to build your skills or help with things you are finding tricky.

The Knowledge & Library Hub is a good place to start if you just want a quick search for evidence.

All King's College Hospital staff can request one of their Clinical Support Librarians to undertake an evidence search on their behalf to find journal articles and evidence to support patient care, clinical practice, quality improvement projects or guidance development.