HEALWA: Evidence-based medical information you can trust

Staying current on evidence-based medical practices is crucial to nursing. In a time when the conve­nience of Google and Wikipedia can expose patients and health care practi­tioners to inaccu­rate medical infor­ma­tion, HEAL​-WA​.org provides a reliable alter­na­tive. This digital library combines the conve­nience of a search engine with a massive collec­tion of author­i­ta­tive clinical research from the latest e‑journals, databases and e‑books.

From a computer or mobile device, a HEALWA user can access the latest research on, for example, safe patient handling or opioid abuse, point-of-care diagnos­tics for diabetes or the flu, print­able patient handouts in English and Spanish, and free oppor­tu­ni­ties to earn contin­uing educa­tion credits.

All nurses licensed in Washington state have access to HEALWA. Created by an act of the Washington State Legis­la­ture in 2007, and admin­is­tered through a collab­o­ra­tion between the Univer­sity of Washington Health Sciences Library and the Washington State Depart­ment of Health, HEALWA is the only resource of its kind in the entire country. And for nurses, regis­tering for a HEALWA account is free.

HOW TO SIGN UP #

Regis­tering takes about five minutes and requires your license number and the email address you use to commu­ni­cate with the DOH.

• In a web browser, navigate to www​.heal​-wa​.org and click the ​“Getting Started” link near the center of the homepage.
• Select the option to ​“Create a UW NetID.” Then enter your last name, date of birth and license number (including the letters).
• HEALWA will send a message to the email address you entered to verify your identity. You’ll be asked to create a username and password.
• Create a username and password.
• Start using HEALWA!

To log in next time, click the ​“Log In” link in the top left of the homepage. To log, out simply close the browser window.

HOW TO SEARCH THE COLLECTION #

After regis­tering for a HEALWA account, the next question we often hear is, ​“How do I find what I’m looking for?” To take the guess­work out of searching, we’ve created ​“Toolkits” and ​“Where to Look.”

To use the toolkits, click the blue ​“Toolkits” button on the left side of the homepage. You’ll find resources grouped according to profes­sional license. The RN toolkit includes Nursing Refer­ence Center, DynaMed (a great alter­na­tive to UpToDate), Patient Educa­tion Refer­ence Center, CINAHL Complete and more.

Feel free to use any profession’s toolkit! Once you’re logged in, all HEALWA’s resources are avail­able to you.

If you know what sort of infor­ma­tion you need but not where to find it, visit the ​“Where to Look” page. It’s nestled in the ​“Help” section, which can be found from the homepage by clicking the ​“Help” link in the top right, then ​“Where to Look” along the left side of the page. Here you’ll see resources listed according to infor­ma­tion need, like drugs, mental health condi­tions and alter­na­tive medicine.

HEALWA TUTORIALS #

For help navigating the HEALWA collec­tion, take a HEALWA webinar. To sign up, visit the ​“News” section on HEALWA’s homepage. Atten­dees earn one Contin­uing Nursing Educa­tion (CNE) credit.