Health Sciences Interest Group

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Charge: An opportunity for academic librarians with health sciences responsibilities to have a place in ACRL to network, share information, ask questions, and work on special projects relevant to the academic health sciences.
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Differences between health sciences librarianship at a small medical school vs. big medical school with a hospital?

  • 1.  Differences between health sciences librarianship at a small medical school vs. big medical school with a hospital?

    Posted May 16, 2024 02:35 PM

    Hi, 

    The university I work at is in the (long) process of building a hospital. I am currently a librarian there, and I help medical students and undergraduate students with research. 

    To learn more about what I might do to prepare for this, and since I'm interested in moving this direction myself, I was reading about medical librarianship and health sciences librarianship on MLA Net, as well as the page with resources for new hospital librarians on the same site. 

    I can't help but feel like there are a lot of differences I need to learn about.  My current role is at a small, private university. I help students with the beginning of their research. I don't see residents, interns, clinicians, or members of the public. I also haven't worked in association with a hospital before. 

    What reading or training would you recommend for someone in this position? 

    Thank you! 



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    Sadie Davenport
    Associate Librarian
    California Northstate University
    sadie.davenport@cnsu.edu
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  • 2.  RE: Differences between health sciences librarianship at a small medical school vs. big medical school with a hospital?

    Posted May 17, 2024 09:48 AM

    Sadie, bluntly put, the ALA membership and a couple of books may not be your best resource. Reach out to your regional office (Region 5) of the Network of the National Library of Medicine (NNLM) to see what they offer in terms of support. I see your university is already listed as a member of the network, which is a good first step. If you have not worked with them before (there's a good chance your ILL staff are the ones regularly in contact with the regional office), you want to get to know the staff and their functions.

    Also contact the Northern California & Nevada Medical Library Group, which is a chapter of the Medical Library Association.  You need to start networking with hospital librarians, because they live and work in a very different world from purely academic librarians. Specifically, it can be a very fast-paced and high-pressure world at times. Also they support hospital administrators in addition to the patrons you've already listed.

    It looks like you don't have to be an MLA member to join this chapter, and they have a mentorship program. Finances permitting, you should also join MLA itself. Lastly, if you don't already subscribe to MEDLIB-L, you should do so.



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    Nancy R Curtis
    Liaison Librarian for Chemistry and Physics
    Boston College
    She/Her/Hers,Honorifics: [none]/Ms.
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    Original Message