IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF THE MEDICAL SCHOOL LIBRARY.
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Academic medical school libraries are at different stages in implementing the recommendations of the Matheson report. Many have moved to higher-level tasks and are beginning to engage in the significant tasks described in the report; others are reviewing their future options. In the meantime, it is 6:00 P.M. of Mary Smith's first hospital day. How did we, as librarians, contribute to her diagnosis and treatment?
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A questionnaire was sent to all medical school libraries listed in the Annual Statistics of Medical School Libraries in the United States and Canada (1983-1984) asking librarians to describe their end-user programs. Of the 113 responding libraries, 78 had an end-user program. All provided some kind of formal instruction, 39 made equipment available to end users, and 22 provided and administered passwords. The reasons most cited for starting a program were staff interest and patron requests. The two most frequently taught systems were NLM/MEDLINE and BRS/Colleague. In general, respondents felt positive about the programs and planned to continue them. The most frequently mentioned problem was need for more equipment.
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The organization of a new medical school library offered a unique opportunity to develop machine methods of bibliographic control and to use electronic data processing for library routines. The development of the program and an analysis of major problems is reported. The program uses IBM record unit, punched card equipment: the IBM 407 Model E8 Accounting Machine, the IBM 26 Printing Card Punch, the IBM 82 Sorter, and the IBM 85 Collator. The total machine rental. with educational discount, for the program is $506.50 per month. A specific report is given of the ordering. receiving, and processing (including cataloging) procedures.
Factors to consider in determining the type of new medical school library include geographical location, proximity of general library facilities, and financial support. The librarian should be directly responsible to the dean of the medical school, have faculty status, and be a member of the administrative council. Five professional librarians and five clerical workers plus part-time help are necessary to initiate a well-organized library. The basic collection for a medical research library will cost approximately $500,000, and an annual operating budget should be about $103,000. Selection of journal titles for subscription is the first major consideration; the second is the selection of basic, standard monographs. Immediate public service functions include meeting the needs of the new incoming faculty, aiding in the recruitment of faculty, and establishing good rapport with the local medical community. The librarian of a new medical school library must be a leader in every respect of medical librarianship.
The breadth and depth of services that ninety-two medical school libraries offer to individual users were ascertained by interviewing the heads of these libraries, employing a standardized inventory procedure developed earlier (Bulletin 56:380-403, Oct. 1968). Selected aspects of the descriptive data obtained on services to faculty and to medical students are presented and commented upon. Comparisons with the findings of earlier surveys suggest that increases in the staffs and budgets of medical school libraries over the past two decades have gone largely to supporting a rapidly increasing volume of service, rather than to any striking increase in the breadth and depth of services. To facilitate summarization and comparisions among libraries the descriptive data were weighted and converted to quantitative measures; the weighting scheme was established by a group of five academic medical librarians to reflect the relative values the group assigned to different services. One of these quantitative measures, the percentage score for overall services relative to the optimal library, summarizes a library's services in a single figure. On this measure, medical school libraries ranged from 38 percent to 87 percent; the median overall score was 63 percent. Results of some exploratory analyses are described; these analyses attempted to find explanations for the observed differences among libraries and among geographical regions on the quantitative measures. Present and potential uses of the survey data for managerial and research purposes are discussed. One of the most important of these uses is in establishing and implementing standards-activities which should be carried out by the library profession itself-and recommendations are made for a program of such activities that is appropriate for the Medical Library Association.