GCC hosts winter meeting

Our most recent quarterly meeting happened at Greenfield Community College's Nahman-Watson Library this past Friday, where we heard from Tim Moriarty, Manager of Interpreter and Translation Services at Baystate Health. Full meeting minutes from December 7th available here.

Bay Path hosts WMHIC fall meeting

Our most recent quarterly meeting happened at Bay Path College this past Friday, where we heard about their new and developing Physician's Assistant program. Full meeting minutes from September 21st available here.

WMHIC Meeting September 21

WMHIC's fall meeting will be held Friday, September 21, from 9:30 AM to 12 Noon at Bay Path College, Hatch Library. (The address of the library is 539 Longmeadow St., Longmeadow, MA.)

At this meeting, we'll hear from Jennifer Hixon, the director of Bay Path's new Physicians Assistant program. The agenda: 

9:30 - 10:00 Arrival and coffee

10:00 - 11:00 Business meeting and reports from member libraries

11:00 - 12:00 (approx.) Speaker's presentation

Hope to see you there! 

Insider's Tour of the Library of the Commonwealth

Wow.  Here's a great opportunity to go behind the scenes at the Boston Public Library.  The Massachusetts Library System arranges Insiders Tours for librarians and library staff.  I attended the July 18th event.  First up: Social Sciences.  This department manages family/local history, law, grant resources and government documents.  Next: the Leventhal Map Center.  The current exhibit is America Votes: Mapping the Political Landscape.  Third stop: Rare Books & Special Collections.  In Boston vernacular, wicked awesome.  The library of John Adams and other treasures.  An hour break for lunch.  Many of us took advantage of the on-site cafe and the gorgeous courtyard. 

After lunch, a tour of Microtext and Newspapers (tip--friend them on Facebook, you will not be disappointed!!!), Reference & Readers Advisory and the Interlibrary Loan.  Yes, this is a librarian tour.  Lots of librarian-speak.  We finished with the digitization lab of Digital Commonwealth.  Learn how your library can participate in this exciting project.

The best part of the Insider's Tour is that our tour guides are so enthusiastic about their work.  Want to get pumped up about being a librarian?  Keep an eye out for the next opportunity on the MLS Calendar of Events.

National Library of Medicine (NLM) Drug Information Portal, mobile version!

Do you already use the NLM Drug Information Portal in your work? Now there's a mobile version. The mobile version, at http://druginfo.nlm.nih.gov/m.drugportal/ , was released on June 21, 2012. Popular mobile devices will be referred to the mobile site automatically when they access the main Drug Information Portal site, according to the press release.

Read the entire NLM Technical Bulletin (posted June 25, 2012) about this new mobile site.

Disaster Health Information Outreach and Collaboration Project 2012

The National Library of Medicine is again soliciting grant proposals "to design and conduct projects that will improve disaster medicine and public health information access for health professionals, first responders, and others (paid or volunteer) that play a role in health-related disaster preparedness, response, and recovery." 

Need some inspiration?  See the Disaster Health Information Outreach and Collaboration Projects awarded in 2011. Previous recipients include county health departments, university medical centers, health systems, and professional organizations. What will you come up with? 

Grants awarded are for a minimum of $15k up to a max of $30k, for a one-year project. Proposals are due to NLM on August 8, 2012, by 2 PM ET.

(RFP No. NIHLM2012411 and NIHLM2012412)

 

Photos from June 2nd meeting at Baystate Health

Our June 2nd meeting at Baystate Health Center was a great chance to hear more about new medical technology. During our meeting, Lisa Fugiel and Theresa Przybylowicz spoke about their experiences using handheld devices for reference in nurse training. 

After the business meeting, we took a tour of new parts of the health center. It's a beautiful place,  with a rooftop garden and a lot of natural lighting and gentle artificial lighting. They've put a lot of effort into making the new wing a restful place for patients, and a more pleasant place for employees.

Huge thanks to our Baystate Health Center members and Baystate Patient Services for arranging for us to have a thoughtful, thorough tour!

Baystate Health Sciences Library hosts Summer Meeting

Our most recent quarterly meeting happened at Baystate health this past Friday. We listened to nursing faculty from Springfield Technical Community College tell us about how they use mobile apps and ebooks in their teaching and clinicals and also took a tour of the new Heart & Vascular Center at Baystate. Full meeting minutes from June 6th available here.

WMHIC Meeting June 1

WMHIC's summer meeting will be held Friday, June 1, from 9 AM to 12 Noon at Baystate Health Sciences Library at Baystate Medical Center. (The address of the library is 759 Chestnut Street, Springfield, MA 01199.)

Our discussion topic will be mobile apps and mobile devices: please bring any devices you have access to, and we'll do a session of hands-on sharing and learning. See you there!

Registration is open for MLA Annual Meeting in 2012 to be held in Seattle, Washington on May 18-23.

Check out the Annual Meeting Blog, preliminary program information (the official program will be available in May), and the feed of tweets with the hashtag #mlanet12 for more information on what's new and what's happening. This year's Plenary Session speakers are Steven Johnson, Mark E. Funk, AHIP, FMLA, and T. R. Reid.

Metadata Day May 9

National Networks of Libraries of Medicine/New England announces its Metadata Day, a professional development event for New England librarians, to be held May 9.

The event will be held at Hoagland-Pincus Conference Center in Shrewsbury, MA, and will feature speaker Diane Hillmann, Director of Metadata Initiatives, Information Institute of Syracuse. The day will also feature presentations by local metadata librarians.

Registration information will be forthcoming in April 2012. Stay tuned! 

Register now for March 29 program on healthcare information inequity

From NNLM:

"The National Network of Libraries of Medicine New England Region is sponsoring an all-day program to explore issues related to health equity and health information access. The day will examine the role of health equity, access to care, and wide-spread technology integration. We see the presentation of these themes as setting the stage for discussion of how information providers have engaged with populations affected by health equity and technology divide issues. We will hear from experts in the areas of health equity, the digital divide, and health communication and technology. We’ll hear from information providers and how their outreach projects have encountered these issues."

Speakers will be Janine Anzalota from Boston Public Health Commission, and librarian and blogger Jessamyn West. Learn more and register here.

MAHSLIN Annual Meeting April 20th

The topic for this year's Massachusetts Health Sciences Library Network annual meeting is "You Are Your Library!" This program will discuss marketing, advocacy, and how to choose the best ways to tout your library's assets, in particular their most valuable asset: YOU!

The meeting will take place April 20, 2012, at:

Massachusetts Medical Society
Waltham Woods Corporate Center
860 Winter Street, Waltham, MA
Program & Registration

You can also apply for a 2012 Annual Meeting Scholarship, if you are a current member of MAHSLIN. Application form here.

WNEU hosts Spring Meeting

Western New England University's D'Amour Library welcomed the WMHIC group this past Friday for our quarterly spring meeting. Along with a general business meeting and updates from members' institutions, we were able to tour the brand new pharmacy program facilities with the Pharmacy Librarian at WNEU.

View our full March 2nd meeting minutes here.

Two reminders:

1. WMHIC March meeting is tomorrow, Friday March 2, at Western New England University, in the Mass Mutual Room at the D'Amour Library. (GPS address: 1215 Wilbraham Rd., Springfield 01119 and there will be reserved parking near Herman Hall, otherwise use visitor parking spaces.)  We start at 9 AM with coffee and the business meeting, and we'll be taking a tour of the Pharmacy program and facilities at 10:30 AM. Hope to see you there!  

2. Tomorrow, Friday March 2, is also the last day to sign up for a spot at the joint program on Library Marketing to be held March 23 at Olin College (see previous post for full details). Those who are MAHSLIN/BBLC/NECHI/SEMCO members get priority registration, ahead of those who are not members of any of these groups, but only until tomorrow. Email Alison Clapp of Children's Hospital Boston to sign up.

Boston Biomedical Library Consortium is happy to welcome all Massachusetts Health Science librarians to their first joint educational meeting, with a topic in support of the upcoming MAHSLIN Annual Meeting theme of marketing. (MAHSLIN Annual Meeting will be Friday, April 20th, 2012.)

WHEN:

Friday, March 23, 2012 (9:00 – 2:00)

WHERE:

Olin College, Needham, Crescent Room in the Campus Center

Directions to the college: http://www.olin.edu/campus/directions.aspx )

Campus Map: http://www.olin.edu/campus/images/CampusMap071217_800px.png

LIBRARY MARKETING: THE NUTS AND BOLTS

9:00 – 9:30      Coffee

9:30 – 10:30    The Marketing Biz: Knowing Your Customers.

10:30 – 12:15  Communicate with Clarity and Impact.

12:15 – 12:30  The 20-Minute “Message”.

12:30 – 2:00    BBLC/NECHI/SEMCO Business Meetings

Thanks to Olin College for providing the meeting space and to MAHSLIN for financial support of a speaker.

TO REGISTER:

Please email the following information to Alison Clapp of Children's Hospital Boston:

Your Name:

Your Institution:

Your Email:

Your Consortium (only if you are a BBLC/NECHI/SEMCO member)

Meeting scheduled for March 2, 2012 at WNEU

Friday, March 2, 2012
Western New England University 

9:00-10:30am –Coffee and business meeting
o Updates from our institutions/conferences/related organizations
o Reports from officers
o New officers for June—let the arm-twisting begin!
o Decide next meeting:  date, location, topic

10:30am-12noon
WNE’s Pharmacy program/facilities

Please notify Margot Malachowski, President, of any additional agenda items or nominations for VP for the June 2012-June 2013 term. 

From Margot: "For those of you who are considering getting more involved, this is a very low-key commitment.  We meet quarterly.  Half of the meeting is devoted to checking in and discussing any relevant conferences, etc. The other half of the meeting is topic-related.  Currently, we are touring our members’ libraries.  Officers hold it all together, more or less.  Join us!"