Phrase Searching is a technique to find exact matches for a set phrase. In other words, when you use a phrase search, your results will contain the chosen words in the exact order you enter them.
Perform a phrase search by putting terms within a set of double quotes.
traumatic brain injury (75,073 results) -> "traumatic brain injury" (55,506 results)
anterior cruciate ligament (32,267 results) -> "anterior cruciate ligament" (31,464 results)
human immunodeficiency virus (457,286 results ) -> "human immunodeficiency virus" (114,050 results)
Using phrase searching is not always necessary or desirable when performing searches. You may not want to use phrase searching if key word searching if you want a broader search using key words. Furthermore, you may not want to use phrase searching in PubMed, as it disables a feature in PubMed that matches your terms to correct like-terms.
