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Objective: To report on the successful working partnerships between Canadian and British staff that have been established in the BMJ Knowledge Information Team.

Methods: A process evaluation of our experiences working with colleagues from Canada based on a questionnaire and personal testimony covering all members of our Information Specialist Team. We will look at what can be learned and identify the elements that have allowed this to proceed successfully.

Results: The evaluation is currently ongoing, but we already know that employing three different Canadian librarians over recent years has produced a successful outcome in each case. Common characteristics do run across each appointment, but each post and situation was distinct, so we wish to understand more about the factors that contributed to this success, both at the organisational (the BMJ and Canadian employers) and the individual level. We hope to analyse more fully the value of this form of cross-border sharing of staff expertise and highlight what circumstances allow it to work effectively, in the way that we have experienced.

Conclusions: Working abroad in a professional library/information post can be a rewarding exercise, but is often a 'hit and miss' process. We hope by analysing our experiences, we can provide an insight into the factors that are required for success, both for the individual and the employers involved, which will help others to replicate the good outcomes we have achieved.

Contact details for O. Beaven and T. Rader
BMJ Knowledge
BMJ Publishing Group
BMA House
Tavistock Square
London
WC1H 9JR
U.K.

Email: obeaven@bmjgroup.com
Email: trader@bmjgroup.com
Tel: +44 (0)20 7383 6083

Objective: To investigate whether a blog is an effective way to provide a current awareness service for long-term care practitioners.

Method: Many social networking technologies are ideally-suited to alerting users to new research and journal literature. While blogs in particular, provide potential for busy clinicians to stay current with new research, and an option for health librarians in delivery of information services, little research exists to determine whether they do so effectively.

Using a simple interface, and integrating information technologies such as RSS feeds and bookmarking tools, I created a hybrid weblog (http://infoltc.blogspot.com/) to communicate with health care practitioners in long-term care.

This poster will illustrate how a blog can be used to provide a current awareness service in long-term care, and will also report on tools (survey and blog statistics) to evaluate use and satisfaction with the blog.

Results: Blog statistics will report on frequency of use and page views. Survey results will include profession of visitor, comparison to other current awareness services, useful areas of the blog, and overall satisfaction.

Discussion: A current awareness service using blogging and other social networking software is easily created and maintained, and is potentially an effective way of alerting healthcare professionals to new websites, resources and journal literature.

Laurie Blanchard
Outreach Librarian, Long Term Care
J. W. Crane Memorial Library
University of Manitoba Health Sciences Libraries
2109 Portage Avenue
Winnipeg, Manitoba
R3J OL3
Laurie_blanchard@umanitoba.ca
Ph: (204) 831-2943

Background: Global health is an interdisciplinary endeavor. In 2007, a group of McGill librarians from across the Library system began to collaborate in support of global health research and teaching, including organizing training workshops and maintaining a wiki as a guide to information resources. In preparing workshops, example subject searches were shared. It quickly became evident that the databases and Internet resources of no single discipline covered the topic comprehensively; valuable answers would be missed if topics in this interdisciplinary area were not searched across various resources.

Objective: To quantify the value of various bibliographic sources and Internet resources for identifying publications on global health.

Methods: 10 questions representing the various areas of global health will be searched in the health, social science, legal, and statistical databases and on Internet resources such as those provided by international organizations.

Results: The results will be classified by resource and by discipline to point out the strengths of each resource and the best resources to use for each discipline.

Discussion: This study will identify the best resources for finding global health information, analyzing results by number and quality. Results will suggest the most efficient strategies for finding information and will bring out the necessity of searching a range of resources for information on interdisciplinary topics.

Outline: Undergraduate students often find it difficult to select the most relevant research materials for their courses from the various resources offered through the Library website. Many universities use a course management system or CMS. One of the benefits of using a CMS, like Moodle, is that course materials can be accessed from one web location whenever and wherever students want. So why not use the course management system to push library resources relevant for specific courses?

Objective: To promote the use of library resources in first-year courses by integrating a library presence into the campus CMS, Moodle.

Methods: Nine first-year courses, including Nursing 101 and Psychology 101, were selected as part of a funded pilot for the 2007 Fall Term. A standard block of four library resources appears by default. In addition, course-specific resources are selected by the liaison librarian in consultation with the course instructor. Course-specific resources include electronic course reserves, databases such as CINAHL or PsycINFO, research guides, and tutorials. These additional resources are integrated into the courses and dynamically updated using an in-library developed "database of databases".

Results: It quickly became evident that the standard set of resources could be useful to all courses through to the 4th year level and was immediately provided in all Moodle course communities. Based on positive feedback from participating faculty and students, the service is expanding to other courses.

Discussion: Placing direct links to library resources in Moodle provides students with one-click access to a visible set of Library resources. Other resources could include a link to RefWorks, online reference tools, and websites. This project expands the use of a database originally designed to manage the Library's databases on our website to include managing library resources in the CMS. Liaison librarians can use this service to partner with faculty in promoting the use of library resources as well as participating in course forums and chats. Bring the Library to the student by using the CMS as a gateway to library resources.

Objective: This poster presentation will highlight more recent consumer health initiatives in fostering health literacy and the consumer health librarian's role in ensuring patient and families understand the most recent evidenced based health information.

Health literacy is defined in Healthy People 2010 as: "The degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health decisions". 1

Health literacy is not just knowing how to read. It requires a complex set of skills involving listening, problem solving, and a set of decision making skills that can be over whelming for many individuals. Research has show that low health literacy is often linked to higher rates of hospitalizations and higher costs associated with increased emergency visits and overall health care costs.

2007 statistics show 60% of adult Canadians (ages 16 and older) lack the capacity to obtain, understand, and act upon health information and services and to make appropriate health decisions on their own. 2

Ensuring culturally appropriate resources are available can sometimes be a significant challenge, however with the growing immigrant population in Canada it is ever more important for consumer health librarians to be diligent in advocating for such resources.

Consumer health librarians are often faced with the challenges of ensuring patients, families, and the public have a good understanding of their health care needs and options. Utilizing their expert knowledge, librarians have the ability to help individuals make informed health decisions.

This poster presentation will highlight more recent consumer health initiatives in fostering health literacy and the consumer health librarian's role in ensuring patient and families understand the most recent evidenced based health information. The poster will feature examples of existing programs, tips to ensure patients and families get what they need and opportunities for librarians to advocate for healthy public policy and more health research.

Objective: The Saskatchewan Health Information Resources Partnership (SHIRP) provides library instruction to healthcare practitioners across Saskatchewan as part of its mission to provide the province's health community with access to critical evidence-based health information. This poster will describe the use of a portable lab for instruction.

SHIRP Training
The Saskatchewan Health Information Resources Partnership (SHIRP) provides library instruction to healthcare practitioners across the province as part of its mission to provide Saskatchewan's health community with access to critical evidence-based health information.

The Need for Hands-on Training
Training has previously included a mix of presentation style demonstrations and computer lab training where lab facilities exist. Participant feedback reflected a preference for hands-on training; however, most rural health facilities do not have computer labs and it can be difficult for practitioners to travel to another facility in their region.

The Lab
To address the need for hands-on training in more facilities, SHIRP created a portable lab composed of 5 laptops, each equipped with anti-virus software, Windows Firewall, a spare 9 cell battery, and a cordless optical mouse; a wireless broadband router; an LCD projector; a portable printer; and a custom travel case. There has been the odd bump along the way, but overall the introduction of the portable lab has been smooth.

The Participants' Response
Since August 2007 the lab has functioned well in a variety of spaces, and the response to the new equipment has been very positive. Participant comments received both informally and through the session evaluations indicate that they want - and need - hands-on sessions to strengthen their skill using the SHIRP library resources.

Objectives: The Regina Qu'Appelle Health Region (RQHR) Health Sciences Library provides library services for physicians, staff, and medical residents and needed to better understand who the users are, what their information needs are, and how the library can best meet those needs. The main purposes of the study were to determine, among RQHR staff and physicians

1. the level of awareness of library services,
2. the use of library services,
3. the frequency of library patrons requiring information, and
4. the reasons why library patrons require information.

Design & Methods: A survey was sent to all RQHR physicians and medical residents (n=564), and a random sample of RQHR health practitioners identified as information users (n=1200).

Results & Conclusions: The response rate among physicians and staff was 47% . Staff and physicians are continuing to use print departmental collections, and lack of computer access is impeding complete adoption of electronic resources. However, easy offsite access is a critical issue that needs to be resolved. The library needs to implement easier off site access. Despite significant promotional activities some staff remain unaware of the library and library services. Additional work needs to be done to identify the pockets and enhance library promotion. Departmental print collections continue to be important for responding to immediate information needs.

Background: The Ontario Public Health Libraries Association (OPHLA) is a community of information professionals who work in partnership from within public health units across Ontario. In winter of 2007, OPHLA became aware that an e-learning module on information searching and retrieval was being developed for the Public Health Agency of Canada's Skills Enhancement for Public Health Program and offered to enhance the module's content with public health-focused information.

Objectives: Building on the already developed content, OPHLA integrated into the module their own custom designed information tools and products. The additional topics included in the updated version of the module, and their scope, were chosen to provide public health practitioners with rudimentary skills in information literacy, basic literature searching, information management and awareness of intellectual property issues.

Methods: Contributors employed their collective public health information expertise to design the module. After several consultations, the group developed a strong project model and focused work plan. They incorporated into the content of the module tutorials based on instructional materials used to train public health unit staff to address the requirements of an online learning environment. Feedback from a pilot session was utilized to include additional information identified by users as useful.

Results: The course has been evaluated by a test group, with excellent reviews, and approved for inclusion in the Skills Enhancement program across Canada. The module's customized information literacy instruction and provision of appropriate research tools will empower public health practitioners to become more efficient information users. This project also allowed OPHLA to promote the role of information professionals in public health research.

Objectives: To measure the value of using demonstration videos / online tutorials in place of one-on-one training for basic training in a hospital setting.

Methods: Created a demonstration video that will be posted on the hospital intranet to teach library users how to access journals through the library website. Monitored frequency of use of demonstration video and invited all users to participate in an online survey / test to measure the impact.

Hypothesis: The number of one-on-one instructional sessions that were requested by users of the virtual collection will be reduced with the availability of demonstration videos. With the availability of demonstration videos, training resources will be available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. A cost-benefit analysis will prove this to be a beneficial tool for hospital libraries.

Discussion: The preference for demonstration videos / online tutorials is a personal choice. While we understand that some users will never use demonstration videos, the availability of an alternate source of information will meet some users needs. This will reduce staff time spent training users and increase accessibility to training for users.

This poster will have two components, a poster and an electronic demonstration of the video.

Contact: Risa Shorr (rshorr@ottawahospital.on.ca), Alexandra Davis (adavis@ottawahosital.on.ca ) or Margaret Quirie (mquirie@ottawahospital.on.ca)

The Ottawa Hospital
501 Smyth Road,
Ottawa, ON
K1H 8L6
(613) 737-8899 x78529

Program Objective: Develop a simple, re-usable method to help students quickly identify and select the best tools for answering clinical questions.

Librarians delivered a 3-hour workshop on evidence tiers and synthesized information resources to 75 students, as part of a transitional program for physicians educated abroad. None of the participants had prior exposure to synthesized information products. Using feedback from a similar clerkship program, where students reported difficulty understanding and applying the well-known evidence pyramid (Haynes, 2006), librarians developed a "tierless" evidence pyramid within which 13 search tools were placed in a loosely-arranged vertical order from most distilled (e.g. BMJ Clinical Evidence) to least distilled (e.g. Google). To further help students, 3 smaller subset pyramids were developed, containing information tools to best answer questions about diagnosis, treatment options or drug information. Students were taught to match the clinical question to the best subset pyramid and then select and search from resources in that pyramid.

Results: The simplified tierless pyramids enabled students to select the best tools for specific types of questions without requiring a deep understanding of each tool's content or features.

Conclusion: Initial results indicate that this method can save valuable instruction time, and additionally could be used to introduce undergraduate medical students to evidence-based information tools earlier in their medical education. The method will be used in September 2008 to introduce synthesized resources at lower levels of the undergraduate medical curriculum, thereby enabling subsequent clerkship sessions to focus more on comparative appraisal of information tools.

References: Haynes, RB. Of studies, syntheses, synopses, summaries, and systems: the "5S" evolution of information services for evidence-based healthcare decisions. Evid Based Med 2006 Dec;11(6):162-4.

Please address communication to:

Rita Vine
Gerstein Science Information Centre
University of Toronto
9 Kings College Circle
Toronto ON M5R 3M6
rita.vine@utoronto.ca
416-946-4041 voice
416-971-2848 fax

Objective
The Western Ontario Health Knowledge Network (WOHKN) is a newly created not-for-profit, voluntary cooperative between Western (UWO), Grey Bruce Health Services, London Health Sciences Centre, Shared Library Services and St. Joseph's Health Care, London. The basis for the WOHKN partnership is the mutual care, teaching, and research goals of the partners and is founded in the view that collaboration between the libraries is mutually beneficial and will allow for excellence in service for hospital and professional staff, faculty and students. Additionally, WOHKN partners believe that equal access to quality knowledge-based information is required for enhanced patient care and patient safety, and for the provision of best practice.

Setting
WOHKN hospitals currently represent 29 sites with 16,707 clinical and other staff mostly with the Southwest Local Health Integration Network (LHIN 2).

Method
In the Fall of 2005, library leadership from the respective organizations developed a project plan which included data collection in the current local context, an overview of existing provincial and regional models and a significant amount of consultation. In March 2006, a preliminary report was delivered to the Steering Committee and to library staff and an implementation plan and structure was then established for the development of the regional library network.

Results and Discussion
WOHKN partners officially sanctioned the relationship between its parties via a Letter of Intent. A robust collection strategy was developed and a common suite of electronic journals, e-books, databases and evidence-based resources was established. A portal was designed and launched - www.wohkn.ca. WOHKN's strategic and operational aspects are now managed by its Planning and Operations Committee which receives recommendations from five sub-committees in the areas of: Collection Development, Communications, Services, Information Technology and Purchasing/Contracts.

Next Steps
The evolution of WOHKN and expansion to partners within our LHIN will occur by working progressively through a balanced use of evidence based practice, continuous re-evaluation, together with the flexibility for innovation and responsiveness to community, regional and provincial concerns.

Objective: We planned to determine what behaviours were expected from nurses and physicians to function as competent clinicians and use these findings to suggest what liaison librarians can do to assist both groups to develop the skills necessary to survive and to thrive in clinical settings.

Methods: Building on our shared experiences as liaison librarians we explored the professional cultures of both groups by conducting a review of the literature on the professional cultures of nursing and medicine. We aimed to link our findings on the each group's skills and valued behaviours with suggested content, methods and objectives for the delivery of evidence-based practice training.

Results: The evidence was less abundant and more difficult to find than we anticipated. It became necessary to rely on less systematic and more serendipitous methods of searching, including using Google and Amazon to search book content. Much of the literature on this topic was American and from the 1980s and 1990s which made it difficult to transfer to today's electronic environment and to the Canadian health care context. Evidence was also more general, and some interpretation was required to apply it to evidence-based practice.

Conclusions:

Implications for Practice: The way in which we approach evidence-based practice in medicine is different from the way we need to address it in nursing. This reflects the different professional philosophies and subcultures of these two professions. In medicine, the overarching issue is certainty vs. uncertainty and evidence-based information and resources give students, practitioners and faculty a way to deal with this uncertainty. For nursing students, the resources they need are more theoretical and qualitative in nature, while after graduation the information is sought to inform their own practice and thus is tied more specifically to nursing interventions.

Implications for Research: Our study identified a lack of evidence around how different health professions' subcultures affect the information that they require and how best to educate them in evidence-based practice. In order to validate the implications for practice above we hope to conduct a qualitative research study with students, faculty and/or practitioners to assess their information needs and to develop some generalizable learning objectives and strategies for delivery of our evidence-based practice skills training.

Objective: The objective of this project was to increase accessibility of the archives of the Ontario Health Libraries Association. This would impact not only the individual members who may want to review past activities and projects, the executive and other committees of the OHLA that require quick reference to past history and data, but also other organizations and associations with whom we have affiliations and share activities.

Methods: The methodology of the project involved three steps: 1) identifying materials which would be included in the archive from an existing collection of documents; 2) digitizing the archival materials; and 3) posting the digitized documents to the existing website.

Results: Documents from the inaugural meetings in December 1985 through to the present were assessed for inclusion. Approximately 185 separate documents were chosen based on the inclusion criteria developed by the executive. These were forwarded to Emmett Digital Solutions Inc, where they were digitized into pdf files, and named according to the document type and year of origin. OHLA’s Webmaster organized the documents into natural groupings, and posted these to the website using HTML coding. The archives were made available on the website April 2008.

Discussion: It is expected that the impact of this new accessible archive for the association will be that similar library associations, may model this method of making materials accessible. Making the organizational memory available helps current projects flow more smoothly and contributes to the field of health librarianship by broadening the shared knowledge base.