Top 20 in 20: The Most Borrowed Books from Falk Library Since 1987
Health sciences librarians often analyze circulation statistics to guide collection development. A common rule of thumb is the 80/20 rule: About 20 percent of items in a library collection receive about 80 percent of the use. One study at the University of Illinois at Chicago found that a tiny percentage (2.21 percent) of items accounted for nearly 22 percent of circulation during a three-year period.*
HSLS purchases books to support the full range of health sciences programs at the University and UPMC, adding topics of interest today, and safeguarding these materials for future researchers.
The list below represents the 20 book titles that were borrowed most often from Falk Library in the past 20 years. Our top 20 list represents a broad range of subjects of interest to our varied user population: statistics, molecular biology, clinical care, dental medicine, basic science, and self-study. (Only titles and authors are listed, not specific editions.) How many of the top 20 have you read?
1. Robbins and Cotran Pathologic Basis of Disease
edited by Vinay Kumar, Abul K. Abbas, and Nelson Fausto
2. Introduction to Probability and Mathematical Statistics
by Lee J. Bain and Max Engelhardt
3. Applied Logistic Regression
by David W. Hosmer and Stanley Lemeshow
4. Fundamentals of Biostatistics
by Bernard Rosner
5. Basic Statistics for the Health Sciences
by Jan Kuzma
6. Functional Histology: A Text and Colour Atlas
by Paul R. Wheater
7. Statistical Power Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences
by Jacob Cohen
8. Molecular Biology of the Cell
by Bruce Alberts, et al.
9. PCR Technology: Principles and Applications for DNA Amplification
edited by Henry A. Erlich
10. McDonald's Blood Flow in Arteries: Theoretical, Experimental, and Clinical Principles
by Wilmer W. Nichols and Michael F. O'Rourke
11. Contemporary Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery
edited by Larry J. Peterson
12. Color Atlas of Histology
by Leslie P. Gartner and James L. Hiatt
13. The ICU Book
by Paul L. Marino
14. Contemporary Implant Dentistry
edited by Carl E. Misch
15. A Color Atlas of the Rat: Dissection Guide
by Ronald J. Olds and Joan R. Olds
16. Biomechanics: Mechanical Properties of Living Tissues
by Y.C. Fung
17. Atlas of Human Anatomy
by Frank H. Netter
18. A Practical Guide to ECG Interpretation
by Ken Grauer
19. PCR: A Practical Approach
edited by M.J. McPherson, P. Quirke, and G.R. Taylor
20. Molecular Cloning: A Laboratory Manual
by J. Sambrook, E.F. Fritsch and T. Maniatis
* Blecic DD. “Monograph Use at an Academic Health Sciences Library: The First Three Years of Shelf Life.” Bulletin of the Medical Library Association. 88(2):145-51, 2000. <www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=10783969>
--Charlie Wessel
