The Bottleneck in research communications

Researchers find it increasingly difficult to investigate the research literature as a result of sharply restricted university library budgest. Fremont Rider's barometer of the effectiveness of an educational institution is more relevant now, after fifty years, because it provides a clear measure of the deficits in university collections and can be corroborated by other evidence of reduced productivity in research. Librarians and faculty have been told there is no money for the library while growth of administrative expenditures has been well funded. Researchers have begun to call for reforms.     

Blockchain for research: Review

Key points

• Digital Science's paper is one of the first looking at the application of blockchain technology in scholarly publishing.
• Wholesale use of blockchain technologies is suggested as a possible replacement for scholarly publishers.
• There remain questions around the adoption of blockchain technologies, including privacy, researcher support, and fraudulent use.
• Blockchain technologies may provide a new means of understanding problems and customers' evolving expectations, but careful consideration is required of whether blockchain is the best solution.

     

Assembling the evidence: patient-focused outcomes research

相似文献   

Inside outreach: a challenge for health sciences librarians.

OBJECTIVE: Like medical and health sciences libraries throughout the country, the Lamar Soutter Library (LSL) at the University of Massachusetts Medical School is dealing with ever-increasing outreach needs in times of diminishing funding. With the goal of reshaping the library's outreach program to better serve our patron groups, the Outreach Study Group was formed to investigate existing models of outreach. METHODS: The group initially examined the current literature and subsequently conducted a nationwide survey of medical and health sciences libraries to identify trends in outreach. This article details the methods used for the survey, including establishing criteria for selecting participants, determining the focus, and developing and conducting the survey. RESULTS: Of the 40 libraries invited to participate, 63% completed the survey. An analysis of the data revealed successes, problems, and trends. The group's conclusions led to recommendations for the LSL's future outreach efforts. CONCLUSIONS: Analysis of the data revealed key findings in the areas of strategic planning, funding, and evaluation. A thoughtful definition of outreach ensures that outreach activities are expressions of the library's mission. Funding shifts require flexible programs. Evaluation provides data necessary to create new programs, sustain successful ones, and avoid repeating mistakes.     

Patient education and health outcomes: implications for library service

Many librarians take an active role in patient education, for practical and ethical reasons; however, it is important to examine the effect of such activities on health outcomes. Although the rationale for patient education is that increased knowledge leads to a change in attitude that in turn affects behavior, studies have shown that this is not always true. Furthermore, other studies have shown that patient education programs by themselves have no lasting influence on patient compliance with therapy that has been linked to improved health. Librarians should examine a variety of reasons for their involvement in patient education activities. For librarians who accept improved patient compliance as a goal, specific recommendations based on literature review are made to help implement effective strategies.     

Review article: Consumer health information services*

相似文献   

The unique nature of communications regulation: Evidence and implications for communications policy analysis

The numerous policy changes taking place following the passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 necessitate an examination of the nature of communications regulation. Specifically, it is necessary to reexamine whether the prevailing analytic perspective adequately accounts for the fundamental differences between communications regulation and the regulation of other industries. This article outlines three fundamental differences and discusses their implications for effective communications policy analysis.     

研究型大学创办英文科技期刊的机遇与挑战

随着科学技术的不断进步,反映科技成果的科技期刊越来越朝向专业化、国际化和系列化的方向发展。中国大学特别是研究型大学具有雄厚的科研实力,是中国高水平科技论文最重要的产出地之一。但由于研究型大学主办的英文期刊多数为综合性期刊,受到国内外同行的关注程度较低,很难吸引高水平的稿件,不能客观地反映和代表研究型大学的最高学术水平。因此,开展我国大学英文科技期刊的国际化、专业化和系列化研究与实践,有助于提高我国英文科技期刊的整体水平。     

The relationships between distance factors and international collaborative research outcomes: A bibliometric examination

Increasingly, scholars have been conducting team-based research with multinational collaborators to carry out internationally relevant studies, generate global impact, and promote academic exchanges. In this paper, we examine how four types of distance, i.e., geographic, political, cultural, and economic, relate to the output of international research collaborations. We analyze a bibliometric data set derived from four leading marketing journals spanning the 2001–2016 time frame. Among other insights, our results show that in the context of international collaborative research efforts, co-authors from countries with wider economic distances and narrower political distances have published fewer articles and received fewer citations compared to those from countries with narrower economic distances and wider political distances.     

LGBTQ+ health research guides at North American health sciences libraries: a survey and content analysis

Objectives:Current literature recommends online research guides as an easy and effective tool to promote LGBTQ+ health information to both health care providers and the public. This cross-sectional study was designed to determine how extensive LGBTQ+ health guides are among hospital and academic libraries and which features are most prevalent.Methods:In order to locate LGBTQ+ health guides for content analysis, we searched for guides on the websites of libraries belonging to the Association of Academic Health Sciences Libraries (AAHSL) and the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL). Additionally, we searched the Springshare interface for LibGuides with the word “health” and either “LGBT” or “transgender.” Content analysis was performed to identify major characteristics of the located guides, including target audience and the information type provided.Results:LGBTQ+ research guides were identified for 74 libraries. Of these, 5 were hospital libraries, and the rest were academic libraries. Of 158 AAHSL member libraries, 48 (30.4%) had LGBTQ+ guides on their websites. Nearly all guides (95.9%) provided general LGBTQ+ health information, and a large majority (87.8%) also had information resources for transgender health. Smaller percentages of guides contained information on HIV/AIDS (48.6%) and women''s health (16.2%).Conclusions:Even though literature recommends creating LGBTQ+ health guides, most health sciences libraries are missing an opportunity by not developing and maintaining these guides. Further research may be needed to determine the usage and usefulness of existing guides and to better identify barriers preventing libraries from creating guides.     

Evaluating digital libraries in the health sector. Part 2: measuring impacts and outcomes

This is the second part of a two-part paper which explores methods that can be used to evaluate digital libraries in the health sector. Part 1 focuses on approaches to evaluation that have been proposed for mainstream digital information services. This paper investigates evaluative models developed for some innovative digital library projects, and some major national and international electronic health information projects. The value of ethnographic methods to provide qualitative data to explore outcomes, adding to quantitative approaches based on inputs and outputs is discussed. The paper concludes that new 'post-positivist' models of evaluation are needed to cover all the dimensions of the digital library in the health sector, and some ways of doing this are outlined.     

Engaging in research: challenges and opportunities for health library and information professionals

This year's virtual issue (the 6th in the series) has been published to coincide with the European Association for Health Information and Libraries’ (EAHIL) 2015 workshop (10–12 June, Edinburgh): Research‐Minded: Understanding, Supporting, Conducting Research. This event is being run in collaboration with the International Conference of Animal Health Information Specialists and the International Clinical Librarian Conference. Although research has always been a central part of any librarian's role, until recently health librarians and library users and funding bodies assumed that librarians were ‘midwives’ – there to assist students, clinicians, academics and managers set up and carry out their research. The notion of the librarian as a professional with a research agenda, who understands research methods, submits research grants, and publishes, is a relatively new perspective. If librarians are to take an evidence‐based approach to their profession they need to acquire research skills. This is the rationale for the 2015 EAHIL workshop. To support the workshop, this virtual issue contains six original articles published in Health Information and Libraries Journal over the last 2 years that demonstrate the range of research activities carried out by health librarians, as well as a review article and articles from each of the three feature columns. All articles included in this virtual issue are available free online.     

Medical journals and effective dissemination of health research

Clinical medical journals have not been effective in meeting the information needs of practitioners and bridging the gap between clinical research and practice. The slow adoption of results of clinical research is at least partly due to the failure of clinical journals to disseminate information in a way that would motivate practitioners to change practice. Although implementation is primarily a local process, medical journals are in a unique position to advance implementation by modifying their focus and adjusting their contents. Strategies that may be useful include publication of pre‐appraised evidence summaries and ‘clinical bottom‐lines’ and giving importance to systematic reviews and large evaluative research articles as they represent higher levels of evidence and have greater potential to change practice. Clinical journals should encourage researchers to consider how and by whom the findings will be used and provide information on implications for implementation such as possible strategies that may work, cost‐effectiveness, side‐effects and potential barriers to implementation. Medical journal publishers should explore ways to cooperate so that findings of landmark clinical trials could be shared thus reducing the ‘scatter’ of medical information. Electronic media offers numerous advantages such as quick accessibility and linking of information, and medical journals should capitalize on such innovations. There is a paradigm shift in health care practice as evidence is consciously and explicitly incorporated into individual patient care. Medical journals need to change to reflect this change in practice and provide practitioners with valid and relevant information.     

British and European communications

EUROPE'S NETWORK INDUSTRIES: CONFLICTING PRIORITIES by Lars Bergman, et al. (London: Centre for Economic Policy Research “Monitoring European Deregulation 1,”/Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1998—$25.00, paper, ISBN 1–898128–37–5, 258 pp., tables, charts, notes, appendices, bibliography, index)

GERMAN COMMUNICATION YEARBOOK edited by Hans‐Bernd Brosius and Christina Holtz‐Bacha (Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press, 1999—$26.50, paper, ISBN 1–57273–296–2, 304 pp., tables, charts, references)

A DECADE OF EU BROADCASTING REGULATION: THE DIRECTIVE “TELEVISION WITHOUT FRONTIERS”; by Emmanuelle Machet (Düsseldorf, Germany: The European Institute for the Media, 1999—DM 20.00, paper, ISBN 929673–33–9, 100 pp., tables, notes, bibliography)

CONVERGENCE IN EUROPEAN DIGITAL TV REGULATION edited by Chris Marsden and Stefaan Verhulst (London: Blackstone Press “Law in Its Social Setting,”; 1999—£19.95, paper, ISBN 1–85431–990–6, 247 pp., notes, references, index)

MEDIA POLICY: CONVERGENCE, CONCENTRATION & COMMERCE edited by Denis McQuail and Karen Siune (London: Sage, 1998—$24.95, paper, ISBN 0–7619–5940–8, 231 pp., charts, tables, notes, bibliography, index)

TELEVISION AND THE PRESS SINCE 1945 by Ralph Negrine (Manchester, England: Manchester University Press”; Documents in Contemporary History,”; 1998; New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999—$79.95/24.95), ISBN 0–7190–4920–2 hard, 0–7190–4921–0 paper, 212 pp., tables, bibliography, references)

THE MEDIA IN BRITAIN: CURRENT DEBATES AND DEVELOPMENTS edited by Jane Stokes and Anna Reading (London: Macmillan; New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999—$59.95, ISBN 0–312–22528–8 [St. Martin's], 316 pp., charts, tables, references, index)