Research Guides

Health Equity

Resources and information related to health and healthcare in the United States.

Searching in Databases

The language authors use to describe health equity or health disparities can vary widely, it is important to consider what additional terms may be relevant to your project. On this page you will find suggestions for developing a health equity related search strategy.

The National Library of Medicine's MEDLINE®/PubMed® Health Disparities and Minority Health Search Strategy (last updated 2019) suggests terms for health equity related topics. 

MeSH are "Medical Subject Headings." These are tags/indexed terms that the National Library of Medicine (NLM) uses to identify and organize articles in their database, MEDLINE. You can use the MeSH database to identify more subject headings. 

Tips for searching: 

  • Using a combination of keywords and database specific indexed terms, you can develop highly sensitive search concepts.
  • It is important to have a structured question, using a framework such as PICO to identify your key concepts to search.
  • If your concept is a phrase, such as "person of color" you should use quotation marks around that phrase to string them together. Otherwise a database might search person AND color - which is not what's intended. 

Click through the tabs below to see some terms related to population groups and health equity. This is by no means an exhaustive list, but a place to start.

Antiquated Terms in Literature

As Townsend et al. (2022) note, "Some searches, due to the nature of their topics, must include antiquated, non-standard, exclusionary, and offensive terms in order to identify all published literature on that topic. This is particularly true of searches supporting evidence syntheses, where a robust and sensitive search is critical to the validity of the review." 

Terms to Consider

"Health disparities"
"Healthcare disparities"
"Health equity"
Inequity
Inequality
Discrimination
Racism
"Race factors"
Homelessness 
Houseless 
“Food insecurity”
“Job security”
“Health literacy”
"socioeconomic status" 
accessibility 
"Social determinants of health" 

  • For a focused search, it is best to pick one or two determinant(s)

The ISSG Search Filter Resource

"The InterTASC Information Specialists' Sub-Group Search Filter Resource is a collaborative venture to identify, assess and test search filters designed to retrieve research by study design or focus. The Search Filters Resource aims to provide easy access to published and unpublished search filters."

"Person of color"
"People of color"
Race
Racial 
Ethnicity
Ethnic
"African American"
"African Continental Ancestry Group"
Arab
"Asian American"
"Asian Continental Ancestry Group"
"Oceanic Ancestry Group"
Hawai'ian
"Pacific Islander"
Hispanic
Latino
Latina 
Latinx
"Mexican American''
"Mexican Americans"
"Pacific Islander"
Indigenous
"Tribal Community" 
Tribal 
Native
Natives
"Native American"
"First Nation People" 
"First Nation Peoples" 
"American Indian" 
"Alaska Native"
"Alaskan Native"
Aboriginal 
Amish
Black
BIPOC
"Disabled person" 
"Wheelchair user"
"Person with disability"
Disability

"Social Determinants of Health"[Mesh]
"Health Equity"[Mesh]
"Health Care Reform"[Mesh] 
"Systemic Racism"[Mesh]
"Racism"[Mesh] 
"Antiracism"[Mesh]
"Social Discrimination"[Mesh]
"Prejudice"[Mesh]
"Bias, Implicit"[Mesh]
"Health Services Accessibility"[Mesh]
"Health Status Disparities"[Mesh]

"Disabled Persons"[Mesh] 
"Persons with Mental Disabilities"[Mesh] 
"Visually Impaired Persons"[Mesh]   
"Persons With Hearing Impairments"[Mesh]
"American Indian or Alaska Native"[Mesh]
"Asian American Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander"[Mesh]
"Black People"[Mesh]
"Black or African American"[Mesh]
"African People"[Mesh]
"Sub-Saharan African People"[Mesh]
"Caribbean People"[Mesh]
"South American People"[Mesh]
"Hispanic or Latino"[Mesh]
"Middle Eastern and North Africans"[Mesh]
"Racial Groups"[Mesh]
"Ethnic and Racial Minorities"[Mesh]
"Culture"[Mesh]
"Population Groups"[Mesh]
"Minority Groups"[Mesh] 
"Ethnic and Racial Minorities"[Mesh]
"Sexual and Gender Minorities"[Mesh]
"Emigrants and Immigrants"[Mesh]
"Health Disparate, Minority and Vulnerable Populations"[Mesh]
"Vulnerable Populations"[Mesh]

Example Search Strategy

In summation, a search regarding access to healthcare for tribal communities might look something like this: 

"Health Services Accessibility"[Mesh] AND ("American Indian or Alaska Native"[Mesh] OR "native american" OR tribal OR "first nation") 

Research Bias

You may be unintentionally introducing bias into your search.

  • Did you include outcomes? If so, you're telling the database what you expect to see, and you might not get results that will counter your expectations
  • Are you searching more than one database?
  • Have you searched grey literature? Preprints?
Last Updated: Nov 26, 2025 3:12 PM
Subjects: Health Sciences