COAHL meeting Fall 2009 - key messages

Informatics competencies
COAHL is mapping informatics competencies to relevant CanMEDS 2005 and MCC objectives. This document will act as a blueprint for a common curriculum for medical information literacy in Ontario.

Collections
In the spirit of the Thunder Bay agreement the six COAHL schools will post to the listserv any materials within their collections which they are considering for de-selection.

The numerous e-resources available are challenging our collections budgets: the COAHL schools will share usage statistics of commonly held resources to support decision-making at renewal time.

COAHL Meeting Spring 2009 - Key messages

Cochrane access in Canada
The National Network for Libraries for Health has arranged a trial period until December 2009 for Canada-wide access to the Cochrane Library. COAHL institutions are maintaining their subscriptions and will continue to be involved in disseminating information about the free access to all Canadians.

ODESI - COAHL rep
This new gateway to statistical information features an easy search interface and powerful compilation and display mechanisms. Health data from government sources, including census figures are included. COAHL is pleased to have Neera Bhatnagar from McMaster University, participating in the development of this tool.

Ovid presentation and discussion with Karen Abramson, CEO
The spring meeting offered a unique opportunity for COAHL members to inform Ovid about the unique health care and academic settings and challenges our libraries are facing. Ovid’s CEO explained the structure of the company and their plans for future growth.

CISTI budget cuts
Libraries are very concerned about the impact of CISTI’s deep budget cuts . There is the potential for loss of health sciences collections, and an increase in document delivery charges which could result in libraries borrowing more from each other. COAHL strongly supports the development of a national health sciences library and hopes that CISTI will be able to fill that mandate.

Presentation on University of Toronto Institutional Repository
Guests Kathy McConell and Rea Devakos explained how the U of T has set up policies and procedures and encourages researchers to deposit their publications in the institutional repository.

COAHL strategic framework
The group discussed revisions to the Terms of Reference and Constitution documents. Final versions will be approved at the fall meeting and will be posted to the website.

COAHL Meeting Fall 2008 - Key Messages

1. COAHL is preparing a list of Informatics Objectives that each university could use and which would be matched to MCC objectives, CanMeds roles and eventually to other existing competencies.

2. COAHL discussed pursuing with Knowledge Ontario the possibility of offering evidence-based health information resources for all Ontarians.

3. COAHL negotiations for resources may include affiliated hospitals depending on formal relationships and on vendor willingness to do so. Each university will discuss purchases with hospitals in their own region and make appropriate arrangements that benefit all parties.

4. Point-of-care tools: COAHL members interested in comparing these resources for potential publication or conference presentation.

5. Ovid rep presented Nursing@ Ovid portal. A trial will be arranged for all COAHL sites.

Mary Ann Liebert Journal Package

The Northern Ontario School of Medicine, the University of Ottawa, Queen's University, and the University of Toronto completed negotiations through COAHL for a three-year subscription for access to the complete package of Mary Ann Liebert journals.

There are nearly 70 important journals in the fields of biomedical research, biotechnology, clinical medicine, complementary and alternative medicine, and public health policy.

Essential Evidence Plus

Launched in January 2008 to replace 'InfoPOEMS with InfoRetriever', Essential Evidence Plus (EE+) is marketed as a point of care resource for clinicians who provide “first contact care”.

EE+ currently consists of three main databases:

InfoRetriever is the main search interface of EE+. It allows ‘any word’ searching and browsing of multiple databases and tools as well as subject browsing. Search results include a Level of Evidence used by the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, Oxford.

POEMS (Patient Oriented Evidence that Matters) are added daily, and can be accessed through email alerts or RSS feed, and are also released as podcasts.

EBM Guidelines is a collection of collection of clinical guidelines for primary care combined with the best available evidence. EBM Guidelines includes 1,000 concise primary care practice guidelines, 3,000+ evidence summaries and a library of 1,000 photographs and images.

EE+ also includes a number of clinical tools such as Clinical Rules and Calculators, and Derm Expert.

Related Links:
· Essential Evidence Plus
· Wiley-Blackwell to Relaunch InfoPOEMs with InfoRetriever as Essential Evidence Plus, Wiley Press Release, Nov. 27, 2007

Allison Thompson,

Health Sciences Library, McMaster Univesity

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