About the Knowledge Hubs

What the hubs do

• One search, all databasesOne term is enough: the search runs in all databases of the hub, from PubMed to German registries.
• Search in German, find internationallyYou enter the German technical term. International databases automatically receive the English one.
• New studies every morningNew articles from PubMed, selected for their relevance to Germany and summarised in German.
• Newsletters and downloadsThe daily selection arrives by e-mail on request and can be downloaded as a Word or Excel file.
• No tracking cookies, no third-party servicesThe hubs use no third-party analytics or tracking. A cookie is only set if you choose light or dark mode yourself. IP addresses are not stored.
• Free and openAll hubs are free of charge. You need neither an account nor a registration, and there is no paywall.

How the search works

Every database has a tile in the hub: a box with its name and a link. You enter a term at the top, for example „Primärversorgung“ (primary care), and click In allen Datenbanken suchen (search all databases). A click on a tile then opens the matching search in that database, in a new tab. Each tile shows which of three kinds it is:

Show results directly. The second button („Treffer direkt anzeigen“) queries seven openly accessible databases at once, the same in every hub: PubMed, Europe PMC, OpenAlex, Crossref, DOAJ, ClinicalTrials.gov and Zenodo. All results appear in one list directly below the search field, 25 per page; duplicates are merged. For the first results the Unpaywall service checks whether a free full text exists, and if so a link is shown. The list can be saved as a Word or Excel file or exported as RIS or BibTeX to reference managers such as Zotero, EndNote or Citavi.

Glossary. You search with a German term. For international databases the hub translates it into English automatically, using 1,340 German technical terms with their English equivalents, for example Nutzenbewertung → health technology assessment or Routinedaten → claims data. The translation is a fixed list, not AI.

Search operators. With the words AND, OR and NOT (Boolean operators) you combine several terms:

Not every database understands these operators. We tested each one. Every tile shows whether they were tested and work (AND/OR ✓), tested and do not work (AND/OR ✗) or have not been tested yet (no mark).

Getting the full text

The hubs show where literature can be found; you read the text itself with the provider. Much of it is openly accessible: open access articles, for example from Monitor Versorgungsforschung, as well as reports and decisions of G-BA, IQWiG or RKI. If an article is behind a paywall, five legal routes help, even without access through a university or hospital:

• Nationallizenzen. Funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG). After free registration you can read many journals and e-books.
• Unpaywall. Finds a freely accessible version of an article.
• Open Access Button. Finds free versions or asks the authors.
• subito. Document delivery service of the libraries; sends you the article for a fee.
• Interlibrary loan (Fernleihe). Ordered through your local library, in the K10plus catalogue.

New studies every morning

Every morning new studies appear in each hub: articles newly added to PubMed, with a German summary, the key result figures and an assessment of how well the result transfers to Germany. The hubs on health care topics and the obesity hub select from all new PubMed records on their topic; diabetes, cardiology and oncology select from the core journals of their field.

Three criteria decide:

• Transferable to Germany: high for similar health systems (German-speaking countries, Benelux, France), medium (Scandinavia, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia), low (USA)
• A recognisable link to health care
• A clear result rather than a mere description; qualitative studies are included

What counts is the day PubMed adds a study, not its publication date; this is why older studies sometimes appear. At weekends usually nothing is added.

Selected and summarised by AI The selection of the studies and their German summaries are produced automatically by AI, without editorial review. This is why every one of these studies carries this label (in the hub: „Von KI ausgewählt und zusammengefasst“).

News and funding calls. Next to the studies, every hub shows current news and funding calls. The news are chosen by a simple keyword filter without any AI and therefore carry no label. The funding calls come from the funding radar (in German): an AI selects them, the texts come directly from the source. They therefore carry the label selected by AI.

Newsletters and downloads

Every hub has its own daily newsletter with its selection of studies, on weekdays at around 10 a.m. Several hubs can be ordered together, free of charge and cancellable at any time. The selection in the hub and the archive can also be downloaded as a Word or Excel file, for forwarding or analysis.

Choose newsletters →

What the hubs do not do

Two kinds of hubs

The same study may therefore appear in one hub and not in another. Depending on the hub, 1 to 15 % of the selected studies also appear in another hub. All 15 hubs at a glance are on the start page of the Knowledge Hubs.

The hubs in numbers

Databases: tiles in the hub, one per database. Live search: tiles whose click opens the results list directly. Categories: groups of databases in the hub. Glossary: stored German-English translations. Studies: studies selected so far. *Without duplicates. Click a column header to sort.

As of 30 October 2026. The study counts are refreshed every morning from all hubs; the other numbers are recounted every time this page is built.

Who is behind the hubs

The Knowledge Hubs are a service of Monitor Versorgungsforschung, the German journal for health services research and health economics, published by eRelation AG – Content in Health in Bonn. Our English-language journal is Monitor Healthcare Research. monitor-versorgungsforschung.de ↗