Searching a biomedical bibliographic database from Bulgaria: the ABS database.

BACKGROUND The University of Sofia, Bulgaria, disseminates local biomedical literature (1994 to present) through a free online database, ABS. OBJECTIVES Our objectives were to systematically search ABS, identify citations to controlled trials and discover what proportion of these studies are to be found on medline. METHODS We searched using Bulgarian and English phrases; manually selected citations of controlled trials and sought these citations on medline. RESULTS Using the two languages, we found a total of 628 unique citations, 47 of which seem to be relevant controlled trials (precision 7.48%, 13% of ABS citations were found on medline). The trials in ABS commonly focused on evaluation of care for people with cardiovascular or urological problems. DISCUSSION ABS is another source of easily accessed trials not readily available elsewhere.