Ask a librarian and literature search services

Anyone can submit a question to the Library team. We can help with any queries relating to health and social care, whether you’re a health professional, student or a member of the public. 

We answer questions on any issues related to health and social care, including health inequalities, managing long-term conditions, NHS management, leadership, commissioning, patient and public involvement, Black, Asian and ethnic minority health, social care, older people and mental health care, workforce development and NHS reforms. 

If you have a publication title and need further details, or have a citation and need the name of the report or book, we can help. 

While we can’t undertake your assignment or essay on your behalf, we can help by advising which information sources would be suitable and how to search them most effectively. 

We recognise that there are many routes into careers in the NHS and social care, and with our unique free resource we can support further education colleges to prepare the workforce and leaders of the future. Our professional skills combined with our expert knowledge of the health and care landscape mean that we can provide tailored training and support on:

• identifying research, evidence and information for academic assignments and coursework – essential skills that will provide a strong foundation for your students to develop professional evidence-based practice

• evaluating and assessing research, evidence and information

• understanding the value of grey literature in research

• referencing and citation

Our study support sessions can be tailored for whole groups and centred around students' current assignments. Please get in touch with us to discuss your requirements.

Unfortunately, The King’s Fund can’t comment on individual cases or complaints relating to NHS organisations or other healthcare providers. We advise that you contact  

• Find your local Healthwatch | Healthwatch 

• Find patient advice and liaison services (PALS) - NHS (www.nhs.uk)  

• The Patients Association (patients-association.org.uk) 

We will curate a simple list of results from a literature search, in chronological or author order with abstracts. We include links to freely available resources and the search strategy used for each resource we have searched. This type of search will usually take at least a week. 

This is a list of relevant results of a literature search that have been screened and categorised by the library staff (e.g., by publication type or theme). We also provide an overview detailing the methods we have used and any key findings relating to the literature. We include links to freely available resources and the search strategy used for each resource we have searched. This type of search will usually take at least two weeks. 

Having carried out the literature search as above we will synthesise the search results for you to produce a short briefing identifying key evidence for your search topic. We include links to freely available resources and the search strategy used for each resource we have searched. This type of search will usually take at least three weeks.