Being a Solo Librarian in Healthcare

Pivoting for 21st Century Healthcare Information Delivery

Elizabeth C Burns

• Publisher: Chandos Publishing
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9780081001295
• Topic: Filología
• Subtopic: Biblioteconomía y ciencia de la información

This book brings to light the current job responsibilities of the healthcare librarian, but at the same time reveals a dichotomy. In theory, advances in healthcare research promise better care and improved safety for patients. In practice, there are barriers that undermine change. The author calls attention to the underutilized healthcare librarian at a time when clinical information delivery to the doctor or nurse is equal to or more important than how wired the hospital is. This is a book for healthcare stakeholders who support evidence-based practice and for those considering entering medical librarianship. The profession is in flux as hospitals must decide whether they can afford a library and librarian or whether they can afford not to have one.

• Discusses current trends in healthcare librarianship
• Describes the daily job duties of a hospital librarian
• Looks at barriers to hospitals practicing evidence-based medicine
• Connects improved patient care to healthcare librarian services

1

Forethoughts

This chapter introduces the core requirements for healthcare solo librarianship, which includes flexibility, prioritizing, and networking. Healthcare librarianship is at a pivotal stage. To stem the current trend of closing hospital libraries will require a new trajectory, and one that will include the input from all healthcare stakeholders.

Keywords

Core requirements; priorities; flexibility; library closings; stakeholders

The title of this book chooses the words solo healthcare librarian to bring attention to the dwindling number of medical librarians at a time when they are needed more than ever. I hope to show that today’s medical librarian can contribute to improving patient care, but is not being utilized and in some hospitals, no longer exists. This book is written for the stakeholders in healthcare and for anyone considering healthcare librarianship as a profession.

When I began organizing my thoughts for this book, I did a mind map. Some people will know exactly what I’m talking about. For those who don’t, mind mapping is a way of linking ideas. It is a way of connecting thoughts which leads to discovering the major ideas, and how these connect with other subsidiary subject matter. The major focus of the mind map was to get a clear idea of what constitutes the best representation of what a medical librarian does. Healthcare librarians provide information storage, information retrieval, and information delivery. As I jotted down the many duties of the solo librarian, the mind map took on the shape of two circles or wheels. The hub of one wheel was library patron needs, and the other, librarian needs. The many other ideas were like spokes radiating out from these two hubs, with much overlapping. The image of these two wheels brought to mind a bicycle, but then a third hub began to form, which had to do with elements that kept the other two balanced and running smoothly. These other elements or what I would call core requirements came from a poll I sent to the MedLib Listserv. The MedLib listserv is a public discussion list for medical and health science librarians. The question posed was “What is the one piece of advice you would give to a librarian who has to do it all alone? Or, what is something helpful to make the job easier or more efficient?” The answers were varied, but these four dominated.

1. Flexibility or the ability to multitask and prioritize

2. Networking

3. Supportive boss

4. Volunteers.

These four topics formed the third hub bringing to my mind a triangular image or a wheelbarrow. Being a person who loves to play with symbols, I looked in the Penguin Dictionary of Symbols (1996) and discovered the wheelbarrow actually makes a fitting ideogram for an information delivery system, of which librarians are only a part:

The symbolism of the wheelbarrow derives from an overall view of the object regarded as an extension of the human arm and as a miniature farm-cart. In fact it symbolizes the enhancement of human strength in three different ways. The first is in intensity, since the two handles of the wheelbarrow form levers; the second in volume through the capacity of the barrow; and the third in freedom of movement, thanks to the wheel… Its balance also depends on the person holding the handles and it is just as easy to tip it over as it is to push it forward. In this context it might stand for fate with all its potential and all its ambivalence (p. 1104).

Further support for this symbol came from the Janet Doe Lecture given by Margaret Bandy at the 2014 MLA (Medical Library Association) Conference in Chicago. Margaret spoke about pivoting as a word to describe quickly adapting to change and moving librarianship to interdisciplinary collaboration. She spoke about pivoting as a way of changing the trajectory of the profession. As I listened, the wheelbarrow image came to mind again. A wheelbarrow pivots very well, and it can be filled with all sorts of things. I began to see the wheelbarrow as an icon for an information delivery system for all healthcare. If you think this is too antiquated an image, I would argue that perhaps today this is exactly what we need to counter the blown-out-of proportion misinformation circulating about the Internet. It was with the advent of the Internet that everyone believed all information would be available and free. Sometimes I think this one idea is responsible for doctors and residents using Google and not using the library purchased databases. We all know that the databases that hospitals pay thousands of dollars to search are far from free. We also know that with this misperception of the internet came the idea that librarians and libraries were no longer needed. Ironically, librarians were early adopters of computers and the Internet. For a quick look at the last 35 years in librarianship, see Dudden (2004). It is the public perception of librarians that is outdated. The wheelbarrow may represent a need to return to commonsense, to a grounding on what works for a twenty-first century information delivery system. The wheelbarrow is a working person’s tool, and some things are so basic, they are timeless.

Of course, here we are considering the fate of healthcare libraries and librarians. Will hospital libraries exist 10 years from now? Will clinical librarianship or informationists embedded in different departments replace the healthcare librarian and library? Who or what is responsible for the direction of libraries moving toward the future? Solo librarians are acutely aware of the precarious circumstances surrounding medical libraries. Nationwide, all of us have witnessed many hospital library closings. In an effort to stem the tide, the MLA set up a task force to investigate and come up with ways to help hospital libraries. The National Network of Libraries of Medicine (NNLM) and the Mid-Continent Medical Library Association (MCMLA) Library Advocacy Committee composed letters to send to administrators, detailing a list of reasons for keeping the libraries and librarians. It soon became evident the letters were too little, too late. Though librarians are passionate about the profession and do publish excellent articles on the many services provided, we’ve been mainly publishing in library related journals. In other words, we were preaching to the choir. Shumaker (2012) agrees, saying, “Medical librarians have done amazing work, but it’s all written up in the medical library journals, and if you’re not a medical librarian reading those journals, you probably haven’t read about it” (xv). Therefore, I think the title of this book almost begs for a subtitle such as “A book not written for librarians” or “Healthcare librarians need not read this book.” A librarian friend of mine shared this with me and I’m sure there are many stories similar to this one. She said that a friend of hers, who is a pharmacist was in the library with another pharmacist who commented “She’s got the best job in the hospital. All she has to do is check out books to people.” Healthcare librarians encounter this misperception, often. What does a solo librarian do? Everything in the wheelbarrow. That’s what this book will cover. The focus will mainly be on the major services, but also how these services collide with other seen and unseen forces.

The three hubs: the patron’s needs, the solo librarian’s needs, and the core requirements obtained from the poll intermingle creating an iterative quality to the content of this book. The core requirements help to support and balance, allowing pivoting as the solo librarian performs daily work. However, when we talk about pivoting, there is a more far-reaching scale of pivoting that this book will address. In this information-rich world, librarians have the potential and the obligation to serve in ways that will alter and improve delivery of healthcare. I hope that this glimpse of healthcare librarianship will contribute to rousing all stakeholders involved in improving diagnosis and treatment of patients.

Before moving to Chapter 2, I want to say a few words about flexibility and multitasking. I think I prefer the word flexibility rather than multitasking. Flexibility is moving from one job to another and then returning to the task that was temporarily suspended. Multitasking gives one the impression of doing several jobs at the same time and perhaps not a good idea. For example, doing a literature search requires deep concentration and is almost impossible to do simultaneously with other work. Even though I’ve heard that the Millennial is the master of multitasking, I think even a Millennial or Net Gener would have to do some reflecting while conducting a search. In addition, whatever task you are enga...

Table of contents

• Cover image
• Title page
• Table of Contents
• Copyright
• Dedication
• About the author
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• 1. Forethoughts
• 2. Bedrock services
• 3. Purchasing
• 4. Maintaining electronic resources
• 5. All-around support
• 6. Afterthoughts
• References
• Index