NEW TITLES SORRY FOR THE DELAY

Apologies for the length of time it has been since my last post, we have been doing many training sessions for the new students over the past weeks. The health team also attended the launch of the health informatics collection, and a blog about this should be arriving shortly.

Here are the book reviews for this week, selected by Helen and with no particular topic in mind!


The art of waking people up
Kenneth Cloke and Joan Goldsmith
Jossey-Bass, Wiley 2003


This book evokes the ‘aha’ phenomenon. You will recognize immediately the somnolent state of many workers whom Cloke and Goldsmith describe. In a wonderfully written book, these incredibly wise and humane organizational experts approach the problem of workers apathy with the keen eye of the clinician, the clear- mindedness of the theoretician, and the empathic heart of the gifted therapist.



The Endangered Medical Record
Ensuring its integrity in the age of informatics
Vergil Slee et al
Tringa Press 2000


Why we still don’t know the true size of the AIDS epicemic – years after the first cases appeared in the U. S.
Why we may not catch the next Nile Flu outbreak in time
Why we can t properly track the Gulf War Syndrome problem
Why your own medical record may not help your doctor take care of you

Why NOW is a great time to correct the system
How this can be done effectively and relatively painlessly

…As medicine has moved from a quill and pen sensibility …to the era of the microchip, the importance of the properly coded medical record has grown exponentially…. Coding provides the lens through which we view everything from illness prevalence to quality improvement effectiveness to financial trends. Yet as this book disturbingly details, that lens is pockmarked with distortions.

MORE NEW TITLES ADDED TO STOCK

I’m off on my holidays next week, but here are 4 titles recently added to stock for you to enjoy!

Harnessing health libraries
Bruce Madge
Radcliffe Medical Press
2001

The rise of evidence based healthcare has put emphasis on finding specific evidence. Finding exactly the right article can be vital especially when meeting a tight deadline or trying to find evidence for a particular treatment.
This book shows how to find the information quickly and efficiently. It includes handy information such as acronyms with full descriptions and the available search tools. It looks at how novice users can find information in a straightforward and friendly way.


Providing materials for library users
David Spiller
Library Association Publishing
2000

This text has grown out of a previous work – Book Selection – but provides a fresh approach to the subject reflecting the increasing complexity of providing library materials in the digital age. It provides a clear, practical approach to selecting print and electronic materials, giving guidance on the best principles and procedures.

Key areas covered include;

Policy and provision, assessing users requirements, budgeting, evaluating print and electronic material, stock logistics, stock evaluation and performance measures, weeding, and holding versus access.


Life lessons from history’s heroes
Look Back to get ahead

Michael Anthony Jackson
Arrow Books
2003

The book takes five historical figures and explores the lessons their lives and actions provide for people in the 21st century. By studying Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan’s motivational methods, Hannibal’s creative thinking, William the Conqueror’s powers of persuasion and Elizabeth I’s strength of character we can learn how to apply the wisdom of the ages to improve our lives today.



Alexander the Corrector
The tormented genius who unwrote the bible

Julia Keay

Harper Collins
2004

A bibliography of Alexander Cruden, not so much remembered today for his mighty work Cruden’s Concordance to the Bible, as for the widespread belief that he was mad. Julie Keay uncovers the scandal and the reveals the true and tragic story of his ‘madness’. Alexander the Corrector restores the reputation of a lonely and misunderstood genius.

NEW TITLES ADDED TO STOCK

As an on going contribution to the health informatics blog site we are intending to review a couple of the new titles added to stock each week. This will give an overview of the varied nature of the collection and will highlight some of the subject areas covered.

This weeks titles are;

The Ultimate Digital Library: Where the new information players meet
Andrew K. Pace
American Library Association Editions
2003

Pace advocates that libraries shift their current practices and create collaborative and win-win partnerships with vendors to provide better and more forward-looking services. He presents extreme views and suggests radical changes on how libraries can stay competitive in the new digital arena.

Healthcare Information Systems
Edited by Kevin Beaver
Auerbach Best Practices Series
2003

An American book which contains sections on an overview of healthcare systems, tips on disaster planning and system security, ideas for improving quality, information on managing the healthcare community and views on telemedicine, the internet and emerging technologies.

"Providing complete coverage of all aspects of information technology as it relates to the healthcare industry, Healthcare information systems presents workable solutions to the challenges facing the healthcare industry now and in the future."

Comments on the collection are welcome including recommendations for other titles we could add.

Journals

As a part of our intention to establish this collection as the focus of a centre of excellence and an actively developing resource for the Health Informatics community we hope to be able to consolidate and build on the journal runs we recieved as part of the library.

We have performed a thorough edit of all the journals and decided to maintain only those titles which relate specifically to Health Informatics and form 'core titles'. Existing UCLan subscriptions that fall into this category will be recatalogued to include the National Health Informatics Collection heading and thus be contributed to the resource base.

If we do not already have current subscriptions we and where possible we will take up new ones and we will look to fill the back issue gap between the end of the donated runs and the start of the new subscriptions.

The titles we hope to continue are:

British Journal of Health Care Computing and Information Management
Government Computing
Health Information on the Internet
Information in Primary Care
International Journal of Health Informatics
JAMIA
Medical Informatics: the internet and medicine
Methods of Information in Medicine
Privacy and Data-protection

Along with the major conference paper series.

We will be know what 'gaps' we have soon and, in a time honoured tradition we will post them to the library community and hope to be able to fill these with any spares that other libraries or individuals have.

Thank you for you continued interest and if you have materials you feel we should add to this collection please get in touch.

Progress ...

The collection is begining to appear on the UCLan Library catalogue ( www.uclan.ac.uk/library/ and choose Library Catalogue) A search with keyword: National Health Informatics Collection shows 347 items (mainly books) available or loan so far.

The Begining

The National Health Informatics Collection arrived at the Library in May 2006 contained in 48 orange boxes. Included in the delivery was everything a library could need; not only books journals reports but shelving, date stamps and labels. The collection had been kept in storage for over a year, but was in exceptionally good condition.

Over the next few months the collection will be catalogued and procedures for access, collection development, consultation and publicity will need to be developed. This blog will form a part of that process, generating awareness and hopefully, comment and input.