Director's Reflections... Free Resources Through NLM
Nowadays, it’s not easy to find a bargain, especially when purchasing information resources. HSLS wrestles with ever-increasing vendor licensing and access costs for our broad collection of electronic resources. But there is one shining example of an organization that provides high-quality, comprehensive health sciences information, free of charge, and that is the United States National Library of Medicine (NLM).
Recently, HSLS was asked to conduct a mini-survey to measure awareness of information resources produced by NLM. We asked a cross section of 200 faculty members in the health sciences about their awareness and use of databases such as PubMed, MedlinePlus, GenBank, and others. We found that almost everyone has used PubMed, but many were unfamiliar with other resources listed below.
NLM, supported by taxpayers and located on the campus of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Md., is the world’s largest health sciences library and the world’s most consulted resource for medical information. Scientists, clinicians, and the public search NLM’s electronic databases more than 1 billion times each year. Among NLM’s programs and services are:
For scientists and health professionals:
• MEDLINE/PubMed: a comprehensive database of 16 million records for medical journal articles from the 1950s to the present.
• GenBank and other databanks with molecular sequence and human genome information.
• Toxicology and environmental health information in a series of electronic data resources that have also been augmented to include information about emergency preparedness and response.
• PubMedCentral (PMC): a growing digital archive of biomedical and life sciences full-text journal literature. PMC is enhanced each week with articles from more than 350 important life sciences journals whose publishers have agreed to deposit current issues. The Back Issue Digitization Project scans older issues of historically important journals from cover to cover, starting with volume one.
For consumers and the public:
• MedlinePlus: a consumer health information resource created by NLM in cooperation with NIH and other reliable sources of health information.
• ClinicalTrials.gov: descriptions and sign-up information for more than 27,000 clinical trials sponsored by public and private institutions around the world.
• NIHSeniorHealth.gov: information aimed at older citizens and formatted for easy viewing and retention, even with an option to hear the content read aloud.
• Genetics Home Reference: information in lay language about genetic conditions and the genes or chromosomes responsible for those conditions.
• The Household Products Database: information on more than 6,000 commonly encountered chemicals contained in commercial products encountered in everyday life.
Information about NLM and its resources can be found at www.nlm.nih.gov. HSLS users should access PubMed from the link under “Most Popular” on the right side of the HSLS Web site at www.hsls.pitt.edu to be automatically linked to HSLS electronic journal holdings when available.
--Barbara Epstein
