ABOUT THIS COLLECTION

View conference proceedings from the North Atlantic Health Sciences Libraries' 2018 Conference, held in Manchester, NH. NAHSL is a regional Chapter of the Medical Library Association (MLA). Membership is comprised of librarians, information professionals, and others from New England states, who are interested in health sciences libraries and the issues facing health-related libraries and information services. The theme of the 2018 conference was "Remaining Strong in an Ever-Changing Landscape."

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Recently Published

  • The Librarian Comes to You: Being Resilient in Times of Change

    Casella, Jessie (2019-07-08)
    Background: Due to library space downsizing and a virtual library collection, the librarian sought ways to meet staff and promote library resources. This was complicated due to the large area of the main campus and several satellite clinic locations. Objectives: The librarian developed a marketing approach that included working with a small library space and being outside of the library. The objectives were to increase staff’s awareness of library resources and services the librarian provides. Description: Online events included information sessions on library resources and training on Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint. Online scavenger hunts were held during National Medical Librarians Month and National Library Week to promote library resources and services. The librarian turned a closet into a small reading room and created a mobile patient resource cart. The librarian took part in hospital committees demonstrating skills that could assist each committee with their information needs and outreach work. The librarian also attended 10 outreach events on campus and in the greater community to promote the hospital’s work. Results: Increased visibility helped increase usage of library resources and services. Specific numbers will be available at the end of FY17/18 in September. The librarian was invited to join another committee on campus due to the design abilities demonstrated in other committees. Conclusion: These outreach efforts have helped increase library usage and helped the librarian meet staff from many departments. Staff now request library services beyond literature searches.
  • Collaboration and Innovation: NNLM’S Nationwide Online Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon: Lightning Presentation

    Coghlan, Karen (2019-07-08)
    There is a growing trend of libraries engaging their communities with information and open data by holding Wikipedia “edit-a-thons.” During the events, participants learn about the culture and norms of this widely used online resource by doing hands-on editing of articles, improving citations and adding new facts. The National Network of Libraries of Medicine (NNLM) held a health-focused edit-a-thon utilizing librarians’ research skills towards making Wikipedia a better and evidence-based resource in promoting NLM resources. Participants were able to view a customized training from Dr. James Hellman of WikiProject Medicine prior to the one-day event. On April 17, 2018 during the network wide online edit-a-thon, participants received online support from NNLM staff throughout the 12-hour event across the nation. At the end of the day, more than 700 edits were done in 111 articles focused on rare diseases. NNLM is planning similar events in future. This presentation will outline the planning process, marketing strategy, event details, evaluation, and future vision for this project.
  • Professional Skills for the Modern Student: How Librarians Developed and Taught a New Elective Course for Medical and Dental Students

    Gauthier, Marissa F; McIntyre, Rich Jr; Shiel, Teri (2019-07-08)
    In the Fall of 2017, a group of librarians at the UConn Health Sciences Library were exploring new instruction opportunities and decided to offer an elective on professional skills for first and second year medical and dental students. Our objectives were to become more involved with the Medical School’s curriculum, make more connections with students and faculty, and to represent the library and librarians in a new way. Our planning and ideas became “Marketing You,” a one-week, five-day course that taught students professional social media management strategies, how to write cover letters and resumes, how to design presentations and posters, and public speaking. Each session was two hours long and covered one professional topic with pre-class readings and media, in-class activities, discussion, and real-life examples. Students gave 10 minute presentations on the final day about what they learned over the week and what changes they made to their existing social media accounts, resumes, posters, or presentations. The course was taught in February-March 2018 and received great reviews and feedback from the six students who took the class. All students who took the post-class assessment rated it as being educationally beneficial, found the course content helpful, and enjoyed working with librarians. We benefited from the experience of honing our teaching skills, developing curricular materials, and learning more about the various course topics. We plan to offer Marketing You again in February 2019.
  • Organizing Centennial Resources Using Dataverse

    Casella, Jessie (2019-07-08)
    Background: The hospital is preparing to celebrate its centennial and the librarian had been asked to help gather materials. While many items were found, there was not a way to systematically organize and locate the items. Objectives: Many items were collected for the hospital’s centennial including hospital publications, scrapbooks, photos, and newspaper articles. The Librarian sought out how best to organize these items and make them findable for staff as well as members of the local historical societies. Description: After reviewing repository options, the librarian used Harvard’s Dataverse to create a catalog that can be accessed by staff and local historical groups. Hospital published materials as well as newspaper articles related to the opening of the hospital were cataloged in Dataverse. Each item was tagged with metadata. Images and hospital publications were uploaded to be accessible directly from Dataverse. When copyright allowed, newspaper articles were also uploaded directly to Dataverse. Results: The outcome is a searchable resource of the hospital’s centennial information that is currently still being added to. Standard naming conventions for newspaper articles proved to be challenging with multiple people scanning microfilm. Having a clear naming convention at the start would have saved time at later stages. Conclusion: This project allowed the librarian to demonstrate to leadership team members that there is more to library services than books and literature searching. The work of the historical research committee is appreciated by the hospital’s leadership team.