Enclosing terms within quotation marks creates a bound phrase, which means that:
- Term(s) must appear side-by-side as they do within the quotes (not case sensitive).
- Plural spellings are matched, but excludes alternative spellings and synonyms (e.g.,"extract" matches extract and extracts but not extracting).
For example, the query “cortisol metabolites” AND “GnRH agonist” will only return results that have both of the exact bound phrases. Results with any of the following would be ignored:
- cortisol and amino acid metabolites (terms separate, not side by side)
- LHRH agonist (synonym of GnRH agonist)
- corticosterone metabolites (synonym of cortisol)
Note: The AND operator is implied when searching for two sequential terms or phrases within quotes. For example, the query "pain treatment" "headache disorders" is searched as "pain treatment" AND "headache disorders".