{"id":242,"date":"2013-03-31T21:02:42","date_gmt":"2013-04-01T05:02:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/?p=242"},"modified":"2019-04-04T15:58:29","modified_gmt":"2019-04-04T23:58:29","slug":"learn-about-the-alaska-medical-library-this-week-on-informania-monday-at-9am-and-thursday-at-5pm-on-krua-88-1-the-edge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/2013\/03\/31\/learn-about-the-alaska-medical-library-this-week-on-informania-monday-at-9am-and-thursday-at-5pm-on-krua-88-1-the-edge\/","title":{"rendered":"Learn about the Alaska Medical Library this week on Informania, Monday at 9am and Thursday at 5pm on KRUA, 88.1, The Edge."},"content":{"rendered":"

On April 1, 2013, Deb the Librarian interviewed Kathy Murray, Head of the Alaska Medical Library.\u00a0\u00a0Professor Murray shared historical information about the Alaska Medical Library<\/a>, the clients they serve, health-related resources available, and tips for\u00a0evaluating medical-related web sites.\u00a0 Listen to this podcast\u00a0using QuickTime software at www.kruaradio.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n

History<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Alaska Medical Library (AML)\u00a0began as part of the Alaska Native Medical Center\u00a0(ANMC)\u00a0in 1968.\u00a0 AML has gone through a\u00a0series of funding changes (from ANMC to Alaska State Library to University and fee-based) and name changes (including Health Sciences information Center\u00a0and Health Sciences Information Services), and is now\u00a0located on the second floor in the Consortium Library.\u00a0 The name, Alaska Medical Library, was\u00a0adopted in 2002.\u00a0 There are currently three medical librarians and three support staff\u00a0that help\u00a0with AML services.<\/p>\n

Who\u00a0uses the Alaska Medical Library?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Medical Professionals, University Students, Community Members<\/p>\n

The Alaska Medical Library is the primary library for most hospitals\u00a0and medical practitioners\u00a0in Alaska.\u00a0 There are only two other medical libraries in Alaska:\u00a0 one at the Alaska Native Medical Center and one at a Fairbanks\u00a0Memorial Hospital.<\/p>\n

Students at the University of Alaska Anchorage and Alaska Pacific University, and those involved in the WWAMI medical school program have access to AML resources online\u00a0using their student user name and password (also used for Blackboard and university email access).\u00a0 Students studying nursing, biological sciences and allied health areas (dental assisting, emergency services, dietetics and nutrition, medical assisting, pharmacy technology, radiologic technology, etc.) are common users of Alaska Medical Library resources and services.\u00a0 The medical libararians provide subject-related research instruction for courses in these subject areas.<\/p>\n

Any person\u00a0who\u00a0comes to the Consortium Library can access\u00a0databases paid for by the university and state.\u00a0 These unique\u00a0databases include Anatomy and Physiology Online<\/strong>, GIDEON Online<\/strong><\/a>,\u00a0and Natural Standard<\/strong><\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0Visitors to the Consortium Library may also ask for assistance in using any of the Library’s resources.\u00a0 The Alaska Medical Library will do the research for people, but this is a fee-based service.\u00a0 In other words, it costs money.<\/p>\n

Evaluating Medical Information Online<\/strong><\/p>\n

Kathy Murray provides health literacy instruction, and provided great tips for evaluating health- and medical-related websites online.<\/p>\n

1)\u00a0 Look at the date – Is the information current?\u00a0 Whas the web site updated recently?<\/p>\n

2) Look for the author – Is the author of the web site listed?\u00a0 Are their credentials (background schooling and professional experience) listed?\u00a0 The Alaska Medical Library has a book that includes the board certifications of health professionals that they used to check the qualifications of medical web sites’ authors.<\/p>\n

3) Look at the list of references \/ research resources that they claim support their statement about the health topic.\u00a0 Does the\u00a0site include a list of\u00a0resources?\u00a0 Can you find these resources?<\/p>\n

4) Look for advertising on the web site.\u00a0 Advertising gives a clue about who is paying for the web site.\u00a0 There will be a bias (a certain perspective or an opinion) about the topic included on the web site, and when you see a large amount of advertising, be aware that the products paying for the web site might be recommended more frequently than others, even though they may not necessarily be better.\u00a0 WebMD is an example of a medical web site that includes advertising.<\/p>\n

What sources for finding medical information does\u00a0Professor Murray\u00a0recommend?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

It depends on the point of information needed, and the background of the person looking.<\/p>\n

MedlinePlus<\/strong>\u00a0<\/a>is the\u00a0source that Professor Murray will begin her research given a general health topic.\u00a0 MedlinePlus is a source created by the U.S. National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health.\u00a0 The Mayo Clinic produces useful reports also, and these are searchable through MedlinePlus.<\/p>\n

The next step up would be a search through CINAHL, the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health<\/strong>, a database available at the Consortium Library, but not accessible\u00a0through the Internet without a subscription.<\/p>\n

For Alaskans unable to come to the Consortium Library, and alternative might be the Health databases available through sled.alaska.edu\/databases<\/a>, which include Academic Search Premier\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Health Source:\u00a0 Nursing\u00a0Academic Edition<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Finally, PubMed<\/a>,<\/strong> is a comprehensive database of medical research, but is technically advanced.\u00a0 This is the source used by medical professionals in their research.\u00a0 It is available online through the Internet, but not all the articles are available in full text (so that you can read them).\u00a0 Professor Murray said that if you search PubMed through the Consortium Library’s web page,\u00a0the articles that are available in full text through the statewide databases\u00a0will be identifiable.\u00a0 For other titles, you could check\u00a0for the title of the journal\u00a0in\u00a0the Consortium Library’s\u00a0journal database.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Subject web pages<\/a> <\/strong>created by Alaska Medical Librarians include:\u00a0 Health Sciences, Nursing, Dental Assisting and Technology, Dietetics and Nutrition, and Medical Laboratory Science.\u00a0 These web pages include subject-specific databases, web sites, books, and other sources.\u00a0 A link to these Subject pages can also be found at www.consortiumlibrary.org<\/a>, under the Subjects<\/em><\/p>\n

Music played on Informania, April 1, 2013:\u00a0 Information<\/em>, by Dredg, and Help<\/em>, by the Beatles<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On April 1, 2013, Deb the Librarian interviewed Kathy Murray, Head of the Alaska Medical Library.\u00a0\u00a0Professor Murray shared historical information about the Alaska Medical Library, the clients they serve, health-related resources available, and tips for\u00a0evaluating medical-related web sites.\u00a0 Listen to this podcast\u00a0using QuickTime software at www.kruaradio.org. History The Alaska Medical Library (AML)\u00a0began as part of … Continue reading “Learn about the Alaska Medical Library this week on Informania, Monday at 9am and Thursday at 5pm on KRUA, 88.1, The Edge.”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":250,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5294],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-242","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-informania-interviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/250"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=242"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":978,"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242\/revisions\/978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/consortiumlibrary.org\/blogs\/dmole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}