Health literacy and COVID‐19

In early 2020, the world experienced an unprecedented health crisis. When the pandemic of coronavirus was declared by the World Health Organization, it brought with it sudden and dramatic changes to everyday life. In the UK, the key message from the Government was to ‘Stay at home, protect the NHS, save lives’, sending out a clear warning that failing to stay at home would put other lives and the ability of the NHS to cope at risk. This editorial discusses COVID‐19, how society responded and the vital role that health literacy plays in saving lives during a global health emergency.     

Health Insurance Literacy and Roles for Reference Librarian Involvement

The role of librarians in addressing health insurance information needs emerged following a request from President Barack Obama for librarians to assist the public with navigating the Affordable Care Act and the Health Insurance Marketplace. The goal of this article is to highlight a number of concrete ways reference work could be expanded, especially in public library settings, to support health insurance literacy concerns by offering illustrative examples and recommendations for authoritative health insurance information resources. Overall, this article contributes to the existing literature by offering practical recommendations that may be relevant to reference librarians supporting the health insurance information needs of their communities.     

Facilitating Collaboration and Research in Sex and Gender Differences and Women's Health: Year One Experiences

Librarians at the University of Florida Health Science Center Libraries partnered with faculty to promote awareness of and access to research on women's health and sex and gender resources in an outreach project funded by the National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health Office of Research on Women's Health. The project featured elements that facilitated cross-disciplinary collaboration (using CoLAB Planning Series®, or CoLABs), instruction to various groups (including faculty, undergraduate students, graduate students, and professional students), collection development, and information dissemination. Librarians leveraged existing partnerships with faculty and built new ones. Success in this project demonstrates that libraries can partner effectively with their faculty on emerging trends and new initiatives.     

Health and Medical Resources

SUMMARY

The sites reviewed in this article represent only a small fraction of the consumer health information sites available on the Web and are intended to be a starting point for locating authoritative, reliable health information. The first part of this article focuses on evaluation, since this is an important component of using information, particularly information located on the Internet. The second part of the paper reviews consumer-related Web sites arranged by categories:Comprehensive Sites; Directories/Portals;Government Sites; Association Sites; Drug Information; Alternative Medicine; Nutrition and Food Safety; and Other Health Issues.     

Creating information resources and trainings for farmworker-serving community health workers

Background:Farmworker-serving community health workers have limited access to farmworker health research findings, training, and education resources. With funding from the National Library of Medicine, we are working to improve the health information literacy of both community health workers and farmworkers. We conducted focus group discussions with community health workers to explore their experiences providing health education and information to farmworkers, their information-seeking behaviors, and their technology and information needs. Data from the focus groups provided insights into the main areas in which community health workers would like to receive professional development.Case Presentation:Our team, which includes health sciences librarians, developed a resource list of educational materials for farmworker health, videos to increase community health workers'' skills finding health information online, and webinars to introduce these resources to community health workers. Videos, available in Spanish and English, included instruction on finding and evaluating online health information, accessing reputable online consumer health information sources, and advanced searching tips for Google and PubMed. Through three webinars, we introduced the resource list, videos, and design software for creating handouts and infographics to community health workers.Conclusions:Community health workers have a critical role in providing health education and information to farmworkers, and our efforts represent a first step in addressing community health workers'' limited access to professional development. Health sciences librarians are well positioned to partner with interdisciplinary teams working to reduce health disparities and provide resources and training to community health workers, farmworkers, and other underserved communities.     

Framing social determinants of health within the professional public health community: research translation and implications for policy change

Despite what experts know about the importance of social determinants of health (SDOH), poor health is generally understood by the public as an individual problem ameliorated through lifestyle and/or healthcare. To remedy this knowledge gap and promote policy change, public health professionals are investing in media advocacy to raise public awareness about SDOH and promote collective responsibility for health improvement. However, policy theory suggests this may be insufficient. More attention to the role of professional communities, as mediators of research translation and important policy actors, is warranted. We conducted a content analysis of news articles published by the American Public Health Association and found substantial attention to SDOH. However, the discourse was more biomedical than expected given the evidence regarding the relative importance of the major categories of health determinants. This may be a barrier to policy change and detract from the field’s efforts to promote political action.     

The COVID‐19 (Coronavirus) pandemic: reflections on the roles of librarians and information professionals

This Regular Feature explores the role of health science librarians in the coronavirus pandemic. COVID‐19 has spread rapidly all over the world. All major cities around the globe are in lockdown. In Pakistan, the first case was diagnosed on 26 February 2020, and currently, there are more than 2039 diagnosed cases and 26 deaths as on 31 March 2020. Across the country, there are further 12 000 suspected cases. This will undoubtedly increase if precautionary measures are not taken. Pakistani universities, colleges and schools were in lockdown. The role of university librarians in this emergency included raising awareness through public health education, providing support to medical staff, researchers and providing ongoing traditional services to regular library patrons in Pakistan. The Regular Feature also provides links to useful resources. JM.     

在线健康信息搜寻研究进展及其启示

健康信息搜寻是日常生活信息搜寻研究中的重要内容,与人们的生活休戚相关。随着互联网的发展,越来越多的人选择通过网络浏览、搜索、征询以获取各类健康信息。通过研读分析国内外在线健康信息搜寻的相关文献,从在线健康信息搜寻的影响因素、内容、平台及相关技术等几个方面展开综述,在梳理现有研究进展的同时分析现有研究的不足,并结合国外相关研究探讨其对于我国在线健康信息搜寻研究工作的启示。     

Creating an Evidence-Based Culture Within the Schools of Public Health and Medicine

Information technology is having a huge influence on health care. With ease of access and an abundance of information, today's health care personnel are expected to practice and develop policies or programs based upon evidence in order to avoid inefficiency and ineffectiveness. Our library has the responsibility to serve the needs of students, faculty, and practitioners of medicine and public health and strives to create an information literate workforce. In this article, the authors reflect on the library's instruction program and evaluate and plan for the future order to determine if the library's instruction program is properly developing an evidence-based medical and public health workforce.     

The Librarian's Role in Linking Patients to Their Personal Health Data and Contextual Information

The objective of this project was to make an institution's patients aware of a new patient portal with contextual links to MedlinePlus. Through partnerships with information technology personnel and LSU Health Shreveport clinics, the Health Sciences Library created and distributed promotional and educational materials and instructed patients on how to use MyChart and access reliable consumer health information via MedlinePlus Connect. Although most patients were not interested in coming to the library for demonstrations, many of them expressed interest in using MyChart. The contextual information in MedlinePlus Connect worked well for most topics. The institutional team leader for MyChart expressed gratitude for librarian involvement.     

国外网络健康信息用户研究进展及启示

从研究内容和研究方法两方面探讨国外网络用户健康信息需求和行为领域的主要进展和热点问题,以期为我国更好地开展网络健康信息用户研究提供发展思路。     

国外消费者健康信息学研究综述

[目的/意义]分析消费者健康信息学从诞生至今20多年的发展状况,并在文献评述基础上提出建议,为国内消费者健康信息学研究提供参考。[方法/过程]对近年来国外有关消费者健康信息学文献进行梳理,主要对来自Web of Science、Science Direct、Scopus、PubMed 4个数据库中相关主题的研究性论文、综述性论文及会议论文进行调研和分析。[结果/结论]虽然有关消费者健康信息学的研究成果硕果累累,但是目前对消费者健康信息学的定义尚未统一。未来对消费者健康信息学定义需要达成共识,同时数字健康鸿沟也是该领域研究的重点。     

Practices of Locating Health Information in an Electronic Environment: Reflections on Conducted Health Information Skills Training

ABSTRACT

Health information skills in an electronic environment are essential to health science librarians, who serve as educators both within and outside of their health training institutions. This reflective study was conducted to examine the application of online health information skills obtained from the training provided for librarians who are working in health settings. Health sciences librarians, as future information skills educators, therefore need to possess their own health information skill sets. Capacity building is vital in order to promote the development of health information skills for health sciences librarians who can then teach and advocate the concept of health information skills on the Internet within and outside of their places of work.     

Finding and Evaluating Health Sources on the Internet

Summary

Librarians and patrons searching for reliable health information are fortunate in that this subject area is one for which many reliable, in-depth sites exist. Government, education, and organization sites are, in particular, good sources of information and provide links to other Web pages. It is important, however, for both librarians and their clients to know how to access this information and, especially, how to evaluate the worthiness and usefulness of the information contained therein.     

全民健康信息化保障体系建设

文章通过总结、借鉴国内外已有的健康信息化实践经验,提出以全民健康保障为目的、构建以人本电子健康 档案为核心的全民健康信息化保障体系的总体目标,系统分析我国全民健康信息化保障体系的需求、问题和对策,明确 我国全民健康信息化保障体系的建设思路、关键技术、运行机制、服务模式及保障措施。     

Health Information and Health Literacy: Public Library Practices,Challenges, and Opportunities

This study investigated 18 libraries in two public library systems in Oklahoma to find out how they are addressing health literacy and facilitating access to consumer health information; how library staff members view their roles and responsibilities relative to health information and health literacy; what challenges libraries face; and what strategies are being used. Staff members recognized several challenges to providing health information and to developing programs, including staff and patron difficulties with reference interviews, and patron lack of awareness of library resources. Staff members often had only a partial understanding of health literacy, and were unaware of system strategies to address health literacy or provision of health information.     

试论广告的健康传播功能及其异化

本文对广告的健康传播功能及其异化趋向进行客观分析,并探求解决该问题的策略.     

在线健康信息替代搜寻影响因素研究：基于健康信念模型和社会支持理论

[目的/意义]在线健康信息替代搜寻是基于人际关系协作的日常信息实践模式,基于经典理论探究该行为的影响因素和机制对于深入理解该信息行为具有重要意义。[方法/过程]基于健康信念模型和社会支持理论,构建健康信息替代搜寻影响因素模型,提出12个研究假设。通过问卷调查收集475份有效数据,使用SmartPLS软件进行数据分析。[结果/结论]结果发现：同理心、信息支持意愿、感知严重性和感知收益正向影响健康信息替代搜寻意愿,感知障碍负向影响健康信息替代搜寻意愿,感知易感性和自我效能对健康信息替代搜寻意愿没有直接相关关系。通过中介效应分析发现,同理心对感知易感性与健康信息替代搜寻意愿之间的关系存在完全中介效应;同理心对感知严重性与健康信息替代搜寻意愿的关系存在部分中介效应;信息支持意愿对自我效能与健康信息替代搜寻意愿之间的关系存在部分中介效应。这一研究结果为进一步激励、管理和干预在线健康信息替代搜寻实践提供参考。     

Those Pesky Online Statistics

No abstract available for this article.     

Data disaggregation: the case of Asian and Pacific Islander data and the role of health sciences librarians

Health disparities within Asian and Pacific Islander (API) communities are often masked due to aggregated data. Lack of adequate data limits required health care services for these communities. While moving forward toward health equity, it is critical that disparities for API communities are acknowledged and addressed. This article focuses on the issues of aggregated data for API communities followed by suggestions on how health sciences librarians can support and promote better practices for data disaggregation.