Anatomy (September 2010)
Chronic Diseases and their risk factors (June 2010)
Disaster Resources (March 2010)
Obesity in public health (December 2009)
Image websites, and a little bit about influenza (September 2009)
Critical and Intensive Care (June 2009)
Gastroenterology & Hepatology (March 2009)
Sports medicine (December 2008)
Pregnancy and birth (September 2008)
Diabetes, and one brief piece about meningitis (June 2008)
Bioinformatics (March 2008)
Medicine and Conflict (December 2007)
Open Access Foot and Mouth Disease (September 2007)
Drugs and pharmacology,
and National Knowledge Weeks (June 2007)
This page includes the 'Internet sites of Interest' column written by Keith Nockels for the HLG Newsletter. The Newsletter will continue to include the column in each issue.
From HLG Newsletter June 2011
Open access – a better update
I need to start with an apology. I managed to send the March column before I had quite finished it. I had meant to rewrite the introduction, and there were some links that had not been amended. Please ignore the March 2011 column and read this one instead! I do apologise for this, and especially to anyone who has sent the links or column to anyone, or put anything on a website or blog. I am sorry for any inconvenience or extra work I have caused.
The original column on open access appeared in September 2007. Open access has moved on and developed, and so I felt an update is worthwhile. I hope this is now an update worthy of the name!
What is open access?
Material published on open access is free to read, with no payment needed and no subscription necessary. The idea predates the internet (although perhaps it was not known by that name), but the internet has made new things possible. Open access is also one response to the serials crisis.
Some research funders insist that work they have funded is published as open access, and some universities (including mine) have similar requirements.
We can distinguish open access publishing and open access archiving.
Open access publishing is a publication model in which neither the reader, nor the reader’s institution, pays to access a journal article. To cover their costs, publishers may charge the authors a fee, and the authors may be able to meet this from research funds, or, in some institutions, an institutional fund. Some open access journals charge no fee. Some journals are entirely open access, while some traditional journals and publishers offer an open access option, so that some articles in the journal are available only to subscribers, and others available to everyone.
Open access archiving exists alongside more traditional publishing. A version of the article is made available on open access, in a subject or institutional repository. This version will exist in addition to the published version. Many publishers do not allow the published version of an article to be made available in this way, but will allow the authors’ final draft, post peer review, of the article to be made available. This final draft will not bear the publisher’s logos, formatting, or volume and page information. The text may be identical to the published version, or at least close to it.
Two final things worth noting. “Open access” does not override copyright. Some open access material will be published under a Creative Commons licence, but some will be published under other sorts of licence, and be subject to more restrictions. And “open access” certainly does not imply a lack of peer review. Material published in an open access journal will be peer reviewed. Material in an open access archive may be a post peer review draft, as discussed above. It may, however, be a “preprint”. “Preprints” have not been peer reviewed, and may not actually have been accepted for publication anywhere. Preprints are common currency in some subject disciplines, for example, physics or economics, where they have always formed part of the way that scholarship is produced and discussed, and it is usual to produce preprints and working papers before publishing, My experience with medicine is that preprints are not liked – people prefer to keep their ideas to themselves until they are published. So, when reading something from an open access archive, it is worth determining exactly what it is that you are reading, and how it relates to published work.
All links were checked on 12th May 2011.
General information on open access
Mark Funk: Open access – a primer
http://www.mlanet.org/pdf/resources/oa_primer_mfunk_200710.pdf
Will help unravel the various open access alternatives- this seems still to be the latest version.
Peter Suber: Open access overview
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/overview.htm
SPARC Open Access Newsletter
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/newsletter/archive.htm
A regular publication, produced by Peter Suber. The archive includes all issues to date.
SHERPA
http://www.sherpa.ac.uk
SHERPA is major support mechanism for repositories, and therefore one of the major sources of information and advocacy material for open access archiving.
Open access publishing
Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)
http://www.doaj.org
DOAJ lists open access journals that are peer reviewed, and so is a useful tool for choosing a journal to publish in. It covers all subjects. The contents of the journals can also be searched. It does not include journals that are not entirely open access, where some articles are subscription only and others open access. RoMEO (see below) does give details of “traditional” publishers’ open access (“paid open access”) schemes, for example, BMJ Unlocked or Springer Open.
Open access archiving – institutional repositories
Institutional repositories contain work from one institution. Who has a repository? There are two major directories which will help you to find out, and give statistics on content.
OpenDOAR
http://www.opendoar.org/
Maintained by the SHERPA Project (see above)
ROAR (Registry of Open Access Repositories)
http://roar.eprints.org/
Open access archiving - subject repositories
A subject repository contains work from many institutions. The arXiv e print archive (http://arxiv.org/) is a long standing subject repository covering certain areas of physics, and there are others. OpenDOAR and ROAR will help you locate subject repositories, but UK PubMed Central is the one that affects medicine and health the most. Many health and medical funders mandate authors to deposit their work in UKPMC.
PubMed Central
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/
PubMed Central, maintained by the National Library of Medicine, is an archive of backfiles of biomedicine journals, with full text available free. There are links to this from PubMed. But it also contains authors’ manuscripts of papers funded by bodies that mandate them to make their work available on open access, as mentioned above. See http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/about/authorms.html for details of this.
UK PubMed Central
http://ukpmc.ac.uk/
Closely related to PubMed Central, this contains author manuscripts of papers published by UKPMC funded researchers, who mandate deposit in UKPMC.
Searching the contents of open access repositories
Google indexes some repositories and some other open access material, and so do other search engines. Some open access journals are in PubMed (although open access repositories, apart from PubMed Central) are not. If you want to search only open access material, here are some specialist tools:
BASE
http://www.base-search.net/index.php?i="b
BASE is produced at Bielefeld University in Germany. It used to include subscription material available to Bielefeld University, but I think this is no longer the case, and it only includes open access material.
Institutional Repository Search
http://irs.mimas.ac.uk/
Originally part of INTUTE, this searches across 130 (in 2007 the figure was 76) UK academic repositories, including The Depot (http://www.depot.edina.ac.uk/), which is a repository for use by academics whose institution does not have its own repository.
OAISter
http://www.oclc.org/oaister/
OAIster is a union catalogue of digital resources and is a major source for open access material available in full for free. Started by the University of Michigan, it is now part of OCLC. A list of indexed sources is available at http://www.oclc.org/oaister/contributors/default.htm.
OpenDOAR Search
http://www.opendoar.org/search.php
A trial service, using Google’s Custom Search, searching repositories listed in OpenDOAR. OpenDOAR Search is global.
Scientific Commons
http://en.scientificcommons.org/
Scientific Commons indexes items from open access repositories (now over 38 million items, in 2007 the figure was 13 million). It enables you to search for co-authors of a particular person, as well as giving links to the full item in its home repository.
SHERPA Search
http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/repositories/sherpasearchalluk.html
Another trial service using Google’s Custom Search, searching only UK repositories.
Open access archiving: which publishers allow it?
Authors may sign away a lot of rights in their work when it is accepted for publication, and they can only do certain things with the work once it is published. They therefore need to check if they are allowed to put their article, or a version of it, in an open access archive. Many publishers do allow archiving, but perhaps not immediately, and perhaps not the use of the final published PDF file. The major source of information about who allows what is:
RoMEO
http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo.php
What do grant awarding bodies require?
As mentioned above, grant awarding bodies may insist that the work that they have funded is made available on open access. Exactly what these funders require is described in:
JULIET
http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/juliet/index.php
Another SHERPA project. People working in academic institutions would be well advised also to check if their own institution has any open access mandate. The University of Leicester, for example, mandates deposit of publications in its open access repository, Leicester Research Archive.
More information
A regularly updated bibliography is Charles Bailey’s Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography
http://www.digital-scholarship.org/sepb/sepb.html
Section 7 covers publishing models (including open access), and section 9 repositories.
The next column (unless I need to do this one again!)
Aside from the BLDSC, are there libraries or networks that you use to obtain inter library loans? Lesley Huss of the Birmingham Community Healthcare NHS Trust has kindly sent me a list, which I will use as the basis of the next column. If you use a library or network that you can recommend or share with others, that I can add to Lesley’s list, please let me have details, by July 31st. And thank you.
The column editor is changing office
I am not changing jobs, but my site library, the University of Leicester’s Clinical Sciences Library is closing, and books, journals, staff and services are moving to the larger site library, the multi-award winning David Wilson Library.
So, my contact details from the start of August will be:
Keith Nockels
David Wilson Library
University of Leicester
PO Box 248
University Rd.
Leicester LE1 9QD
Email: khn5@le.ac.uk (this is unchanged)
(At this point I do not know what my new phone number will be)
Reproduction of the contents of this column, with acknowledgement to Health Libraries Group Newsletter, is absolutely fine – please do!
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From HLG Newsletter December 2010
THE EXPERIENCES OF PATIENTS, PLUS A NOTE ABOUT CHOLERA
Here are some sites that contain actual experiences of patients. I have not listed sites that offer patient information (information for patients), or which talk about how to survey the patient experience or use it in planning services.
I am grateful to Outi Pickering of the library at Warneford Hospital, Oxford, for bringing some of these sites to my attention.
All links were checked on 8th November 2010.
Better Together - Stories
http://www.bettertogetherscotland.com/bettertogetherscotland/29.html
Better Together is NHS Scotland’s patient experience programme. This part of the site enables people to share stories. However, the facility to find stories was not working on the day I checked the link. Hopefully it is by the time you read the column!
Health Talk Online
http://www.healthtalkonline.org/
Health Talk Online contains videos and written information recording experiences of health and illness from more than 2000 people. The site replaces DIPEx, and the information is based on qualitative research undertaken at the University of Oxford. Subjects covered include cancer, dying and bereavement, health disease, pregnancy, later life and young people. A related site at http://www.youthhealthtalk.org/ is aimed at young people and covers cancer, type 1 diabetes, health and weight, epilepsy, sexual health, long term health conditions, and depression.
The Patient Experience
http://www.patient-experience.com/
A discussion forum, provided by The Patients Voice, part of a London based market research company and not to be confused with Patient Voices (see below). There are blogs, video blogs, fact sheets, and information sites.
Patient UK Health Experience Forum
http://experience.patient.co.uk/
A place for people to share experiences. There are currently over 100000, and these can be searched by medical topic or by name of medicine. These experiences also display in the “Your experience” section of Patient UK’s information leaflets.
Patient Voices
http://www.patientvoices.org.uk/
Not to be confused with The Patients Voice (see above), this site aims to facilitate the telling and sharing of patient stories so that those who make policy can hear them. I have to say I did not find the stories easy to locate – I hope the policy makers have more luck. The “Search” facility searches the whole site, not just the stories, and the results page is full of adverts. However, using Find a Story and searching the resulting page for the word I wanted seemed to work.
Other thoughts
Blogging offers an easy way for people to record their health and illness experiences, and so I suspect that a search of the web may also uncover useful material. Google, for one, offers a blog search.
Paying attention to patients’ descriptions of their experiences is a theme in the field of “narrative based medicine”. Although old, this introductory book is still in print:
Greenhalgh, T. and Hurwitz, B. (1998). Narrative based medicine: dialogue and discourse in clinical practice. London, BMJ.
Radcliffe Publishing produce a Patient Narratives series, see http://www.radcliffe-oxford.com/patientnarratives/default.htm.
Columbia University in New York run a program(me) in Narrative Medicine, and there are materials and information at http://www.narrativemedicine.org/ . The bibliography (under “Resources”) may lead you to other useful published material.
December 2006’s Internet Sites of Interest column covered Medical humanities, a related area.
A note about cholera
There were outbreaks of cholera in 19th century London, and John Snow’s investigations into their cause are well known. However, in some parts of the world cholera is more than historical. As I write, it is rearing its ugly head in Haiti. Cholera is a bacterial infection that can happen after disasters, as in Haiti, because the bacterium can be found in contaminated water. In severe cases it causes catastrophic dehydration through diarrhoea and vomiting.
Some places to find information on cholera:
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
http://www.cdc.gov/cholera/
Health Protection Agency
http://www.hpa.org.uk/Topics/InfectiousDiseases/InfectionsAZ/Cholera/
The HPA is among the organisations which the UK government wants to close, as part of its cost cutting.
MedlinePlus
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/cholera.html
ProMed Mail
http://www.promedmail.org/
Todar’s Online Textbook of Bacteriology
http://www.textbookofbacteriology.net/cholera.html
A chapter on Vibrio cholerae and Asiatic cholera.
WHO
http://www.who.int/topics/cholera/en/
CDC, ProMed Mail and MedlinePlus are providing updates on the situation in Haiti.
Information about John Snow:
John Snow Society
http://www.johnsnowsociety.org/index.html
The Society promotes Snow’s life and works, as well as providing a communication network for epidemiologists.
Making the Modern World
http://www.makingthemodernworld.org.uk/learning_modules/geography/05.TU.01/?section="2Learning modules based on the Science Museum’s gallery of the same name. Aimed at A level and vocational students.
UCLA Department of Epidemiology
http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow.html
An extensive site.
My contact details:
Keith Nockels
University of Leicester Library
Clinical Sciences Library
RKCSB
Leicester LE2 7LX
UK
Best way to contact me is by email: khn5@le.ac.uk; but my office has a phone: +44 (0)116 252 3101 .
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
From HLG Newsletter September 2010
ANATOMY WEBSITES
Here are some websites to help students and others learn human anatomy. Leicester Medical School does still have a dissecting room (are we unusual in this?), but even with a dissecting room, our students make use of online resources like the ones listed here. I have included a short list of subscription resources, and then a longer list of free ones. All links were checked on 26th July 2010.
SUBSCRIPTION SITES
NetAnatomy
http://www.webanatomy.com/
Images of radiographic, cross sectional and gross anatomy (gross anatomy is large scale anatomy, which can be seen without a microscope). A sample of the material, with details of how to subscribe, is available from the website.
Primal Pictures
http://www.primalpictures.com/Home.aspx
A three dimensional model of human anatomy using data from scans. Animations demonstrate function, biomechanics and surgical procedures. The University of Leicester has access to some Primal Pictures material through Ovid, but the site gives details of all the available material, which includes things we do not have (like resources aimed at speech and language pathologists and acupuncturists), and material on CD. Anatomy.tv is, I think, another name for the online version of Primal Pictures.
Visible Body
http://www.visiblebody.com/
3D visualisation of human anatomy, views can be rotated and zoomed. We trialled this after a student drew it to our attention and it needed a plugin to be downloaded. Visible Body is now available in the UK through the STAT!Ref but I have no experience of this directly.
Winking Skull
http://www.winkingskull.com/navigation.aspx
A study aid produced by the publisher Thieme. Access to everything (“Winking Skull Pro”) needs a subscription, although 200 images are available free.
FREE SITES
eSkeletons
http://www.eskeletons.org/
From the University of Texas at Austin. View bones and data about them, for humans and various other primates. You can also view a bone and compare it between species.
GetBodySmart
http://www.getbodysmart.com/
Being developed by Scott Sheffield, a university teacher of anatomy, as an online anatomy textbook. Still under development.
Gray’s Anatomy
http://www.bartleby.com/107/
Specifically the 20th edition of the book, published in 1918. The latest edition is the 40th edition and online access is possible if you buy the printed book. Other editions may be available in Google Books but a search for “grays anatomy” also gives you related books and editions in other languages. It also seems to reveal the TV series “Grey’s Anatomy”, and as seems to be usual with Google Books, not everything is in full text.
Human Anatomy Online: an interactive tutorial and reference
http://ect.downstate.edu/courseware/haonline/toc.htm
Courseware from SUNY Downstate Medical Center, Brooklyn, NY. Each chapter of this resource contains an overview of that part of the body, osteology, laboratory dissection procedure, and a summary of anatomical terms encountered.
Instant Anatomy
http://www.instantanatomy.net/index.html
Website maintained by Robert Whitaker, who teaches anatomy to medical students at Cambridge and based on his diagrams and notes. There are also podcasts (which may need purchasing) and a CD for purchase, as well as a related book.
LUMEN – Structure of the Human Body
http://www.meddean.luc.edu/lumen/meded/grossanatomy/index.htm
LUMEN is the Loyola University Medical Education Network, based in Chicago. The LUMEN site as a whole is awash with online learning materials but this particular page gives links to anatomy resources, including the Bone Box (under “LUMEN Learn ‘Em”) , a Master Muscle List, and a cross sectional anatomy tutorial, which uses images from the Visible Human Project. These things all appear to be free to use, but some other parts of the site need a login.
Visible Human Project
This NLM project aimed to create a complete set of 3D representations of the human body. There is more information, including links to images, conference material and other NLM initiatives at http://www.nlm.nih.gov/research/visible/visible_human.html. There are some normal anatomy images at http://library.med.utah.edu/WebPath/HISTHTML/ANATOMY/ANATOMY.html, part of the Internet Pathology Laboratory for Medical Education, created by Edward C. Klatt, MD, formerly of the University of Utah and now at the Mercer University School of Medicine, Savannah, Georgia. Some images are available through LUMEN resources (see above).
The column editor writes…
Is there still a place for an annotated list of web resources, such as this column? I think so. The column can draw on the expertise and experience of the editor or writer and bring to light resources that might not appear on the first page of results from an easy but possibly too simple, search of a general search engine.
However, I work in a University setting, not an NHS one, and only with medical and operating department practice students, not nursing or allied health ones or with practitioners. So, there is a danger that this column will only be of interest to people in the same setting as me, and become more and more irrelevant to all the other members of HLG. You can help me to stop this happening, by:
1) Either, suggesting a topic for a future column,
2) Or, even better, writing a column yourself using your own expertise and experience. I can edit your annotated list into the column’s usual format.
If you feel you can help, please contact me, and thanks!
My contact details:
Keith Nockels
University of Leicester Library
Clinical Sciences Library
RKCSB
Leicester LE2 7LX
UK
Tel.: +44 (0)116 252 3101
Email: khn5@le.ac.uk
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From HLG Newsletter June 2010
CHRONIC DISEASE PREVENTION
The column for June has been kindly compiled by Jennifer Ford, Information Services Officer at the National Heart Forum, www.heartforum.org.uk. My thanks to her. It includes general sites, including statistical information, and also risk factors including diabetes, cholesterol, diet and physical activity.
Global Alliance for the Prevention of Obesity and Related Chronic Disease
http://www.preventionalliance.net/index.htm
An alliance formed between the World Heart Federation, International Diabetes Federation, International Pediatric Association, International Union of Nutritional Sciences and the International Association for the Study of Obesity. The site has a useful country resource base section, which lists details of institutions, reports and prevention interventions country by country.
National Heart Forum
http://www.heartforum.org.uk/
Membership organisation bringing together organisations dealing with all areas and risk factors in the field of chronic disease prevention. Information on NHF position statements and policy work areas is available from the site, along with publications such as the Healthy weight, Healthy lives toolkit, and the NHF modelling team’s reports on obesity trends.
NHS Evidence National Library for Public Health
http://www.library.nhs.uk/publichealth/
Includes research information such as systematic reviews, meta-analyses and guidelines, covering health determinants such as environment, education, food and nutrition and biological composition (obesity and blood pressure).
Oxford Health Alliance
http://www.oxha/org
A UK based not-for-profit organisation. The Oxford Health Alliance website contains a library of publications grouped by topics, including smoking, physical activity, diet, economics, workplace and others.
World Health Organization: Chronic Diseases
http://www.who.int/topics/chronic_diseases/en/
The subsection of the WHO site devoted to chronic disease. Includes fact sheets on cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, obesity and prevention in healthcare.
STATISTICS
Heartstats
http://www.heartstats.org/
The British Heart Foundation’s regularly updated statistics website. Includes a wide range of statistics on risk factors for chronic disease such as blood cholesterol, smoking, physical activity and diet.
NHS Information Centre: Health and lifestyles statistics collections
http://www.ic.nhs.uk/statistics-and-data-collections/health-and-lifestyles
Available collections include statistics on diet, diabetes, alcohol consumption, smoking, obesity and physical activity levels.
CHRONIC DISEASES AND THEIR RISK FACTORS
Built environment
Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE)
http://www.cabe.org.uk/
CABE is an independent UK advisory body advising on design and building in England. One area of work is health, where CABE aims to create buildings and spaces that will positively impact on health by encouraging physical activity. The CABE website includes information on how design impacts on health, and on their work with the NHS.
DIABETES
Diabetes Atlas
http://www.diabetesatlas.org/
Provided by the International Diabetes Federation, the Diabetes Atlas provides at a glance and more detailed information on diabetes prevalence. Figures are broken down into regions.
Diabetes UK
http://www.diabetes.org.uk
A wealth of information on diabetes, including diabetes type 2 and how this condition can be managed to further impacts on long-term health. The site also has information on Diabetes UK research projects.
International Diabetes Federation
http://www.idf.org/
The IDF website includes Information on current activities relevant to diabetes that are happening across the world. Position statements and policy information can also be found here, as well as the IDF Consensus on Type 2 Diabetes Prevention.
NHS Evidence - Diabetes
http://www.library.nhs.uk/diabetes/
A searchable database containing guidelines, systematic reviews and other information on all forms of diabetes.
PHYSICAL ACTIVITY
BHF National Centre for Physical Activity and Health
http://www.bhfactive.org.uk/
The BHF National Centre produces tools and resources aimed at increasing the physical activity levels of the population. One of their most recent publications, their Exercise Referral Toolkit, is available from their website.
Physical Activity Alliance
http://www.activityalliance.org/
A new site, established with the support of the Department for Health.
Physical Activity and Health Alliance
http://www.paha.org.uk
A Scottish Allaince that aims to engage people from all sectors and professions in the promotion of physical activity and health in Scotland. Resources include policy information, professional support materials and research.
DIET AND NUTRITION
NHS Choices Good Food
http://www.nhs.uk/livewell/goodfood/Pages/Goodfoodhome.aspx
A wealth of information on healthy eating for the general public. The pages include information on cutting back on salt and dietary fats, a tool to health check your shopping, and tips for healthy food swaps.
School Food Trust
http://www.schoolfoodtrust.org.uk/
The School Food Trust was established in 2005 with a remit to improve school food and promote the education and health of young people. Resources available from the site include nutrition training manuals, posters and recipes.
HYPERTENSION
Blood Pressure Association
http://www.bpassoc.org.uk/
A charity supporting patients as well as healthcare professionals managing hypertension. The site includes guides to the effects of high blood pressure, available medication for its treatment and monitoring.
British Hypertension Society
http://www.bhsoc.org/
The British Hypertension Society acts as a medical and research forum for hypertension. The Society produces guldelines on mananagment of hypertension, whic are avilbale from thier site, and also links to NICE guidance.
BLOOD CHOLESTEROL
Heart UK
http://www.heartuk.org.uk
Website includes resrouces such as a cardiovascular didease predition chart, JBS risk assessor, and links to NICE guidelines and various publications.
If you have an idea for a future column, or would like to contribute an actual list of resources for a future column, please contact me.
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From HLG Newsletter March 2010
DISASTER RESOURCES
The dreadful earthquake in Haiti on 12 January this year demonstrates something of the terrible power of nature, but has also shown something of how people can work together for each other.
A few days after the earthquake, I began to see messages on the US based MEDLIB-L discussion list about information resources that might be of use to health professionals working in Haiti or preparing to travel there. One posting drew my attention to the existence of the separate DISASTR-OUTREACH-LIB list, maintained at the NLM. I started to gather a list of resources together, and blogged about this, in the hope that my blog post would be picked up by interested parties. Very quickly the NLM drew together a page of resources which is much more comprehensive than anything I could do.
Some of these resources are from libraries, and others from health professionals or publishers. This column is devoted to those resources, for several reasons. Firstly, you may know someone who is in Haiti or planning to go there, and the things listed here may be useful to them. Secondly, this is an example of how librarians can be involved in useful things in aid of humanity. And last of all, it is at least a partial record of what has been done in this particular situation.
[All links were checked on 11th February 2010]
Health Resources for Haiti – from the Disasters Information Management Research Center at the NLM
http://disasterinfo.nlm.nih.gov/dimrc/haitiearthquake.html,
http://disaster.nlm.nih.gov/dimrc/haitiearthquake.html
You can put this widget:n your webpage, to link to the NLM page. The widget is available from http://disaster.nlm.nih.gov/dimrc/widgetdimrc.html
This comprehensive page lists resources covering earthquakes and health, US federal agency pages, free resources from publishers, including passwords for trial access (courtesy of Ebsco) to GIDEON and DynaMed, a long list of resources in Haitian Creole and French, and details of some organisations that are using Twitter.
Cochrane Evidence Aid
http://www2.cochrane.org/evidenceaid/haiti/index.html
Cochrane systematic reviews of relevance, with some material in French. Updated daily.
Emergency Access Initiative - NLM
http://eai.nlm.nih.gov/
This scheme involves the NLM, the NNLM and publishers, and was new to me, I have to confess. It provides free access to full text to health professionals, libraries and the public in the USA in the event of a disaster, and has been activated for people working in Haiti. There is more detail of how the scheme works at http://eai.nlm.nih.gov/public/faqs.htm and the EAI site explains how to get access to the materials.
Joint Languages University
http://jlu.wbtrain.com/
An initiative of US federal government agencies and academic institutions, which includes learning objects to help you learn Haitian Creole.
Mobile MedlinePlus
http://m.medlineplus.gov/
I plan to cover mobile applications of interest to health librarians in a future column, but Mobile MedlinePlus is one that has useful resources in this context.
It does seem trivial in the wider scheme of things, but among the buildings destroyed have been some library buildings, and collections have of course been affected. Bibliotheques sans Frontieres, http://www.bibliosansfrontieres.org/index.php, has more information, in (as you might suspect) French. It does make the point that helping those affected is the priority, but that the long term future of the country must include rebuilding cultural institutions.
See the MEDLIB-L archives and join the list at http://list.uvm.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=MEDLIB-L. See the DISASTR-OUTREACH-LIB list archives and join at http://disaster.nlm.nih.gov/dimrc/dimrclistserv.html. My now very inadequate blog post is on http://browsing.blogspot.com.
As always, suggestions for future columns welcome, and, indeed, columns themselves. If you have an idea for a future column, or would like to contribute an actual list of resources for a future column, please contact me.
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From HLG Newsletter December 2009
OBESITY IN PUBLIC HEALTH
The column for December covers obesity, diet and nutrition, and physical activity, and has been kindly compiled by Jennifer Ford, Information Services Officer at the National Heart Forum, www.heartforum.org.uk. My thanks to her. All links checked 17th November 2009.
American Obesity Association
http://obesity1.tempdomainname.com/
Includes a range of factsheets on obesity, covering research, treatment and obesity as a global epidemic.
Association of Public Health Observatories
http://www.apho.org.uk/
Site highlights include a series of analytical tools to use with public health statistical data.
Association for the Study of Obesity
www.aso.org.uk
Includes an obesity resource centre, with a range of factsheets on the subject, information on the obesity strategies of the different UK Primary Care Trusts, and consultations.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Division of Nutrition Physical Activity and Obesity
http://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpao/index.html
Highlights include an extensive resources and publications section, policy resources and information on social marketing.
National Obesity Forum
http://www.nationalobesityforum.org.uk/
Online training resources for healthcare professionals, and information for the general public on tackling obesity in adults and children.
National Obesity Observatory
http://www.noo.org.uk/index.php
National Obesity Observatory for England contains a range of publications on topics such as obesity prevalence and measurement , and links to a selection of data sources and surveys. Graphics mapping obesity prevalence across the UK are also available.
NHS Evidence Public Health
http://www.library.nhs.uk/publichealth/
A specialist collection of information on a range of public health issues, including obesity. The site includes information and links to relevant guidance and literature.
This portal aims to share best practice, provide links to information, training and data available on obesity. This website has been developed to support those people who work, either directly or indirectly, on promoting a healthy weight or tackling obesity. Developed by the National Heart Forum, with the support of the Department of Health and Department for Children, Schools and Families.
World Health Organisation – Obesity
http://www.who.int/topics/obesity/en/
An informative site including obesity factsheets, technical information on diet and physical activity and country by country statistical and survey information on obesity and overweight.
DIET AND NUTRITION
American Dietetic Association
http://www.eatright.org/
The world’s largest organisation of nutrition professionals. Includes a range of food and nutrition information.
British Dietetic Association
http://www.bda.uk.com/
Useful resources include the Food Facts section of the site, which has information on understanding food labelling, food and behaviour and eating for health.
British Nutrition Foundation
http://www.nutrition.org.uk/
Highlights include the nutrition science section of the site, with information on labelling, nutrition through life, energy balance and food intolerance.
Eatwell – Food Standards Agency
http://www.eatwell.gov.uk/
The Food Standards Agency’s website aimed at helping the general public to make more informed and healthier choices for food. Includes a BMI calculator, height and weight chart as well as tips for healthy eating and dealing with health issues such as diabetes and obesity. Also covers understanding food labelling including the traffic light system.
5 a day – NHS
http://www.5aday.nhs.uk/topTips/default.html
The NHS website dedicated to trying to get more of us to eat at least 5 portions of fruit and vegetables every day. Resources include recipes using more fruit and vegetables, and free downloads to help keep track of how much fruit and vegetables you are eating, and what counts as a portion. Includes information on the school fruit and veg scheme.
Food Standards Agency
http://www.food.gov.uk/
The website of the UK independent government department, who protect the interests of the public in relation to food. Includes a wealth of information about nutrition, food labelling, food industries and hygiene.
Healthy Schools
http://www.healthyschools.gov.uk/
Website of the healthy schools campaign, with a range of resources on physical activity, health and emotional wellbeing and healthy eating.
Nutrition Society
http://www.nutritionsociety.org/
The Nutrition Society promotes nutritional science. Site highlights include a discussion forum, publications section, and a section of information for nutrition professionals.
Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN)
http://www.sacn.gov.uk/
An independent advisory committee, providing advice to the Food Standards Agency and Department of Health. Provides access to SACN’s reports and position statements on nutrition issues.
PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND THE ENVIRONMENT
Change4Life
http://www.nhs.uk/change4life/Pages/Partners.aspx
The official website for the Department of Health’s Change4Life campaign, which aims to encourage people to adopt healthy eating behaviours and take more exercise. Resources include health recipe ideas and tips on how to make sure you eat 5 portions of fruit and vegetables a day.
Living Streets
http://www.livingstreets.org.uk/
Living Streets aims to create safe attractive streets, where people will enjoy walking. Resources include a healthy environments toolkit, and information on how to get active in your area to encourage more people to walk.
London Play
http://www.londonplay.org.uk/
Organisation that aims to provide all children in London with the opportunity and environment to play safely. Includes a wealth of resources on adventure playgrounds and how to create and monitor them for a safe play environment.
MEND
http://www.mendprogramme.org/
MEND is an organisation dedicated to reducing global obesity levels. Site highlights include recipe ideas, tips for parents on healthy eating, and a BMI calculator.
Sustrans
http://www.sustrans.org.uk/
Sustrans promotes sustainable travel, and aims to enable everyone to take more active forms of transport to benefit themselves and the environment. Resources include technical guidelines on the country’s cycle network and free cycle maps.
Walk England
http://www.walkengland.org.uk/
Walk England aims to work in social partnerships across the country, promoting walking as a healthier and more relaxing way of travelling. Resources include NHS walking maps, information on the evidence base for walking, and literature reviews on walking and cycling.
As always, suggestions for future columns welcome, and, indeed, columns themselves. If you have an idea for a future column, or would like to contribute an actual list of resources for a future column, please contact me.
Keith Nockels
University of Leicester Library, Clinical Sciences Library
RKCSB
Leicester LE2 7LX
Tel.: +44 (0)116 252 3101
Email: khn5@le.ac.uk
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From HLG Newsletter September 2009
Image websites, and a little bit about influenza
Here are some sites that provide medical or health related images. Always check the conditions of use of the site, of course, to see what you are allowed to do with the images.
IMAGES
DOIA/PedOIA
Both accessible via the Dermatology Information Service at http://www.dermis.net, these are image atlases covering dermatology and paediatric dermatology. The images can be browsed or searched.
Gray’s Anatomy
http://www.bartleby.com/107/
This is a digitised version of the 20th edition, 1918.
Hardin MD Medical Pictures/Disease Pictures
http://www.lib.uiowa.edu/hardin/md/pictures.html Hardin MD is a web gateway maintained at the University of Iowa Library, and this page is a list of links to images, arranged by topic.
HEAL
http://www.healcentral.org/index.jsp
Digital materials for health sciences education, including audio and consumer health materials. Free registration required. Established by the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, the University of Utah Spencer S. Eccles Health Sciences Library, and the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center.
HON Medical Images and Video Repository
http://www.hon.ch/Media/media.html
Maintained by the Health on the Net Foundation, which runs the HONCode certification scheme for websites (sites possessing this certificate have to adhere to certain principles, and there are periodic checks that they are doing so).
Medical Images and Illustrations
http://www.mic.stacken.kth.se/MEDIMAGES.html
This is the link collection that used to be maintained by the Karolinska Institut Library in Stockholm, but which now resides on a site at the Kungliga Tekniska Hogskolan in Stockholm. The rest of the KI links pages seem to have migrated there too.
Public Health Image Library (PHIL)
http://phil.cdc.gov/phil/home.asp
Multimedia and images relating to public health, from the CDC. Includes infectious organisms, environmental health, natural disasters. Copyright and conditions of use clearly explained – I have used this site for images of microbes of one sort or another.
Wellcome Images
http://images.wellcome.ac.uk/indexplus/page/Home.html
Images from the collections of the Wellcome Library, made available for academic teaching under a Creative Commons licence.
Influenza
A shameless plug for our own influenza website, which has just been included in Intute (thank you!), and earlier versions of which have been archived by the UK Web Archiving Consortium.
This site is designed to bring together useful links, and we have recently added a page about H1N1 influenza (swine flu). The site starts at http://www.le.ac.uk/library/clinical/influenza/index.html
End of plug!
As always, suggestions for future columns welcome, and, indeed, columns themselves – if you are interested in contributing an actual list of resources for a future column, please contact me.
Keith Nockels
University of Leicester Library
Clinical Sciences Library
RKCSB
Leicester LE2 7LX
UK
Tel.: +44 (0)116 252 3101
Email: khn5@le.ac.uk
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From HLG Newsletter June 2009
Critical and Intensive Care
My thanks to Preeti Puligari (Outreach and e-Resources Librarian for Surgery, Anaesthesia and Surgical Related Specialties) for help in compiling this column, almost all of which is also part of a leaflet compiled for staff at the Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust.
Critical care and intensive care are both included here – I was not sure what the difference was, but MeSH treats them as related, and MedlinePlus as the same thing. All links were checked by KN on 12th May 2009.
Advanced Life Support Group
http://www.alsg.org
Provides training in life support techniques, to the public and health professionals.
American Association of Critical Care Nurses
http://www.aacn.org/
California based organisation, billed as the largest specialty nursing organisation in the world. I suspect much material on the site is members only, but the ethics material and Practice Alerts and Protocols for Practice (under Clinical Practice – Evidence Based Resources) look to be freely available.
American Thoracic Society - Critical Care
http://www.thoracic.org/sections/clinical-information/critical-care/index.html
The Primer on Critical Care for Patients and their Families includes descriptions of common illnesses, equipment, and end of life decisions.
BRAKE – What happens in an intensive care unit?
http://www.brake.org.uk/resources/downloads/
What_happens_in_an_intensive_care_unit_.pdf
BRAKE is a road safety campaign group, but this guide is designed for anyone with a loved one in intensive care, not just road accident victims.
British Association of Critical Care Nurses
http://www.baccn.org.uk
Site includes information about the association’s activities.
Clinical Knowledge Summaries – Intensive Care
http://cks.library.nhs.uk/patient_information_leaflet/
intensive_care
Patient information leaflet, covering when intensive care is necessary, the equipment used, and recovery, with links to leaflets on related topics.
Department of Health
http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/index.htm
Highlights key documents, guidelines and programmes on Critical Care.
European Society of Intensive Care Medicine
http://www.esicm.org
Research activities of the society include research into the genetics of sepsis, a registry of ICUs in Europe, and research into therapeutic hypothermia. The site also includes guidelines and details of society conferences.
European Federation of Critical Care Nursing Associations
http://www.efccna.org
Publications available on the site include a position statement on the presence of relatives during CPR, as well as updates.
Intercollegiate Board for Training in Intensive Care Medicine (IBTICM)
http://www.rcoa.ac.uk/ibticm/
Supervises intensive care training in the UK - includes representatives from several Royal Colleges.
Intensive Care National Audit and Research Centre (ICNARC)
http://www.icnarc.org/
Highlights the research projects and audits that the Centre is currently involved with a list of journal articles that its research staff have contributed. It also includes information for patients and relatives.
ICU Novices
http://www.aic.cuhk.edu.hk/web8/novices.htm
Information for junior medical trainees and nurses with no previous experience of intensive care, from the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
ICU Web
http://www.aic.cuhk.edu.hk/web8/index.htm
Information for ICU healthcare professionals, from the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
Intensive Care Society
http://www.ics.ac.uk
Site provides information on standards and guidelines, material for trainees; for patients and relatives and background information on how the ICU operates.
MedlinePlus – Critical Care
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/criticalcare.html
Links to many resources, including news, material on clinical trials, dictionaries, and material on neonatal intensive care.
NHS Evidence: Surgery, Anaesthesia, Perioperative and Critical Care Specialist Collections
http://www.library.nhs.uk/THEATRES/
The National Library for Health has recently become part of NHS Evidence, and the former Specialist Libraries are now Specialist Collections. The critical care part of this collection is newer than the rest, and feedback is currently being invited. There is information on clinical topics, procedures and interventions, and drugs and prescribing, and on critical care management.
NICUTools
http://www.nicutools.org/
Neonatal and infant calculators, including some for PDAs.
Society of Critical Care Medicine
http://www.sccm.org/Pages/default.aspx
Society engages in advocacy, including the annual National Critical Care Awareness and Recognition Month. Site also includes publications and professional development materials.
Society of Critical Care Technologists
http://www.criticalcaretech.org.uk/index.htm
TRIP Critical Care
http://www.tripdatabase.com/critical/
specialismhomepage.html
Searches core TRIP content and 14 selected specialist journals. Patient information leaflet search also available.
Suggestions for future columns welcome, and, indeed, columns themselves – if you are interested in contributing an actual list of resources for a future column, please contact me.
Keith Nockels
University of Leicester Library
Clinical Sciences Library, RKCSB
Leicester LE2 7LX
Tel.: +44 (0)116 252 3101
Email: khn5@le.ac.uk
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From HLG Newsletter March 2009
Gastroenterology & Hepatology
My thanks to Pip Divall, Clinical Librarian, University Hospitals of Leicester Trust, for compiling this list, which was also circulated to the clin-lib JISCMAIL list for clinical librarians. All links were checked by Keith on 9th February 2009.
American College of Gastroenterology
http://www.acg.gi.org/
This site provides information on ACG structure, membership, education and research activities, clinical updates and publications. For patients there is information on gastrointestinal conditions and for health care professionals there is a series of resources including practice guidelines, GI focus clinical updates, a meetings diary and research awards.
American Gastroenterological Association
www.gastro.org
The site provides information on the AGA, its structure, aims, publications, symposia and events; legislative issues impacting on gastroenterologists' activities; gastroenterology news; membership requirements; careers, education and training; clinical practice; research programmes; practice management services; position statements and practice guidelines; education and training, and links to other resources, including a report on the burden of gastrointestinal diseases.
British Association for the Study of the Liver
http://glenlivet.mph.ed.ac.uk/basl/
This site provides access to specialised service definitions for hepatology, hepatobiliary, and pancreatic surgery in adults, and clinical guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of cholangiocarcinoma.
British Society of Gastroenterology
http://www.bsg.org.uk/
There is a Members-only area with a directory of members, discussion forum and more, and a publicly accessible area with free access to guidelines, a research database and case reports.
The Canadian Association of Gastroenterology
http://www.cag-acg.org/
The site has information on the organisation, its history, membership details, surveys, research, clinical practice guidelines, consensus reports, policies, meetings, position statements, press releases, educational programmes and links to sites of related interest.
The DAVE Project
http://daveproject.org
Digital Atlas of Video Education, from Harvard University. The project consists of a gastrointestinal endoscopy video atlas and medical lectures and presentations. Clinicians are encouraged to submit their own content to the site. Videos are free to use for non-commercial purposes. Has many endoscopy videos in a searchable database.
Gastroenterology and Liver Diseases Specialist Library
http://www.library.nhs.uk/gastroliver/
From the National Library for Health’s suite of Specialist Libraries, this site is a portal for the best available evidence within gastroenterology and liver diseases to NHS healthcare professionals. It contains guidelines, quality-assessed evidence, current awareness and links to education topics, organised by topic area. These are assessed by an editorial team before publication. Annual Evidence updates are published by the library, these are summaries of the best systematic reviews and guidelines published each year. Access to full text may be possible with an NHS Athens password.
GastroHep.com
http://www.gastrohep.com/
Free site, but requires registration. Contains current awareness, and has links to the major Gastroenterology journals. Also has a section on lectures, a slide atlas, and video clips.
GASTROLAB
http://www.gastrolab.net/
From the Gastrolab Research Centre in Vasa, Finland. Quite a busy site with an image library, videos and access to quizzes.
Gastrosource.com
http://www.gastrosource.com/
From Astra Zeneca, this site has latest trial news, information on congresses and patient cases as well a slide library and videos. The sites requires free registration to access all content.
Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions Gastroenterology & Hepatology Resource Center
http://hopkins-gi.nts.jhu.edu/pages/latin/templates/index.cfm
This site is aimed at a lay audience, and contains images and covers anatomy of the oesophagus, clinical signs and symptoms, causes, diagnosis, and available therapies.
MDLinx Gastro
http://www.mdlinx.com/gilinx/
Requires free registration, this is a US site from which you can choose to receive emails with current awareness topics on a daily or weekly basis.
Medscape Gastroenterology
http://www.medscape.com/gastroenterology
A US web site with a broad scope of resources, has sections on IBD, IBS, Hepatitis B and C, GERD etc. Requires free registration for access to Continuing Medical Education (CME) and other resources, including news.
National Digestive Diseases Clearinghouse
http://digestive.niddk.nih.gov
A US National Institute of Health (NIH) site, which contains links to statistics, current clinical trials and practice guidelines. Also contains podcasts from the NIH Research radio channel, and health tutorials.
Society of Gastroenterology Nurses and Associates
http://www.sgna.org/
US based organisation, which is dedicated to the safe and effective practice of gastroenterology and endoscopy nursing, and to advancing practice through education, research, advocacy, and collaboration. The website provides details about the organisation, its activities, membership benefits, and US legislation, and includes a collection of position statements, standards and guidelines, and links to other useful resources.
TRIP Database
http://www.tripdatabase.com/gastroenterology/
specialismhomepage.html
The Gastroenterology specialist section of the very useful TRIP database – this searches the leading 12 journals as well as TRIP’s core databases, including Cochrane Systematic Reviews, Heath Technology Assessments and electronic text books.
United European Gastroenterology Federation
http://www.uegf.org/index.php
The United European Gastroenterology Federation (UEGF) is a professional medical non-profit organisation. The website provides information on the organisation, its history, statutes, structure, member associations, congresses, news items, events and training programmes. Newsletters, press releases, congress documentation, links to sites of related interest and a database of abstracts can be accessed.
World Gastroenterology Organisation (WGO)
http://www.worldgastroenterology.org/
This site is mainly public health on a global scale and focuses on the improvement of standards in gastroenterology training and education. The WGO is a federation of societies of Gastroenterology, with links to WGO global guidelines and details of training workshops.
Suggestions for future columns, comments, etc., welcome, to the column editor:
Keith Nockels
University of Leicester Library
Clinical Sciences Library
RKCSB
Leicester LE2 7LX
Tel: +4...
Email: khn5@le.ac.uk
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
*****
From HLG Newsletter December 2008
SPORTS MEDICINE
A corrigendum and an addendum
First of all, Lynn Balmforth, Information Officer and Librarian at the National Childbirth Trust, kindly contacted me to let me know that the NCT website is now at http://www.nct.org.uk, rather than the address given in September’s column. She also alerted me to Birth Choices, http://www.birthchoices.co.uk/. This is run by two women, one a midwife. Its mission statement, at http://www.birthchoices.co.uk/, includes providing accurate unbiased information, trying to decrease the medicalisation of birth, and giving a voice to women who have had difficulty with maternity services. My thanks to Lynn for that information.
In this month’s column, the topic that would have been more topical last time (see September’s column for the excuse), sports medicine and related areas. All links were checked on 14th November 2008.
About.com
I have only recently investigated About.com. It is owned by the New York Times, and each section (“channel”) is edited by someone (a “guide”) with some knowledge of the field, appointed by the company. The sports medicine part is at http://sportsmedicine.about.com/. There is a blog, and a discussion forum.
American Academy of Podiatric Sports Medicine
http://www.aapsm.org/
Many useful looking articles on lower extremity injuries and issues in sport – socks and your feet, chronic compartment syndrome, golf and your feet, for three.
American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine
www.sportsmed.org
Includes Patient information and a 3 D surgical animation library, as well as the AOSSM Online Library of educational materials. There may be a charge to access the full text, although searching is free.
BioLab
http://www.biolab.org.uk/
A HEFCE funded project to develop biomechanics learning resources for sport related degree and HND courses. Some materials are available to download.
British Association of Sport and Exercise Medicine (BASEM)
http://www.basem.co.uk/
The oldest sport and exercise medical association in the UK, a member of EFSMA (www.efsma.net) and FIMS (mentioned below).
British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences
http://www.bases.org.uk
“The professional body for sport and exercise sciences in the UK”. Site includes a course finder, and BASES Network includes blogs, podcasts and online Q and A sessions.
British Psychological Society Division of Sports and Exercise Psychology http://www.bps.org.uk/spex/spex_home.cfm
Links to publications and other sites of interest.
Coaching Science Abstracts
http://coachsci.sdsu.edu/
Compiled by Brent Rushall of San Diego State University. Professor Rushall abstracts research articles for the benefit of practising coaches, and the abstracts can be browsed or searched. There are no links to full text but the site may help locate relevant literature. Each issue is themed, and the articles reviewed may not be from the current year.
Drug Information Database (UK Sport)
http://www.uksport.gov.uk/pages/drug_information_database/ This is the information page, with a link to the database itself, which gives information on the status of UK licensed medications in sport. Subject to accepting the terms and conditions of the site, you enter your role (athlete, etc.), sport, where you bought the medication (Canada, Asia, UK), and the active ingredient.
E medicine: Sports Medicine
http://www.emedicine.com/sports/
Collection of online articles.
Gatorade Sports Science Institute
My eldest son seems always to be bringing home from school some new educational venture, sponsored by someone or other. My negative feelings about this made me initially rather sceptical of this site. The Institute is based in Illinois, and researches particularly nutrition and hydration issues, although the website has information on sports psychology and injuries as well. The name suggests a link to the drink (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatorade!) but the GSSI is included in Intute, has an advisory board, and the drink and its manufacturer are mentioned only under “Affiliated links” (under “About us”). So I have included it here!
Institute for Preventative Sports Medicine
www.ipsm.org
US based institute, who have conducted some useful looking research, although the details on the site are rather scant. Projects have included cognitive impairment caused by heading soccer balls, and chest impact induced arrhythmia in baseball.
International Federation of Sports Medicine
http://www.fims.org/
Includes position statements on things including doping, helmets, osteoporosis and sport, Wolff Parkinson White syndrome and sport.
International Federation of Sports Physiotherapy
http://www.sportsphysiotherapyforall.org/
Publications include eBibliographies, which are lists of useful links on sports related topics.
MedlinePlus contains pages on Sports Fitness, Sports Injuries and Sports Safety – use the A to Z index page at http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/healthtopics_s.html to link to these, and follow links from those pages to more specific pages (for example, ankle injuries)
World Anti Doping Agency
http://www.wada-ama.org/en/
The Prohibited List and Therapeutic Use Exemptions list are available from here.
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From Newsletter September 2008
PREGNANCY AND BIRTH
With the Olympics and Paralympics in full swing, the obvious subject this time would have been sports medicine. However, the arrival of our new son Isaac has meant that a number of things have become quite difficult, including compiling a list of sports medicine websites! So, instead, some sites relating to babies. You will forgive, I hope, this rather self centred topic, and a rather more concise list than usual.
Isaac has a blog (http://tinynockels.blogspot.com), and these sites have been useful in writing for that, or for finding information to answer particular questions.
National Library for Health Child Health and Paediatrics Specialist Library
http://www.library.nhs.uk/childHealth/
National Library for Health Women’s Health
http://www.library.nhs.uk/womenshealth/
This specialist library covers pregnancy and birth. Both specialist libraries provide access to evidence, patient information and reference material, with extra material available if you have an NHS Athens username.
National Childbirth Trust (NCT)
http://www.nctpregnancyandbabycare.com/home The NCT provides advice and support to expectant or new parents. Local groups may have information on things like places to breastfeed or buy baby supplies.
There are many sites for parents, providing advice and online communities. Two of these are:
Babycentre
http://www.babycentre.co.uk/
Babycentre offers weekly emails on the progress of your (or your partner’s) pregnancy, and, after the birth, emails on the expected developmental progress of your new baby. Registration is simple, as is changing the due date to the actual birth date so that the emails match your baby. A member of the Johnson and Johnson group, but has a panel of health professionals providing at least some content. There are associated sites in various countries.
Bounty
http://www.bounty.com
Pregnancy, baby and parenting club, produced by the company that provides baby packs (samples of various products and offers, but also the forms to apply for child benefit) to new mums. Free registration required to get the most out of the site.
Other useful looking sites, to which I plan to return, are:
Netmums
http://www.netmums.com
Aimed at dads and other carers too, its reputation looks formidable, and it is a UK site with locally organised online communities.
ParentsCentre
http://www.parentscentre.gov.uk
Developed by the English Department for Children, Schools and Families as a resource for parents. Has links (at the top of the home page) to information for Scotland and Wales.
Brand New Dad
http://www.brandnewdad.com
A social network and resource site for new dads. Includes regular columns and month by month advice on how to care for your baby. American site, so some information likely to be less applicable to the UK - there is a link to a UK site at www.brandnewdad.co.uk but I couldn’t get it to load so am not sure what this is.
Dad Info
http://www.dad.info
I am grateful to Bernice de Braal’s article in Update (1) for this site, which contains baby, birth and legal information for dads, and is a UK site associated with the Fatherhood Institute, a fatherhood “think tank”.
Next time I plan to cover sports medicine, and if you have any sites that you have found useful that you would like me to include, please contact me. I am planning to include sports psychology, training and sports medicine and injuries.
(1) de Braal, B. (2008). Health websites: this year’s best. Update 7(7-8), 45-47.
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
From HLG Newsletter June 2008
DIABETES, AND ONE BRIEF PIECE ABOUT MENINGITIS
In 2005, almost 4.67% of the population of England had diagnosed or undiagnosed diabetes (Yorkshire and Humber Public Health Observatory and National Diabetes Support Team, 2006). By 2010, this could rise to 5.5%. The WHO estimates that more than 180 million people worldwide have diabetes, a number likely to double by 2030. In 2005, an estimated 1.1 million people worldwide died from diabetes, with 80% of those deaths occurring in low or middle income countries (World Health Organization, 2006).
I am grateful to my colleague Sarah Sutton, Clinical Librarian for Diabetes (and many other things) at the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust, for suggesting some of the sites in this article. The final selection is, of course, mine. All links were checked on 8th May 2008.
American College of Physicians Diabetes Portal
http://diabetes.acponline.org/?hp
Resources for patients and families, and for health professionals.
American Diabetes Association
http://www.diabetes.org/home.jsp
Research, information and advocacy organisation. Planet D is for kids, there are resources for schools and teenagers, and much more.
BBC Health: Diabetes
http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/conditions/diabetes
/index.shtml. Includes categorised links to support organisations, and recipes and dietary information
British Society for Paediatric Endocrinology and Diabetes
http://www.bsped.org.uk/
Patient information and information for health professionals.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: Diabetes Public Health Resource
http://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/
Patient information, and information for professionals including data and trends.
Children with Diabetes
http://www.childrenwithdiabetes.com/
Online community for children and families, based in Ohio, and started in 1995.
Diabetes nursing resource (RCN)
http://www.rcn.org.uk/development/practice/diabetes Information for nurses, patients and carers.
Diabetes Round Table
http://www.diabetesroundtable.com/
Diabetes information and CME. Sponsored site, but conforming to HON Code.
Diabetes Stories
http://www.diabetes-stories.co.uk/
Oral histories from patients diagnosed with diabetes between 1927 and 1997, website based at the Oxford Centre for Diabetes, Endocrinology and Metabolism (http://www.ocdem.com/index.php).
Diabetes Trials Unit
http://www.dtu.ox.ac.uk/
Large clinical trials unit, also based at the Oxford Centre for Diabetes, Endocrinology and Metabolism. DTU site includes details of trials conducted there, and downloadable software for calculating risk of cardiovascular disease in individuals with diabetes, and for assessing total burden of disease for populations with diabetes.
Diabetes UK
http://www.diabetes.org.uk
Major UK research and campaigning organisation.
Genetic Landscape of Diabetes
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/bv.fcgi?rid="diabetes.TOC&depth=1
Dated 2004, ebook hosted by NCBI and containing information on genetics of diabetes, along with links to related lectures.
International Diabetes Federation
http://www.idf.org/
Worldwide alliance of organisations, site includes data from the Diabetes Atlas, and a worldwide list of events.
Joslin Diabetes Center
http://www.joslin.org/index.htm
Site includes clinical guidelines, dietary information, resources for the newly diagnosed and a lot of information specific to this centre, affiliated to Harvard.
LeicestershireDiabetes.org.uk
http://www.leicestershirediabetes.org.uk/
From the Department of Diabetes and Endocrinology at the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust, which aims to be a centre of excellence in the UK. Information for patients, including information on pregnancy and diabetes, and links to websites for children.
Medical Library Association: Deciphering diabetes medspeak
http://www.mlanet.org/pdf/diabetes1.pdf
Glossary compiled by the Medical Library Association, includes list of abbreviations used on prescriptions – maybe be North American biased?
MedlinePlus: Diabetes
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/diabetes.html Related pages, on topics such as diabetes and pregnancy, diabetic eye problems, diabetic foot.
National Diabetes Education Program
http://ndep.nih.gov/
NDEP is funded by the United States federal government. Resources for health care professionals, school personnel and business and managed care, including some patient education material in Asian languages (Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese among them)
National Diabetes Information Clearinghouse
http://diabetes.niddk.nih.gov/
Part of the National Institute for Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. Large range of resources, including information in Spanish.
National Diabetes Support Team
http://www.diabetes.nhs.uk/
Set up to support healthcare professionals as they implement the Diabetes National Service Framework.
National Library for Health Diabetes Specialist Library
http://www.library.nhs.uk/diabetes/
High quality information for professionals but also includes patient information. Browse by subject, or search. Includes long list of associations and information on such things as diabetes and alcohol, driving, Christmas and Ramadan.
NHS Scotland e-library: diabetes
http://www.elib.scot.nhs.uk/portal/diabetes/
pages/index.aspx
UK Diabetes Research Network
http://www.ukdrn.org/
Clinical research.
World Health Organization: Diabetes
http://www.who.int/diabetes/en/
For diabetes patient information in languages other than English, you could try:
The 24 Languages Project (Spencer S. Eccles Health Sciences Library, University of Utah)
http://library.med.utah.edu/24languages/
Ethnomed
http://ethnomed.org/ethnomed/patient_ed/
index.html#diabetes
Health Information Translations
http://www.healthinfotranslations.com/
Ohio State University Medical Center, and other bodies.
New South Wales Multicultural Health Communication Service
http://www.mhcs.health.nsw.gov.au/mhcs/
topics/Diabetes.html
New York Online Access to Health (NOAH)
http://www.noah-health.org/
Spanish only.
NHS Direct
http://www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk/
See “Health information in other languages” in left hand column of homepage
SPIRAL: Selected Patient Information Resources in Asian Languages
http://spiral.tufts.edu/topic.html#diabetes
“Asian” = Cambodian (Khmer), Chinese, Hmong, Japanese, Korean, Laotian, Thai, Vietnamese. An initiative of South Cove Community Health Center, and Tufts University Hirsh Health Sciences Library, both in Boston, Massachusetts.
Meningitis
On another note, the recent coverage in the education press about meningitis among higher education students made me compile a resources list that you can find via http://www2.le.ac.uk/Members/khn5, and as a collection of links at http://del.icio.us/csllibrarians/meningitis.
References
World Health Organisation (2006). Diabetes (Fact sheet no. 312). Available from http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/
fs312/en/index.html
Yorkshire and Humber Public Health Observatory and National Diabetes Support Team (2006). Diabetes key facts. Available from http://www.yhpho.org.uk/Download/Public/356/1/
Diabetes_key_facts.pdf
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From HLG Newsletter March 2008
BIOINFORMATICS (updated)
This updates my first Internet Sites of Interest column, which appeared in March 2005. The subject has continued to develop, and an update seemed timely.
I have checked the items in the original column, updating where necessary. I have added some new items, and rearranged the article somewhat. I have used a number of sources in compiling this column, and they are listed as “further reading” at the end.
All links were checked on 13th February 2008.
What is bioinformatics?
The Online Medical Dictionary defines bioinformatics as:
'The use of computers in solving information problems in the life sciences, mainly, it involves the creation of extensive electronic databases on genomes, protein sequences, etc. Secondarily, it involves techniques such as the three-dimensional modeling of biomolecules and biologic systems.' http://cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/omd?query="bioinformatics,
Cellular function depends on proteins. Proteins consist of chains of amino acids. Cells produce proteins, and the information that determines which proteins are produced is contained in DNA.
A molecule of DNA is made up of thousands of nucleotides. Each nucleotide is made up of a 'base', plus a phosphate plus a sugar. The sequence of the bases specifies the order of the amino acids in a protein. A segment of DNA carrying information to encode (produce) an amino acid is a gene. The complete set of genetic information relating to an organism is its genome.
Information about the sequence of amino acids in a protein or the bases in nucleotides, or genes, is available in those 'extensive databases'. Because the information is stored digitally, it can be manipulated and compared with other data.
The column includes sites about bioinformatics, as well as some of those “extensive databases”, tools for searching them and working with the data, and other related resources.
Information about bioinformatics
Bioinformatics
http://cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/omd?query="bioinformatics
Peer reviewed journal published by Oxford University Press. Abstracts are available free of charge, but you will need a subscription to read full text, unless the article has been published under an open access model. Such papers are clearly indicated.
BMC Bioinformatics
http://cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/omd?query="bioinformatics
An open access journal publishing peer reviewed papers.
European Bioinformatics Institute
http://cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/omd?query="bioinformatics
The institute manages databases of biological data, and conducts research.
National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI)
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
NCBI manages databases of biological data. NCBI resources are listed at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/gquery, and the NCBI Handbook provides a guide to each one, at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/bv.fcgi?rid="handbook. The annual Database Issue of Nucleic Acids Research (see below) includes an update on NCBI resources (Wheeler et al., 2008).
Nucleic Acids Research
http://nar.oxfordjournals.org/
This has recently become an open access journal and is available via the publisher website and also through PubMed Central. The annual Database Issue contains articles about factual biological databases, and the annual Web Server Issue articles about web based software tools for analysing data.
Online Lectures on Bioinformatics
http://lectures.molgen.mpg.de/online_lectures.html Web based tutorial, from the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics in Berlin.
Protein Sequence Analysis: A Practical Guide http://www.bioinf.manchester.ac.uk/dbbrowser/bioactivity/ Bioinformatics web practical, from the University of Manchester. It introduces a range of tools and databases.
Bioinformatics databases
Following Xiong (Xiong, 2006), I have divided databases into primary, secondary, and specialized. Primary databases contain biological data, secondary databases add some processing to that data, and specialized databases contain data relevant to a particular research interest.
The Molecular Biology Database Collection is a list maintained by Nucleic Acids Research. It can be sorted by name of database, or by category, and there are links to each database, a summary about each, and a link to any article in NAR itself. Access the collection at http://www.oxfordjournals.org/nar/database/a. The annual Database Issue of NAR includes an update paper on this collection (Galperin, 2008), as well as papers on individual databases.
Primary databases
The three listed here work in close collaboration with each other.
DNA Databank of Japan (DDBJ)
http://www.ddbj.nig.ac.jp/
EMBL Nucleotide Sequence Database
http://www.ebi.ac.uk/embl/index.html
GenBank
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Genbank/
GenBank is a database of genetic sequence data. It can be accessed through several routes, outlined on this page.
Secondary databases
Gene
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db="gene
Gene is a searchable database of genes, including information about their chromosomal location and their function.
OMIM, the Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db="gene
Catalogue of human genes and associated diseases, edited by Victor McKusick and colleagues.
PROSITE: database of protein domains, families and functional sites
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db="gene
PROSITE is a secondary database, which analyses sequence data from primary databases.
Protein Information Resource (PIR): integrated protein informatics resource for genomic and proteomic research
http://pir.georgetown.edu/
Access to various primary databases of protein information.
Swiss-Prot
http://us.expasy.org/sprot/
A composite database, amalgamating data from various sources. TrEMBL, its computer annotated supplement, is also accessible from this site. (The site is about to be replaced with http://beta.uniprot.org/)
TIGR Genome Projects (J. Craig Venter Institute)
http://www.tigr.org/db.shtml
Suite of databases of DNA and protein sequences, gene expression, and other information, for humans and other organisms.
UniProt (http://www.ebi.ac.uk/uniprot/) combines Swiss-Prot, PIR, and TrEMBL.
Specialized databases
These include, among many others:
AceDB
http://www.ebi.ac.uk/uniprot/
Genome database for Caenorhabditis elegans (a nematode worm, used in genetics research).
FlyBase
http://flybase.bio.indiana.edu
A database of the genome of Drosophila – a fruit fly used in genetics research.
HIV Databases
http://www.hiv.lanl.gov/content/
Information on genetic sequences, immunological epitopes, drug-resistance associated mutations, and vaccine trials. Databases hosted by the Los Alamos National Laboratory, funded by the NIH.
TAIR
http://www.arabidopsis.org
Genetic and molecular biology information for Arabidopsis thaliana, a member of the mustard family used in genetics research.
Related resources
The annual Web Server issue of Nucleic Acids Research (see above) includes papers on individual search tools and software packages.
BLAST (Basic local search alignment tool)
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/blast/Blast.cgi
BLAST compares local nucleotide or protein sequences to sequence databases, to look for similarities.
Ensembl
http://www.ensembl.org/
Software system for searching information on the genomes of various organisms including humans, rats and mosquitoes.
Entrez
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/gquery
The NCBI’s life sciences search engine. This page links to a range of databases of biological data, and also to PubMed, PubMed Central, MeSH and other familiar things!
HAPMAP
http://www.hapmap.org/
A public resource to help researchers to find human genes associated with disease.
PubMed
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez/
Bibliographic references in PubMed will link to related information in other NCBI resources. PubMed, as Claverie and Notredame point out (Claverie and Notredame, 2003), is an important way to locate published information on sequences.
References
Claverie, J.-M. and Notredame, C. (2003) Bioinformatics for dummies, Indianapolis, Wiley.
Galperin, M. Y. (2008) The Molecular Biology Database Collection: 2008 update. Nucl. Acids Res., 36, D2-4.
Wheeler, D. L., et al. (2008) Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information. Nucl. Acids Res., 36, D13-21.
Xiong, J. (2006) Essential bioinformatics, New York, Cambridge University Press.
Further reading
In addition to things cited above, here are some things I found useful while writing the old or new versions of this column. Some include information on the science, which I found useful as a non-biologist, and some include information on some of the databases and how to use them.
Attwood, T. K. & Parry-Smith, D. J. (1999) Introduction to bioinformatics, Harlow, Longman.
Bradley, J., Johnson, D. & Rubenstein, D. (2001) Lecture notes on molecular medicine, Oxford, Blackwell Science.
Fogel, G. B. (2003) Internet resources for bioinformatics data and tools. IN Fogel, G. B. & Corne, D. W. (Eds.) Evolutionary computation in bioinformatics. Amsterdam, Morgan Kaufmann.
Moore, J. H. (2007) Bioinformatics. J Cell Physiol, 213, 365-9. (this “minireview” discusses databases and data mining software)
Keith Nockels, Information Librarian, University of Leicester
Contributions should be sent to khn5@le.ac.uk
*****
From HLG Newsletter December 2007
MEDICINE AND CONFLICT
Remembrance Sunday, a few weeks ago, prompts a very selective list of sites relating to medicine and conflict. MedHist (http://www.intute.ac.uk/healthandlifesciences/medhist/) is a good place to look for more, or for information on conflicts not included here.
All links were checked 20 November 2007.
World War 1, 1914-1918
The Edith Cavell Website
http://www.edithcavell.org.uk/
A statue of Edith Cavell stands in Norwich (UK), bearing the words “…I realise that patriotism is not enough, I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone…”. Born near Norwich, Edith Cavell served as a nurse in Belgium during World War 1. She helped stranded allied soldiers to return home, and for that was executed. This site includes a biography, a testimony from a chaplain at the time, and related material.
The Gillies Archives at Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup
http://www.gilliesarchives.org.uk/
The Gillies Hospital performed plastic surgery of the face between 1917 and 1925. This website includes a vast range of information relating to the Great War (1914-1918 War), including images, and a bibliography of medicine and surgery of the Great War. The site is compiled by Dr. Andrew Bamji, consultant rheumatologist and the hospital archivist.
The World War 1 Document Archive
http://www.gwpda.org/
This is an archive of primary documents, which includes images, a biographical dictionary, personal reminiscences, and a page about the “medical front” (http://www.gwpda.org/medtitle.htm).
World War 2, 1939-1945
Caring on the Home Front
http://www.caringonthehomefront.org.uk/
A site compiled by the British Red Cross and St. John Ambulance, covering the stories of the members of those organisations who worked providing medical and other care on the home front. There are many personal stories, and there is the opportunity to add your own story or that of a family member.
The Doctors’ Trial: the medical case of the subsequent Nuremberg proceedings
http://www.ushmm.org/research/doctors/
Part of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum site, this explores the trial of Nazi doctors and administrators for their participation in crimes against humanity. The site includes excerpts from trial documents, and the text of the “Nuremberg Code”, relating to experiments on human beings.
Archibald McIndoe
Many badly burned pilots were treated by the surgeon Archibald McIndoe at the Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead, Surrey. His patients became known as the “Guinea Pig Club”, as McIndoe had very little prior research or published work to draw on. He was later instrumental in founding the UK chapter of the African Medical and Research Foundation (AMREF, www.amref.org), and the Blond McIndoe Research Foundation (http://www.blondmcindoe.com/) researches wound care. For a list of articles about him, use this PubMed link: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db="PubMed&term=McIndoe%20A%5BPS%5D" . The BBC broadcast a documentary about the Guinea Pig Club in 2005, with a website at http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/features/guinea-pig.shtml, which includes a photo gallery. The consultant on the programme, Dr. Emily Mayhew, researched the Guinea Pig Club for her PhD at Imperial College, London – see http://www.imperial.ac.uk/P6224.htm. I have found two links to a Guinea Pig Club website, but sadly, neither was working when I tried them.
Nowadays
The BMJ collects all its work on this sort of subject under the heading of “Medical consequences of conflict”, available at http://www.bmj.com/cgi/collection/conflict.
International Committee of the Red Cross
http://www.icrc.org/
This site links to sites in various languages, with links to resources and publications, as well as information about the work of the ICRC.
Medecins sans Frontieres
http://www.msf.org/
MSF provide medical care in places where it is needed, often in places where there is conflict, and also raise awareness of any human rights violations they encounter. This site includes information about countries where they work, and about the various national branches (“Doctors without Borders”, for example, in the USA).
All links were checked on 20th November 2007.
Season’s Greetings and could you help?
May I wish all the readers of this column a peaceful holiday season, and every good wish for 2008. I am aware that this column is very biased towards information of interest to academic librarians and thus is not of great interest to colleagues in other sectors. I would like to cover subjects like Health policy; Devolution and health; Patient information; and information for carers (on things like benefits, for examples). I don’t have the expertise for these subjects, and so if you would be interested in contributing sites, I would be very interested to hear from you. This isn’t an exhaustive list, either, so if there is anything else I ought to cover, please let me know!
My contact details:
Keith Nockels
Clinical Sciences Library, University of Leicester
RKCSB, Leicester Royal Infirmary
PO Box 65,
Leicester LE2 7LX
England
Tel: 01...
Fax: 0116 252 3107
Email: khn5@le.ac.uk
From HLG Newsletter September 2007
OPEN ACCESS FOOT AND MOUTH DISEASE < BR>I wear another hat at work (metaphorically, of course, having been brought up not to wear hats indoors), that of manager of our institutional repository, Leicester Research Archive (LRA). LRA is a database of research articles and other publications from this University, much of it available to anyone in full text. Plenty of universities, as you may know, have such a thing, and there are subject repositories as well.
Repositories will contain material of interest to many readers of this column, not just those in academic institutions. So, what are the benefits of repositories? How do you know what repositories there are, and how can you search them (without searching them one at a time!). Surely publishers don’t allow you to make their material available on open access? Or do they? How do you know what they allow? What is the difference between open access archiving and open access publishing?
Here are some websites that might help answer those questions.
General information on open access
Mark Funk: Open access – a primer
http://www.mlanet.org/pdf/resources/oa_primer_mfunk.pdf Will help unravel the various open access alternatives.
Peter Suber: A brief introduction to open access
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/brief.htm
Will also help unravel the various open access alternatives.
SPARC Open Access Newsletter
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/
A regular publication, produced by Peter Suber.
SHERPA
http://www.sherpa.ac.uk
SHERPA (“Securing a Hybrid Environment for Research Preservation and Access”) started as a JISC funded project, and continues as one of the major support mechanisms for repositories, and therefore one of the major sources of information and advocacy material for open access archiving.
What repositories are there?
There are two major directories which will help to find a particular institution’s repository, and give statistics on content.
OpenDOAR
http://www.opendoar.org/
Maintained by the SHERPA Project (see above)
ROAR (Registry of Open Access Repositories)
http://roar.eprints.org/
What do repositories contain? How can I search them?
Google indexes repositories and other open access material, and other search engines may do as well. But if you want a search targeted to open access material, so you know that the links to full text will work, here are some specialist tools:
BASE
http://www.base-search.net/index.php?i="b
BASE is produced at Bielefeld University (Germany) and indexes scholarly internet resources available at that University. Some of the material found through BASE is therefore only available to members of Bielefeld University. But, BASE indexes much open access material, available in full for free, and indexes a large number of institutional repositories.
INTUTE Repository Search
http://irs.ukoln.ac.uk/
IRS searches across 76 UK academic repositories, including The Depot (http://www.depot.edina.ac.uk/), which is a repository for use by academics whose institution does not have its own repository.
OAISter
http://www.oaister.org/
OAIster is a union catalogue of digital resources and is a major source for open access material available in full for free. It currently includes almost 13 million records from around 850 sources, including institutional and subject repositories. A list of sources is available at http://www.oaister.org/viewcolls.html.
OpenDOAR Search
http://www.opendoar.org/search.php
A trial service, using Google’s Custom Search technology, which searches repositories listed in OpenDOAR.
Scientific Commons
http://en.scientificcommons.org/
Scientific Commons currently indexes 13 million items, from open access repositories. It enables you to see who is working with who, as well as giving links to the full item in its home repository.
SHERPA UK Repositories Search
http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/repositories/sherpasearchalluk.html Another trial service, using Google’s Custom Search, which searches the contents of UK repositories.
Which publishers allow archiving?
Authors often sign away a lot of rights in their work when it is accepted for publication (not everyone understands that, I fear) and publishers have rules about archiving. Most of them, as you will read in the literature, will allow archiving, but most of those do not allow you to archive their published PDF file. They might allow archiving of the final draft of the accepted article. I have met people in some disciplines who have an issue with this, as final drafts are, they say, difficult to reference properly, or because the draft may not be exactly the same as the published work of record. Also, many people do not appear to keep the final draft for long. The major source of information about who allows what is:
ROMEO
http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo.php
Originally based at Loughborough University but now maintained by SHERPA. Our first port of call when asking ourselves “will this publisher allow us to archive…?”
What do grant awarding bodies want?
Some grant awarding bodies (including the Wellcome Trust, British Heart Foundation, and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council and other UK research councils) now make open access publication or placing work in an open access repository a condition of receiving an award. The major source of information about who requires what is:
JULIET
http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/juliet/index.php
Another SHERPA project.
Subject repositories
The arXiv e print archive (http://arxiv.org/) is a long standing subject repository covering certain areas of physics, and there are others. OpenDOAR and ROAR will help you locate them. The subject repository that will affect biomedicine is UK PubMed Central, maintained by MIMAS, the British Library, and the European Bioinformatics Institute. UKPMC is closely allied to PubMed Central.
PubMed Central
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/
PubMed Central, maintained by the National Library of Medicine, is an archive of backfiles of biomedicine journals, with full text available free. There are links to this from PubMed. But it also contains authors’ manuscripts of papers funded by bodies that mandate them to make their work available on open access, as mentioned above. See http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/about/authorms.html for details of this.
UK PubMed Central
http://ukpmc.ac.uk/
Contains author manuscripts of papers published by UKPMC funded researchers, who mandate deposit in UKPMC.
More information
I have a search alert running in PubMed, for “open access”, which uncovers many relevant new articles, but also (because I have not found a foolproof MeSH heading) finds papers about various surgical techniques!
A regularly updated bibliography is:
Charles Bailey’s Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography
http://www.digital-scholarship.org/sepb/sepb.html
Section 9 includes material on repositories.
Topical footnote – foot and mouth disease
One of the benefits of online publication is that this column will reach you soon. Therefore it seems timely to include links about Foot and Mouth Disease. The easiest way to do this is to point you towards our resource list, which you can find at http://www.le.ac.uk/library/khn5/footandmouth.pdf. If you have problems accessing it there, and would like a copy via email, please contact me.
All links were checked on 16th August 2007.
My contact details:
Keith Nockels
Clinical Sciences Library
University of Leicester
RKCSB
Leicester
LE2 7LX
Tel. +44 (0)116 252 3101
Fax: +44 (0)116 252 3107
Email: khn5@le.ac.uk
Comments, links, and suggestions for future columns most welcome.
From HLG Newsletter June 2007
DRUGS AND PHARMACOLOGY, AND NATIONAL KNOWLEDGE WEEKS
I have listed some sites giving information on medicines. I have included some standard works even though access needs a subscription, as I have found myself often wondering how to access them online and thought a note of this might be helpful.
I have also included two sites that cover drugs of abuse/misuse.
All links were checked on 11th May 2007.
Medicinal drugs
British National Formulary / British National Formulary for Children
http://www.bnf.org; http://bnfc.org/bnfc/
These are also available through the National Library for Health at http://www.library.nhs.uk. Free registration is required to see full text. The BNF is published jointly by the British Medical Association and the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, and the BNFC by those organisations and the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. Both contain key information on the selection and prescribing of medicines. Medicines generally prescribed in the UK are covered, and anything considered less suitable for prescribing is clearly identified. We have had interesting discussions with our medical students on whether the BNF is evidence based – you can read the “How the BNF is put together” section on the BNF site and decide for yourselves!
British Pharmacopoeia Commission
http://www.pharmacopoeia.org.uk/
The British Pharmacopoeia is the “authoritative, current collection of standards for UK medicinal substances and the official source of all UK quality standards”. Available only on subscription. This site includes links to information about the European, Japanese, International and United States pharmacopoeias.
European Pharmacopoeia
http://www.edqm.eu/site/page_581.php
Subscription only. The European Pharmacopoeia aims to ensure the quality of medicines used in Europe or exported from Europe, and to facilitate the free movement of medicines in Europe.
Food and Drug Administration (US)
http://www.fda.gov/
The FDA regulates human and pet food as well as drugs. Extensive site, with information on food safety as well as drug information (includes the “Orange Book” approved drug list), and medical devices. There is also information tailored to particular interest groups. Yorick the bionic skeleton (under “Kids”) looks fun, and the Kids section also includes some information on pet care.
Martindale
Martindale is prepared by staff of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, and contains monographs on over 6000 drug preparations, with information on licensed and unlicensed uses of that drug. Martindale is also useful for identifying drugs and local equivalents. Martindale is available online through Medicines Complete, at http://www.medicinescomplete.com/mc/ but you need a subscription.
Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency
http://www.mhra.gov.uk/
An executive agency of the Department of Health, which works to ensure that medicines and medical devices are safe. Site includes current safety warnings, adverse drug reaction information and drug alerts, as well as information about how the agency works.
MedlinePlus: Drugs and Supplements
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginformation.html I am a fan of this NLM consumer health information site. The Drugs and Supplements section contains information on prescription and over the counter drugs, and herbal supplements as well as FDA drug labels. I suspect that the drugs covered will be those available in the USA.
National Electronic Library for Medicines
http://www.druginfozone.nhs.uk/home/default.aspx Formerly known as DrugInfoZone, this is part of the National Library for Health, and brings together news, evidence and other information relating to medicines.
PubChem
http://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
PubChem is an NCBI initiative, and provides information on the biological activities of small molecules. There are three databases: BioAssay,
Compound, Substance. PubChem can provide a diagram of the chemical structure of the compound, and links to information on its biological activity, toxicology, and more.
Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain http://www.rpsgb.org.uk/
The regulatory authority for pharmacists.
United States Pharmacopeia
http://www.usp.org/
The official authority for all prescription and over the counter medicines, and dietary supplements and other healthcare products, manufactured and sold in the United States. The USP National Formulary (subscription only) is the book of standards, and product monographs are also available for purchase.
Drugs of abuse/misuse
DrugScope
http://www.drugscope.org.uk/
An independent organisation providing information on drugs, with some material only available to members. D-World is a free site aimed at 11-14 year olds. The Library produces a wealth of resources, including:
• DrugSearch, an online encyclopaedia of drugs, which includes historical and legal information, information on likely street prices, prevalence, effects, slang names, and some information in languages other than English.
• HelpFinder, a database of help and advice services.
• DrugData, a database of drug research literature.
The Library also produces lists of grey literature, and has an excellent blog, DrugScope DrugData Update, which details new publications added to the library and has weekly focus articles. The blog is at http://drugscope.blogspot.com.
National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse
http://www.nta.nhs.uk
One of my Drug and Alcohol Treatment students alerted me to this NHS agency. The site includes links to publications, and information on types of treatment available.
*****
National Knowledge Weeks
National Knowledge Weeks are designed to draw attention to the resources available through the National Library for Health Specialist Libraries. The Specialist Libraries (listed at http://www.library.nhs.uk/specialistlibraries/) bring together resources for patients and professionals, in a particular area.
Richard Stevens alerted me to this:
The first National Knowledge Week on 'Pain in Palliative and Supportive Care' appeared on 30th April and is accessible from the NLH Specialist Library's home page:
http://www.library.nhs.uk/palliative/
The resources will remain online until the next Annual Evidence Update appears in 12 months time. So if you would like to contribute to the 2008 update, or if you have any comments on how we went about it this time, please use the Contact Us form accessed from the Library home page or email the Information Specialist direct. All comments - positive and negative - will be warmly received.
The week will have passed by the time you read this, but the resources will be there for one year.
Ann Brocklehurst alerted me to the NKW for Rheumatoid Arthritis:
The week, beginning 7 May 2007, has been designated the Musculoskeletal Specialist Library (http://www.library.nhs.uk/musculoskeletal) National Knowledge Week and coincides with the British Society for Rheumatology Annual General Meeting. Under the leadership of Dr Robin Butler, a Consultant Rheumatologist, an Expert Panel has prepared a series of summaries which concisely set out the state of the art in relation to a variety of aspects of this disease. There will be material relating to aspects of disease management including existing, new and forthcoming drugs and also other hot topics such as identifying prognostic factors and the relationship between RA, infection and malignancy. We hope you will visit the site and give your feedback on this feature.
Thank you to Richard and to Ann for these.
The NKW for Rhinitis is 14-18 May – see http://www.library.nhs.uk/ent/ for details.
There are details of other forthcoming weeks at http://www.library.nhs.uk/rss/default.aspx and a list of all weeks at http://www.library.nhs.uk/forlibrarians/sl. But, if you would like to give your NKW a specific mention, please let me know.
My contact details:
Keith Nockels
Clinical Sciences Library, University of Leicester
RKCSB, Leicester Royal Infirmary
PO Box 65,
Leicester LE2 7LX
England
Tel: 0116 252 3101
Fax: 0116 252 3107
Email: khn5@le.ac.uk
Please contact me with suggestions for future columns or with any comments.