This is a reminder that applications are due by Friday, August 1, 2008 for three MAR Awards:

EFTS Awards: http://nnlm.gov/mar/funding/efts.html

Planning Awards: http://nnlm.gov/mar/funding/planning.html

Technology Awareness Conference Award: http://nnlm.gov/mar/funding/techawareness.html

Now available: Online Search Clinic Recording for PubMed Update on Automatic Term Mapping, Citation Sensor, and Advanced Search

A 30 minute online search clinic was presented by the NLM® and the National Training Center and Clearinghouse (NTCC) via Adobe® Connect™ on Thursday, July 17th (2pm ET). The presentation  covered changes to PubMed including changes to how PubMed handles your search (the new automatic term mapping process), the citation sensor, and the beta Advanced Search page.

View the Clinic recording

Responses to questions that were not addressed during the Clinic time will be posted to this Web site in the near future.

Comments and suggestions regarding the new PubMed features and the search clinic are welcome.

For more training opportunities, see the National Training Center and Clearinghouse Web site and the NLM Distance Education page. Watch for announcements of new training resources in the NLM Technical Bulletin.

We hope you find the Search Clinic: PubMed Update useful and enjoyable.

We have heard from many libraries about rejecting requests from non-EFTS libraries. While we understand EFTS libraries’ desire to avoid paper invoices, we also understand non-EFTS libraries limits in participating in the program.

For all libraries that consider it acceptable to not fill for non-EFTS libraries, we urge you to consider the long-term implications and the potential exclusion this will impose on a large segment of the DOCLINE community. More importantly, if you elect to practice this method of rejection, please use some professional discretion:

• Urgent Patient Care requests require immediate service and all participating libraries should do their best to complete these request promptly for EFTS and non-EFTS requestors alike.
  
• Requests that have routed beyond the normal routing table (Refer to Resource Libraries, Refer on After NLM) have exhausted normal options for borrowing and need to be completed.
  
• Free reciprocal requests which would not require invoicing should not be rejected for non-EFTS libraries. Participation in a library group requires completion of requests per the terms of the group. Any library that is a member of FreeShare or BHSL *must* honor another FreeShare/BHSL library’s requests per group agreements. Even if the requesting library is not EFTS, that has no bearing on whether or not that library is FreeShare/BHSL.

DOCLINE requires that libraries provide reciprocal service and the rejection of an entire category of libraries from resource sharing seriously jeopardizes the continued success of DOCLINE.

MAR has explored non-EFTS libraries’ reasons for not participating in the program and we have found that these libraries are excluded not by choice, but by circumstance—hospital administrators and accounting departments that restrict the placement of money on deposit.

If you encounter a non-EFTS library, take a moment to encourage their membership in the program or refer them to their RML to help them join EFTS.

For non-EFTS libraries, MAR has recently launched a new EFTS award which provides up to $200 in starter funds. These funds can ensure that when and if you ever need to borrow for cost, the money will be there. It also marks your library as an EFTS participant. Please consider applying for this award (http://nnlm.gov/mar/funding/efts.html). Deadline for applications is August 1, 2008.

If you have questions, please contact the RML (rml@library.med.nyu.edu or 1-800-338-7657).

The American Library Association is beginning to rally libraries and their patrons for more privacy in this digital age.  They have posted their white paper on “Rallying Americans for the Right to Information Privacy” as well as posting videos of panel speakers at their recent conference.

You can find all of this on their Privacy Revolution Site.

The National Network of Libraries of Medicine, Middle Atlantic Region is pleased to announce the recipients of our initial round of Technology Innovation Awards!

The recipients are:

• Touro-Harlem Medical Library – Shelly Warwick – Building instructional capacity.
• Columbia University Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library – Flash screen network.
• University of Rochester Medical Center – Donna R. Berryman – CLIC-on-Health online outreach to refugees.
• St. Francis Medical Library – Rosemary Figorito – Projecto Salud – outreach and training to hispanic communities.
• John F. Kennedy Medical Center Medical Library – Lena Feld – Software Upgrade Promotes Enhanced Research (SUPER)

Congratulations to all the award recipients!

All MAR network members should keep an eye out for our next call for applications for Technology Innovation Awards in late summer or early fall!

The NN/LM Emergency Preparedness & Response Toolkit is an online resource for emergency preparedness and service continuity planning. The toolkit includes samples of disaster plans, a “first aid kit” for emergency contact information, an eight-step guide to service continuity planning, prepared PubMed searches on specific topics, current alert services for health, weather, and national security, and so much more in-depth information on emergency preparedness.

Some MAR highlights in the toolkit include an insightful interview with Michelle Volesko Brewer, New Jersey Hospital Association, in the Lessons Learned/Stories Told section. Under the Creating an MOU link is a sample memorandum of understanding written by Michelle Volesko Brewer and Barbara Reich, Hackensack University Medical Center.

For more information visit the NN/LM Emergency Preparedness & Response Toolkit, http://nnlm.gov/ep/

The History of Medicine Division of the National Library of Medicine is pleased to announce our newest website, AIDS Ephemera, based on an exhibit of that name at the NLM from November 2002 to June 2003.AIDS was first identified in 1981 and the initial response to the disease generated ephemeral public health materials, such as buttons, posters, cards, comic books, and even lunch boxes.  Since AIDS was both incurable and invariably fatal, these messages of prevention were the only effective steps public health officials could take.

Produced by government health departments as well as private organizations, these ephemeral objects became an important medium for messages of awareness, prevention, compassion, and responsibility.  Buttons and posters provided information on disease symptoms and safe practices, while comic books spun tales of the consequences of risky sex and needle sharing.

The materials for this website are drawn from the NLM’s Prints & Photographs collection.  Many donors contributed these materials—we wish to take special note of the contributions of William H. Helfand, who, as a consultant to the Library, organized and carried out a project to secure AIDS posters from the many agencies and organizations that were producing and distributing them in the 1980s and ’90s.

Please visit the site at: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/aidsephemera

NN/LM Middle Atlantic Region is pleased to announce three new affiliate members to our region.

The Elbridge Free Library (Elbridge, NY) is part of Onondaga County Public Library and was ranked by HAPLR as one of the best library’s of its size. The library provides reference services, literacy programs, books, magazines, and videos and is interested in increasing the amount of health information it provides to the community.

The Spalding Memorial Library (Athens, PA) is located on a historic plot between the Chemung and Susquehanna Rivers and shares its building with a local museum. The library provides services for all ages, including literacy programs and computer classes.

The Greater Canonsburg Public Library (Canonsburg, PA) provides services for adults, youth, and seniors. The library is currently raising funds for a new, expanded main library.

Please join us in welcoming these libraries to our region.  We look forward to partnering with them to help create a health information community in the Middle Atlantic Region.

The July issue of NIH News in Health, the monthly newsletter bringing you practical health news and tips based on the latest NIH research, is now online at http://newsinhealth.nih.gov/.  In this issue of NIH News in Health:

Medical Imaging
Changing Health Care, Saving Lives
If you or someone you know has had a mammogram to check for breast cancer, an X-ray to detect a broken bone, or an ultrasound to examine an internal organ, then you’ve seen the benefits of medical imaging firsthand.
full story

Are Your Wrists at Risk?
Learn About Carpal Tunnel Syndrome
You’re working at your desk, but you’re distracted by a tingling or numbness in your hand and wrist. Then a sharp, piercing pain shoots from your palm through your arm. If you’ve had symptoms like these for several days—or worse, weeks—or if they keep you up at night, you may have carpal tunnel syndrome.
full story

Health Capsules:

·   Social Ties Affect Smoking Behavior

·   Eating Well as You Get Older

·   Featured Web Site: Time to Talk

Click here to download a PDF version for printing.

Subscribe to receive email alerts when new issues of NIH News in Health are posted by going to https://list.nih.gov/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=nihnewsinhealth-l&A=1.