"Hospital libraries"

Thymus plays a crucial role in cellular immunity by acting as a warehouse for proliferating and differentiating lymphocytes. Thymic stromal cells educate T-cells to differentiate self from non-self antigens while nurse cells and thymoproteasome play a major role in the maturation and differentiation of T-cells. The thymic conditions dictate T-cells to cope with the risk of cancer development. A study was designed to demonstrate potential mechanisms behind the failure to eliminate tumors and impaired immune surveillance as well as the impact of delay in thymus regression on cancer and autoimmune disorders...

The aim of this paper is to review the topic of neonatal fractures of the upper limb, describing the different types of fractures focusing on the etiology, epidemiology, risk factors, clinical approach, diagnosis, treatment and prognosis of these injuries. We included all types of research studies, both experimental and observational, published in English, French, Portuguese and Spanish. The information was obtained using the keywords neonatal upper limb fracture, clavicle fracture or humerus fracture from the following resources: MEDLINE database, Embase®  database and LILACS database...

An electronic table of contents (eToC) program was implemented by a medical librarian more than 11 years ago at a pediatric hospital (now a clinical and academic health system) with the goal of saving healthcare providers time and assisting them in staying current on the literature in their specific disciplines and/or general medicine. The eToC program still remains a highly popular service with more than 180 clinicians participating. This paper describes the implementation and maintenance of the program.

This study reports on a 2022 survey of pediatric hospital librarians in the U.S. and Canada to assess the status of staffing, resources, and services in their libraries. The report compares the data against the MLA Hospital Library Caucus Standards (2022) and the Canadian Hospital Library Association Standards (2020). The report also provides a comparison of the libraries' rankings using the Regional U.S. News & World Report Best Children's Hospitals and Magnet status. This approach is intended to determine how librarians and library services at hospitals that are recognized by the above programs differ from those that are not recognized...

ObjectiveThe aim of this study was to describe Australia's government-supported clinical knowledge and information resource portals and their alignment with government policies for digital health within an Australian context, and to clarify the role of hospital libraries in the public health system as an adjunct to state and territory portals.MethodsGovernment-supported clinical resource portals in Australian states and territories were examined and benchmarked. A comprehensive search of Australian state, territory, and federal government websites was conducted for strategies, policies, and projects relating to medical research, digital health, and health workforce education...

BACKGROUND: Health professionals require up-to-date information in their pursuit of evidence-based practice in health care. There is a plethora of literature on information behaviour of different user groups across disciplines in Malawi with little evidence on health professionals. OBJECTIVES: The study investigated the information behaviour of health professionals at one of the three biggest hospitals in Malawi. METHODS: A descriptive survey design was used...

Medical libraries in Sweden are digitised to a large extent, technically advanced and developing rapidly. This paper investigates technological trends among Swedish medical libraries in the near and distant future and their application within different areas of library activities. The authors also present a roadmap to increase technological developments within medical libraries in Sweden. Current technological trends include digital collaboration tools, mobile technologies and visualisation. Artificial intelligence, big data and smart technologies are upcoming trends...

BACKGROUND: During the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, many consumer health libraries were forced to close their doors to patrons. At the Health Information Center in Knoxville, Tennessee, the physical space closed, while health information services continued to be provided via phone and email. To examine the impact of lack of access to a physical library for consumer health information, researchers analyzed the number of health information requests pre-COVID-19 pandemic compared to during the initial phase of the pandemic...

The Hospital Library Caucus of the Medical Library Association (MLA) follows the practice established in 1953 of developing quality indicators and best practices in the newly developing and fast-changing world of hospital libraries. As these libraries increased in number and prominence, the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Hospitals (JCAHO) included in 1978 a hospital library standard developed in collaboration with MLA. Subsequent changes in JCAHO, then The Joint Commission (TJC) knowledge management criteria as well as technological changes in the curation and delivery of evidence-based resources influenced standards changes over the years...

In 2007, Diane Ream Rourke published in this journal, the history and explanation for Baptist Hospital in Florida to include its library on its successful Magnet journey. This article draws heavily from American Nursing Credentialing Center (ANCC) Magnet Information pages. It begins with a quick review of the history of the Program, further suggestions for a librarian's contribution to obtain Magnet Recognition and a brief current literature review on the values Magnet Recognition brings to a hospital's economics, patient care, and nursing staff...

OBJECTIVE: The study purpose was to understand how early months of the COVID-19 pandemic altered interlibrary loan (ILL) and document delivery (DD) in North American health science libraries (HSLs), specifically the decision-making and workflow adjustments associated with accessing their own collections and obtaining content not available via ILL. METHODS: Researchers distributed an online 26-question survey through 24 health science library email lists from January 6-February 7, 2021...

Public libraries have conducted collection diversity audits, but this is the first known report of a diversity audit in the hospital library community. A two-part questionnaire was sent to hospital librarians to determine their use of diversity audits in collection management and to provide a tool for a preliminary assessment of their collections' diversity. Results of the questionnaire indicate that developing diversity within hospital library collections is important to these respondents. These librarians also support diversity in their library personnel, open access, researching critical gaps, and programming...

Since 2006, the University of Tennessee's Preston Medical Library has collected survey feedback from exiting residents through targeted emails or at the required exit process in the library. Questions ask residents which types of articles or sources they use to find information and address the resident's use of the library's physical space. Survey results from 2006 to 2021 were examined for trends and changes in resident utilization of resources to better inform future library decisions on instruction and marketing...

Hospital libraries have a long and storied history in the United States. Since the 1700 s, they have provided vital resources to the medical community. Over time, hospital libraries have evolved regarding staffing, resources, and access, yet their mission has remained the same-they are expected to provide the best possible medical information to support patient care. Hospital librarians need to appreciate the history of their profession and the services they have provided in the past in order to sustain the value of their contributions well into the future...

BACKGROUND: Health librarians have traditionally provided mediated searches to support patient care, education and research. OBJECTIVES: This study aims to discover the types of search result formats used by health science libraries, determine current practice among health science libraries (types of requesters served, fees, deduplication, turnaround time and citation manager use) and uncover innovative methods for providing search results. METHODS: An online survey was distributed to the MEDLIB-L, ExpertSearching, MidContinental Chapter of the Medical Library Association and ICON listservs and through direct email to selected Association of Academic Health Sciences Libraries reference and education librarians...

Introduction: The association of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and ankylosing spondylitis (AS) in a single patient is a rarely described phenomenon. AS and RA are conditions that can have a high impact on the morbidity and mortality of patients. Methods: We described the clinical, epidemiological, analytical, and radiological characteristics of 81 patients with concomitant diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and ankylosing spondylitis (AS). Of these patients, seven were diagnosed at our hospital...

Cyberattacks on healthcare organizations increased dramatically in 2020 and 2021. The University of Vermont Medical Center suffered an attack in October 2020, during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. The disruption to hospital computer systems had wide-ranging impacts, including loss of online access to the medical library for nearly three months. Library staff worked to reduce impacts and increase access for hospital employees until full access was restored. This case study offers lessons learned and resources for health sciences libraries planning for a potential cyberattack...

Histories of bibliotherapy often emphasize the importance of the First World War in stimulating the development of bibliotherapeutic theory and practice. The word itself was used in a 1916 article by the American author Samuel McChord Crothers, while histories of bibliotherapy in the United Kingdom often foreground H. F. Brett-Smith's so-called "fever chart" of therapeutic books for treating shell-shocked soldiers. Despite this, however, we argue that a full account of wartime bibliotherapy (particularly the importance of British hospital libraries in its development) has yet to be told...

When the COVID-19 pandemic arrived in the United States in early 2020, it caused an information explosion in the health science literature. Researchers wanted to share their results quickly, so they utilized sources that were not indexed in conventional databases. Hospital librarians stepped up to meet the information and public health challenges of the pandemic. They developed alternate strategies to provide services and resources remotely at a time when their physical libraries were closed to comply with the need for social distancing and compliance with public health recommendations...

OBJECTIVES: Current literature recommends online research guides as an easy and effective tool to promote LGBTQ+ health information to both health care providers and the public. This cross-sectional study was designed to determine how extensive LGBTQ+ health guides are among hospital and academic libraries and which features are most prevalent. METHODS: In order to locate LGBTQ+ health guides for content analysis, we searched for guides on the websites of libraries belonging to the Association of Academic Health Sciences Libraries (AAHSL) and the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL)...