Annual MLA Meeting

Medical Library Association

On Sunday Jennifer presented a paper at the Annual Meeting of the MLA. The paper, co-authored by Jennifer, Sandy and Dr. Marion Slack from the College of Pharmacy, described a role-playing approach to teaching how to search scholarly literature. Jennifer spoke to a full house and answered several questions – a very successful presentation.

Brooke, Annabelle and Jeanette were co-authors, along with several other people, of a paper presented by Keith Cogdill from the University of Texas, San Antonio. This paper described the Frontera Collaboration, our collaborative project on border health information involving Texas, New Mexico and Arizona.

Jennifer presented another paper on Tuesday, this one co-authored by Dr. Marie Chisholm-Burns, Sandy and several others. Her presentation described the process of carrying out a systematic review of the pharmacy literature looking for evidence of the effect of pharmacists as team members on patient care. Again this was a very full room and Jennifer answered several questions and spoke to some audience members after the talk.

Also spotted at MLA were Clinical Education Librarians Kathleen Carlson from ASU, Marni Ditmar from TMC, Sally Harvey from Good Samaritan/Banner Health and Kathy Zeblisky from Phoenix Children’s Hospital. (Please let me know if I missed anyone.)

The meeting included many interesting papers and plenary speakers. I hope that those who attended can share what they learned with everyone else. I think everyone who attended has returned with new ideas, new information and new energy!

Posters, posters, posters, 24/7, Reception

Research Day
On Wednesday the AHSC presented the “Frontiers in Biomedical Research” Poster Forum on the AHSC plaza. AHSL was represented by two very nice poster presentations. Jennifer Martin and Sandy Kramer displayed their poster describing a literature-searching project in the College of Pharmacy. Our second poster presented work done on the Frontera Collaboration for border health by Annabelle, Brooke, Yamila and Jeanette. You can see Jennifer and Sandy’s poster on our website at:
http://www.ahsl.arizona.edu/about/presentations.cfm and I’m sure that any member of the Frontera team will be happy to share their poster with you. Thanks to everyone who made this event a success!

Collegiate Showcase
As part of Homecoming weekend the Health Sciences Center is presenting a “collegiate showcase” on the AHSC plaza today from 1-3:30 PM. The exhibit will feature posters from many organizations on the AHSC including the library. With short notice Yamila and Mary R. put together a beautiful poster representing the library. Stop by the plaza after our staff appreciation luncheon to see it. Thanks to everyone involved in getting this done!

Dr. John Palmer
Thanks to Nga for putting together a wonderful poster celebrating the life and career of Dr. John Palmer. Dr. Palmer will be receiving the UA Honorary Alumnus Award over Homecoming Weekend. You can see the poster in the glass cases, just outside the library entrance, near the doors at the top of the exterior stairway.

24/7 study area?
The request we get most from students is for longer hours. Many newer library buildings include a room with a separate entrance that is available 24/7 with no supervision. We are starting to explore the possibility of creating a 24/7 study area in room 2101, the Java City area. By closing off the room with a movable partition across the library side in the evenings and giving access from the hallway with a card swipe we may be able to meet the student’s needs. We are considering installing security cameras and perhaps employing a staff person if additional security is needed. We are working with Facilities, Risk Management, UAPD, UMC Security and ITS on this proposal. If you have any ideas or suggestions, please pass them along to any ATeam member.

Exhibit reception
Dr. Witte will be hosting another reception to publicize the exhibit, Creating a Community of Questioners for the Future. The reception will be held on Wednesday, October 27 from 4-6 PM. I’m sure that library staff will be welcome to attend.

WeSearch, Four Corners

WeSearch
This year AHSL again coordinated and presented the WeSearch Institute in collaboration with the UA School of Information Resources and Library Sciences (SIRLS). Annabelle and Yamila worked with Sandy Littletree from SIRLS to provide a week of training for local high school students. Here is an update from Annabelle.

“I just wanted to give you a brief update on last week's activities. As you know we wrapped up the WE Search Institute week last Friday (7/30) with a wonderful celebration event held here at AHSL. First and foremost I would like to acknowledge and thank Javad, Tessie, Katie, Valerie, and Mary R for helping us get us through the week. Principally with patron and visitor traffic flow with respect to the fourth floor. We had approximately 20 family and friends of the students and program supporters attend the event to hear the presentations, meet the mentors, and learn about WE Search.

This year we will be partnering with Desert View High School, the other Sunnyside Unified School District high school. Our main contact at Desert View is Richard Montaño who recruited seven exceptional 11th and 12th graders. We have a few students who identify as American Indian, a key component of the program we lacked in the last two years. We have three great KR Mentors as well - Azul Gomez, Natalia Phillips-Portillo, and Andrea Goodrich.

. . . Here are a few highlights [of the weeks schedule]:

- We worked on public speaking and presentation skills for their health topic powerpoints.
- We focused on evaluating health information websites, as well as searching for health information resources related to Hispanic and American Indian health.
- We discussed health disparities in Hispanic and American Indian communities.
- We toured two Tucson neighborhoods with distinct SES characteristics. (To illustrate issues around health disparities.)
- We looked at community resources for health fair planning and community development. (They will take an active role in the Refugee Health Fair in October.)
- We toured the following information environments:
Mary Givins - Teen Librarian, Martha Cooper Branch Library
Aaron Valdivia - Branch Manager, El Pueblo Branch Library [Guest Lecturer]
Lynn Flance - Librarian, VA Hospital
Merlin Spiller- Arizona State Museum
Joe Labuda, Library Director - Pima County Community College West Campus
Alexandra "Alex" Rivera, Outreach Librarian - UA Main Library (UAL)
Roger Myers, Special Collections - University or Arizona Libraries (UAL)”

Thanks to everyone involved for a really great effort that lays the groundwork for these students to have a productive and educational year.

Four Corners
Last week Gary, Jacque, Jeanette and Yamila attended a meeting of the Tribal Connections Four Corners (TC4C) group in Gallup, NM. Before the meeting, Jeanette and Yamila visited the Hard Rock community on the Navajo reservation in Arizona. It was quite a drive from the Albuquerque airport to Hard Rock and back to Gallup. However it sounds as if some good relationships were formed. Yamila and Jeanette have been invited back. AHSL is helping the community with their walking club project with support from the TC4C and the Midcontinental Regional Medical Library (RML) in Salt Lake City.

The Gallup conference was supported by the RMLs at UCLA, Houston Academy of Medicine and the University of Utah. The purpose of the meeting was to review the accomplishments of the TC4C collaboration and to plan for the future. We heard from an excellent panel of a doctor, health educators and a librarian who work on the Navajo reservation, at the Indian Health Service (IHS) and the Laguna, NM public library. We also visited the HIS Hospital in Gallup that includes a hogan and sweat lodge used in traditional Navajo healing.

MLA meeting (2)

Report from Washington (2)
This morning we heard the annual update from the National Library of Medicine. It’s a great reminder of the many programs and resources that they make available to the health sciences library community. We also heard the inaugural address of Ruth Holst, incoming president of the MLA, and were invited to attend next year’s meeting in Minneapolis. This afternoon Annabelle gave an invited presentation on AHSL’s collaboration with the College of Public Health, the Pima County Public Library, the Southwest Institute for Research on Women, and the UA Department of Women’s Studies to raise academic and community awareness of HPV (human papillomavirus).

Congratulations to Mary R. & Pat, Annabelle speaks, contribution, conference

Congratulations Mary R. and Pat!
The Student Union Advisory Council is recognizing Mary Riordan and Pat Auflick for their service to the refugee community. This is a Service Award in the Special Recognition category.
They will be recognized on the Student Unions' web site, on the Student Union Memorial Center information screens, in a Daily Wildcat advertisement and in a press release. A link to the Lo Que Pasa article about them was sent out on Wednesday.
At the end of the year they will receive an invitation to a reception held to celebrate the accomplishments of all honorees.
Here is some text from the nomination: Pat and Mary have led efforts to provide health information to refugees in Tucson. They created web pages and a handout of web resources on health information in foreign languages spoken by refugees resettled in Phoenix and Tucson. They arranged for library school and local high school students to help Tucson refugees find answers to health questions at a refugee health fair. They recently hosted the first national webinar on Foreign Language Health Resources for Refugees.
The work that Pat and Mary are doing helps support local and state groups (RISP-Net, the Refugee Integration Service Providers Network in Tucson, the Pima County Community Health Task Force (PCCHTF) and the Arizona Refugee Resettlement Program Conference.) A webinar on Foreign Language Health Resources for Refugees that they created and presented attracted a national audience. Recently they have helped medical librarians in other parts of the country find sources of health information in languages such as Hindi, Somali, Kirundi and others. This work has brought attention to the University from across the country in the medical library and healthcare communities.

Annabelle speaks!
Annabelle has been invited to participate in a panel discussion at a symposium at the annual meeting of the Medical Library Association in Washington, DC in May. The symposium is about “informationist” programs – librarians with subject expertise who work closely with clients. Annabelle has been asked to take part in the panel on public health. You may remember from a February update that Carol will be participating in the clinical informationist panel at the same symposium.

Thank you Dr. Taylor
This week the library received a $1,000 donation from Dr. Preston J. Taylor. Dr. Taylor began making housecalls in Tucson in 1956. In the 1980’s he joined the College of Medicine faculty and retired in 1995. He visits the library weekly and has told us that he loves the atmosphere in the library. His unrestricted gift will be used to augment our collection.

Scholarly Communications conference/4 Corners Directors meeting
Jeanette and Gary attended a meeting in Albuquerque last week titled, “Evidence-based scholarly communication; empowering information professionals to unlock translational research for our communities.” Jacque was going to drive to the meeting but was turned back by heavy snows and closed highways in northern Arizona! We took advantage of the gathering to have a 4 Corners Directors meeting before and after the meeting. The conference covered topics ranging from copyright and the NIH Open Access policy to a workshop on how to create an “elevator speech.”

Webinar, Video and Planning

Refugee resources webinar
On Thursday at noon Mary R. and Pat presented a webinar about sources of health information for refugees and others who may speak languages other than English. There were over 40 people watching from all over the United States and I’m sure that they found the presentation as interesting and informative as I did. Mary and Pat were using the WebEx software, which seemed to work very well for those of us viewing the presentation on our computers.

YouTube?
Annabelle is working with staff members in Biomedical Communications to produce a short (under 2 minutes) video about RefWorks. This is an experiment to see if this kind of “spot” can be used in D2L modules or on our website to bring attention to library resources.

Strategic Planning
Next week we’ll take the first step in planning for the library for the next five years. This process will soon involve everyone in the library. On Thursday and Friday the Administrative Team will be working with Rick Forsman, former director of the health sciences library at the University of Colorado. Rick will help us to plan a process for gathering input from the whole staff.

Teaching and teaching!

WeSearch
Last week Pat and Annabelle again taught the We Search students and SIRLS Knowledge River mentors. The students, from Sunnyside High School, learned about finding reliable health information and created their own digital stories about a personal healthcare experience.

Prologue
On Wednesday AHSL librarians took over the “Prologue” - orientation for incoming College of Medicine students. Annabelle took on the classroom session – co-teaching with Dr. Sean Eliot about the principles and practice of Evidence-based medicine. Meanwhile the other half of the student group was in our lab, searching for the answers to their first clinical questions with help from Mari, Carol and Sandy. After an hour the groups switched places. Sandra Martin and I observed both sessions and it was great to see the new students so engaged in learning. They got a wonderful introduction to library resources and to our staff.

Paper Presented at Annual Meeting

Congratulations to Pat and Annabelle who presented their paper, “Coalition for Change” at the Medical Library Association annual meeting in Honolulu on May 20. The paper was presented in a session on new partnerships for libraries and described their work with the Pima County Community Health Task Force.

More PR, Harassment Policy & Course, Budget

AHSL and SIRLS
In the Winter Issue of the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences Alumni newsletter each School and program submitted a short report. The entry from the School of Information Resources and Library Science (SIRLS) talks about the Knowledge River Program, features Annabelle’s testimony before Congress and mentions the WeSearch program with local high schools that Pat and Annabelle have led.

Nondiscrimination and Anti-harassment policy
Per President Shelton’s email yesterday regarding the online course on this topic, I refer you to this copy of the university’s policy. Please review this policy and feel free to print a copy for future reference. I encourage you to take the online course. It takes about 30-45 minutes and is very useful and informative.
http://web.arizona.edu/~policy/Non-discrim-interim.pdf

The course is available at:
http://www.equity.arizona.edu/education/harassment


Budget Update
The budget situation is still unsettled; we never know when things will shift. However, at the moment, the picture isn’t too bad. The Governor has announced that she is going to accept the federal stimulus package for the next fiscal year. One of the requirements of that funding is that the state budget for education be maintained at no lower than 2006 levels. This means that a cut for the next fiscal year is likely to be less than 10%. In past years this would have been a huge decrease (especially considering that we took a similar cut this year), but it is much lower than earlier projections.

Jacque & Kathleen, Visitor, Office Moves

Headline in UA News
Jacque generated some great publicity for the AHSL in working with Kathleen Carlson of ASU (and an AHSL Clinical Education Librarian) to produce a list of trusted consumer health web sites. She and Kathleen gave a presentation on finding health information on the web at a monthly breakfast series for UA and ASU faculty in Phoenix. Their presentation was picked up by one newspaper in Phoenix and by our own UANews.
Link: http://uanews.org/click/23783/1

Visitor
Sandra Martin, Interim Director of the Shiffman Medical Library at Wayne State University in Detroit will be visiting the library next week. As I mentioned in November, Sandra is an NLM/AAHSL Fellow, one of five this year, participating in this highly competitive program for librarians who show strong leadership potential. Sandra will be meeting with many people around the library to ask questions and to learn about our operations. She will visit us again, probably in late summer or early fall.

Office Moves
On Friday Jennifer will be moving downstairs to a cubicle “over the wall” from Amanda. Annabelle will be moving into the Information Desk Offices. This will make their former office available for the ITS Help Desk staff. For the next week Sandra Martin will be using Annabelle’s “old” desk.

Author: Nga, TV Stars: Pat and Annabelle

Congratulations to Nga who coauthored a paper that was published in “Oncology” on October 8, 2008. The full citation is: Nguyen, Nam, et al, 'Impact of tumor board recommendations on treatment outcomes for locally advanced head and neck cancer', Oncology (2008)75:186-191,
To link to this Article: DOI: 10.1159/000163058
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1159/000163058

TV Stars!
On Sunday, November 30, Pat and Annabelle appeared on “In Focus”, a show on KTTU, Channel 18 that deals with local and regional issues. They were interviewed about the WeSearch project, the Knowledge River program in SIRLS and the new roles of libraries and librarians. We will be adding a DVD copy of the program to the collection soon. Great job and great PR for the AHSL!