BME older people and depression is a web-based database of literature on the extent and impact of depression on BME older people in the UK and the acceptability, accessibility and effectiveness of social care provision.

The database currently contains 60 journal articles, descriptive studies and short papers identified in the following ways:

• Extensive background scoping of the topic
• Systematic searching of 8 bibliographic databases
• Searching databases of research organisations
• Searching and browsing key journals
• Harvesting references from key documents
• Searching for further records by key authors in the field
• Recommendations from key organisations in the field

The dates of literature coverage are 1990 to April 2007.

The map indicates that there may be important gaps in research on the access and use of social care services for BME older people with depression.

Records have been systematically keyworded with generic keywords (e.g. country, type of study, population group and intervention characteristics (including setting, provider and type)) and subject specific keywords (e.g. ethnic background of population, incidence of depression, assessment tools used for depression, and the types of outcomes reported).

Searches can be carried out using these keywords, or by using free text terms. Individual search stages can be combined in the 'Search History' using the boolean operators AND, OR and NOT. Several other functions have recently been added to facilitate searches on this database. Use 'Explore' to browse a list of studies which have been coded according to a selected keywording term. The 'Crosstabs' function can be used to generate a table comparing keywording terms against each other.

The summary report on the systematic map including the original search strategy is available on the SCIE website by clicking here.