Nursing papers lean heavily on reports and web publications from bodies such as the CDC, WHO, HHS, AHRQ and NIH. They are easy to use and surprisingly easy to cite badly. This guide walks through the parts that trip people up, mainly in APA 7, with short notes for other styles.
A report from a health agency rarely has one named author. It may come from an agency inside a larger department, carry a report or publication number, and appear on a web page that is revised over time. Each of those facts changes what goes in the reference.
Illustrative examples. Titles, numbers and page paths below are placeholders or fictional. Copy the details from your own source, and follow your program's style requirements if they differ from what is shown here.
| Element | What to do (APA 7) |
|---|---|
| Author | Use the organisation that issued the report, written in full. If named individuals are credited on the report, use them instead. |
| Date | Year for a report, or year, month and day for a dated web page. Use n.d. if there is no date. |
| Title | Italic, sentence case. Copy the subtitle after a colon. |
| Report number | In parentheses after the title, not italic, for example (Report No. xx). |
| Publisher | Omit it when it is the same as the author. Include it when it differs, such as a parent department. |
| URL or DOI | Give the DOI as https://doi.org/... if there is one. Otherwise give the URL. Do not add "Retrieved from" unless the content is expected to change. |
The ProNursingWriters team can help you find, organise and format agency sources for your assignment.
Because the World Health Organization is both author and publisher, the publisher is left out.
When the author is an agency that belongs to a larger body, APA names the parent department or agency as publisher. For an institute within the National Institutes of Health, the publisher element usually lists both parents, for example U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health. Check the title page of the report itself, and confirm the convention with your instructor if your program has its own guide.
Use a retrieval date only for content that is designed to change and is not archived, such as a live data dashboard. For a stable report, the URL alone is enough.
Define the abbreviation the first time, then use it. For the full in-text rules, see APA in-text citations.
Health agencies revise pages often. Give the date shown for the version you used, usually the most recent date the page displays, such as an update or review date. If the page carries no date at all, use n.d. Check your program's preference, because some instructors also ask for the year of original publication.
Keep a note of the date you accessed each page as you research. Even when the style does not print it, you will need it if the page changes before you submit.
AMA numbers references in order of first citation with superscripts, and generally names the publisher. See the AMA guide. Capitalisation and the handling of agency publishers vary, so confirm against the manual.
Numbered in order of citation. See the Vancouver guide for how your program handles authors and place names.
Harvard varies by institution, so use your department's guide. See Harvard referencing.
Reference accuracy is part of academic integrity, so follow your institution's policy on citing sources. A full clinical practice guideline guide covers a related source type, and how to cite a website covers general web pages.
Use the format that fits what you read. A downloadable document with a title page, number or publisher is a report. A page that lives only on a website is a web page.
Only if it is the issuing body. If the report comes from an agency inside the department, the agency is the author and the department may be the publisher.
Use n.d. where the date goes, and consider whether an undated source is reliable enough for your paper.
Cite the version you actually read. If you only read a summary, cite the summary.