School may be out but thethree Rs are in as Research,Residentials and Remembranceall feature in this Summerbumper issue and the networkis as busy as ever.

Fear not – whatever the weather, come rainor shine, LIHNNKup is here and packedwith innovation, collaboration and great tipsand advice on all manner of library andinformation issues from across the region.

Research features heavily in the issue asSteve Glover and Jo Whitcomberecount their experience of delivering apresentation on search methodology at theClinical Librarian’s Conference in Edinburgh.Emily Hurt also knew she just HAD to beat the EAHIL/ICAHIS/ICLC workshopwhere she discovered to be ‘researchminded is to be open-minded’. MichelleBond also shares top tips gleaned after aResearcher asked for support with a meta-ethnography. Staff at Keyll Darree havealso been doing a bit of research of theirown. Stacey Astill tells how they havebeen delving into their inter-library loanstatistics to help improve their service.

Teams have also been looking at branding– Steve Collman shares his experienceof a two day residential thinking aboutBrand DNA as representative of the ethos ofa service and the importance of knowingyour product. In Bolton Dawn Grundyand Paula Elliott are refreshing andrebranding a collaborative scheme for staffworking in the NHS, public health andsocial services.

Remembrance is another theme in thisissue. Adrienne Mayers explains thethree year process of planning an event tocommemorate WWI and Chris Thorntonand Mandy Beaumont share fondmemories of their late friend and colleague

(Catherine) Linda Riley - both of whichleave a lasting legacy.

As always staff have been out and aboutsharing knowledge and collaborating – Iask if we are now ready for eBooks after thestudy day in Warrington and VictoriaTreadway explains how the Moving intoManagement LIHNN residential helpedquash some of her fears as she embarksupon a career move. Cath Harrisrecounts tips learned about impact,promotion and transferable skills at theannual LIHNN Big Day Out where staffshared experiences from other librarysettings including the Ministry of Justice andPublic Libraries. Elsewhere in PublicLibraries Sue Williamson highlights thegreat work being done to support Healthand Wellbeing and reaching those hardestto reach.

Jo Whitcombe and Emma Childoutline the challenges and opportunities ofworking on Systematic Reviews as well asoffering practical advice - there’s also areminder that NICE Evidence Searchincludes a filter for Systematic Reviews.

This issue also features new resources andnew starters. Steve Glover, ValerieHaigh and Donna Schofield have beentrialling EBSCO’s new Discovery serviceallowing users to search across all librarycontent and we say hello and welcome toNicola Gregory and Helen Kiely.

Finally our regular feature ‘The Land ofGeek’ focuses on Metrics and the ModernHealth Care Librarian as Steve Gloverand Matt Holland look at tools that canhelp give you a picture of your library innumbers #makingdatacount.

Katie NicholasLIBRARY ASSISTANT, MANCHESTERMENTAL HEALTH & SOCIAL CARE TRUST

Library and Information Health Network Northwest NewsletterBY HEALTH LIBRARIES, FOR HEALTH LIBRARIES

Funded by the NorthwestHealth Care Libraries Unit

Printed on 100% Recycled Paper

ISSUE 48SUMMER 2015

SCHOOLS OUT...

IN THIS ISSUE

International Clinical Librarian Conference 2015 2

Research-mindedness: It’s easier than you think 4

E-Books are we ready yet? 6

Brand Up and Be Counted 8

HELP@Bolton 9

WWI commemorative 10

LIHNN Big Day Out 12

(Catherine) Linda Riley 13

A healthy library 14

Moving into ManagementLIHNN residential 16

Looking for good quality systematic reviews? 17

New Starters 17

Identifying the evidence for systematic reviews 19

A trial of the EBSCO Discovery Service 20

The Land of Geek 24

Supporting a researcher withtheir meta-ethnography! 26

Inter Library Loan Stats at Keyll Darree 27

2

This year’s InternationalClinical LibrariansConference (ICLC) tookplace in Scotland as partof the larger EuropeanAssociation of HealthInformation and Libraries(EAHIL) Conference 2015held at the University ofEdinburgh.

This allowed delegates to attendthree conferences in one as theInternational Conference of AnimalHealth Information Specialists(ICAHIS) also held their conferenceresulting in over 250 delegatesfrom a large number of countriesgathering at a single venue toshare ideas and present the latestresearch in their fields. The overarching theme of the three dayevent was research focused withsome high profile keynote speakersincluding Alison Brettle from theUniversity of Salford.

Having participated in a StillbirthPriority Setting Partnership (PSP) wehad submitted an abstract to theconference organising committeeand were rewarded by beingselected to deliver an oralpresentation on the ICLCprogramme. The ICLC programmewas conducted over the firstmorning of the opening day.

The session was facilitated by ourclinical librarian colleagues fromthe University Hospitals of Leicester,Louise Hull and Pip Divall andincluded speakers from the UnitedStates, United Kingdom, Australiaand Turkey.

Blair Anton, Associate Director,Clinical Information Services, JohnsHopkins Medical Institutions

delivered the keynote paper. Blair’steam had spent 48 hours on anintensive care unit conducting anobservational study on the typeof clinical questions that arose onthe unit over four continuous shifts.These were then analysed to seehow they were answered. As it wasan observational study the teamdid not answer the questions butrecorded data around who askedthe question, what was the type ofquery, and did it get answered.

The majority ofquestions were around

treatments and interventions andnot diagnosis. Some questionswere either not answered orresolved themselves over the time ofthe study.

Catherine Voutier presented apaper or how to organise an onlinejournal club to support healthlibrarians in Australia and how thiswas managed via a web basedsolution.

International ClinicalLibrarian Conference 2015

Old College Library, University of Edinburgh

3

We presented our work onthe Stillbirth PSP which wasoutlined in a previous issueof LIHNNK UP. Ourpresentation focusedaround the methodologywe used to manage the261 searches on stillbirththat we had to deliver in 5weeks and how the resultswere shared with theStillbirth PSP steeringgroup. The 11 prioritiesidentified for future stillbirthresearch have now beenpublished on the JamesLind Alliance website(http://www.jla.nihr.ac.uk/)

Gussun Gunes fromIstanbul, Turkey presentedon supporting nursingresearch and thechallenges that presents ina Turkish health librarysetting. In addition tosearching the main streambibliographic databasessuch as CINAHL andPubMed there are anumber of Turkish languageindexes that can besearched to find relevantpublished research.

Tom Roper and KathrynCook from Brighton & SussexUniversity Hospitals NHS Trustpresented a research papermeasuring the impact of the clinicallibrarian service. Kathryn, amedical student from Brighton andSussex Medical School, undertooka study to measure the impact ofthe clinical librarian led literaturesearching service by following theresults of searches that ended up indocumentation such as audits,guidelines, and peer-reviewedpublications.

The session was completed byImrana Ghumra who talkedabout the role of the clinicallibrarian within the newKnowledge for Healthcarestrategy.

The ICLC 2015 was afascinating programme withina larger EAHIL conference. In 2016 the ICLC will formpart of the Medical LibraryAssociation Conference 2016 in Toronto, Canada. Our participation in theconference in Edinburgh was funded by the incomegenerated from our supportof the Stillbirth PSP.

Steve Glover & Jo WhitcombeCENTRAL MANCHESTERUNIVERSITY HOSPITALS

Edinbugh Student Union

Jo Whitcombe presenting at ICLC 2015 Edinburgh

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Research-mindedness: When I initially saw theannouncement for theEAHIL+ICAHIS+ICLC work-shop my first thought was‘I want to go!’

The title was Research-minded:supporting, understanding, conductingresearch. I had been in my post forabout 9 months and was starting tothink about how I could go aboutundertaking research. I was alsobeginning to develop a relationshipwith one of my Trust’s AcademicResearch Nurses, with a view tobeing the library liaison person forthe Research & Innovationdepartment. The workshop was aperfect opportunity for me to developmy skills and build on my existingknowledge.

I knew there would be bursariesavailable, so I compulsively checkedmailing lists until one from CILIP HealthLibraries Group was announced. Theywere offering five people a free placeat the workshop along with £200expenses, which would just about coverrail fare and accommodation. I had tosend off my CV and a 500 wordstatement explaining why I wanted toattend and how I would share myexperiences as a result of attending. Aword of advice about bursaries of anytype – apply for them! Even if you thinkyou haven’t got a hope in hell oflanding one, it’s good practice all thesame and you never know, you mightjust get lucky. I had an email shortlyafter the closing date saying that I hadbeen successful – so now the fun ofplanning my workshop experiencebegan! Trying to narrow down mychoice of sessions was ridiculouslyhard. It’s the kind of situation whereyou really need a Time-Turner or somesort of clone, so you can attend morethan one at the same time. I made mydecisions based on what I thoughtwould be most practical and of benefitto my role and research aspirations.

Rather than give you a blow-by-blowaccount of each one, I’ll sum up what Ithink were the most salient points anddirect you towards some furtherreading, so that if a topic piques yourinterest you can go away and find out

a bit more about it. I hope you find ituseful.

Planning Your Research ProjectDr Hannah Spring

This was a very practical workshop, asHannah outlined the process you needto go through before setting out on aresearch journey, and then got usthinking about a fictitious researchscenario and finally our own potentialresearch projects. I think the followingwere the most useful tips:

It’s worth investing time in theresearch design stage of yourproject as it can avoid errors later.

We have to be able to justify ourchoices in research – as long as weknow why we’re using a certainmethod, then that’s ok. In order toconduct effective research you needto use a methodology that fits whatyou’re researching, rather than oneyou think will be easy!

Case studies are often a goodplace to start if you’re new toresearch. They’re small, quick toput together and can be useful fordisseminating good practice.

Further reading: Hannah highlyrecommends using the HEALERResearch Toolkit, which is availablefreely athttp://researchflowchart.pbworks.co

It was put together ‘…to help librariansin the health sector to carry outresearch from small-scale, local serviceevaluation through to much moreformal research’.

Qualitative research methods:interviewing as a way oflearning and knowingJohanna Rivano Eckerdal

This was a keynote speech rather thana practical workshop, but I found it sointeresting I thought it was worthsharing. Johanna described herexperiences of interviewing teenagersabout contraception, and talked aboutthe qualitative research process andhow it can lead us to learn all sorts ofthings that we weren’t expecting. Shereferred to the work of Kvale &Brinkmann, who developed twometaphors of the interviewer, one asminer (a person who collectsknowledge) and one as traveller (aperson who creates knowledge as partof a journey).

To be open minded is to beresearch minded.

As researchers we often set out tofind out what people think, butpeople very rarely say what theythink.

All research has limitations. If weexpect research (particularlyinterviews) to always give definiteanswers, we will be disappointed.

Further reading: As well as Kvale &Brinkmann’s book InterViews: learningthe craft of qualitative researchinterviewing (a 3rd edition wasreleased last year, published by SAGE),Johanna recommended Elliot G. Mishler(1991) Research interviewing: contextand narrative, Harvard University Press.

Using action research inpractice – Dr Hannah Spring

Another very practical workshop,which I came away from thinking, “Icould do this!” Hannah talked usthrough the basics of action research,explained what it was and was not andthen got us thinking about practicalscenarios.

The Old College, University of Edinburgh

5

It’s easier than you thinkAction research is open-ended, itdoesn’t begin with a fixedhypothesis but rather an idea,developed by you, the researcher.

It is a systematic procedure ofevaluation to demonstrate clearevidence of progress, learning andapplication of new learning.

It’s reflective – you’re putting intopractice a change in the way youwork, but you are documentingyour evaluation and changes inpractice along the way.

Further reading: A colleague ofHannah’s, Jean McNiff, is the doyenneof action research and has lots ofresources available on her website:www.jeanmcniff.com. For a short andsweet overview of what action researchis and isn’t, try this YouTube video byResearcherRagan:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHiZdh85R3w

Social Network Analysis –what, why and how? Dr Louise Cooke

This was the one session I went intowith an open mind, as I had noconcept of Social Network Analysis(SNA) or any idea of how it would beuseful within a LIS research field.Louise talked around SNA as amethodology and then gave us somevery interesting examples of how it canbe used to further understandcommunities of practice and helpsupport them.

It’s not just about Facebook! Itfocuses on the relationshipsbetween entities rather than theproperties of entities (for example,how a class of students relate toeach other – friend, acquaintance,study partner? Etc.)

Citation analysis is a form of SNA

There are lots of tools to help youdraw data out – Louise usesUCINET, which can be downloadedfor free for 90 days:http://analytictech.com/products.htm

Further reading: For examples of SNAcase studies (including a reallyinteresting one on discoveringcommunities of practice at IBM), have a

look at: www.orgnet.com/cases.html.For a freely available online textbookabout analysis of social networks, byHanneman & Riddle (2005), visithttp://faculty.ucr.edu/~hanneman/

Focus group interviewsProfessor Ina Fourie

Another practical session where wework very hard in small groups, Inamanaged to de-mystify the focus groupprocess and provide us with some verypractical advice on running them andanalysing the data they produce. She

deserves an award for the besthandouts – we had two, a ‘hands-on’version which was full of usefuldiagrams and questions to ask and a‘take home’ version which was slightlymore detailed and academic.

If you want to run a focus group onquality or evaluation, then getsomeone outside your departmentto facilitate it. If you ask peopleface to face to evaluate the serviceyou provide, then they will just saynice things!

When organising a group,remember that people’s time andwork commitments are moreimportant than the data you wantto collect. You will have to fit inaround them – providing lunch cansometimes work as people have anincentive to attend (freesandwiches!) and are more likely to

have an hour to spare at lunchtimethan any other time of day.

Always take notes, even though youare recording the discussion. Youcan pick up on things that are non-verbal, such as body language,and notes can help you whentyping up transcripts. It’s best tohave two facilitators present, one tolead the discussion and the other tomake notes.

Further reading: Ina didn’t suggest anyparticular further reading, and herhandouts were so comprehensive itdidn’t really feel like we needed any!However, she did refer to RichardKrueger several times, and his bookFocus groups: a practical guide forapplied research has just beenpublished in a fifth edition by SAGE.

As is usual with any kind of conferenceor learning experience, I came awaywith a dozen ideas buzzing round myhead and lots of enthusiasm andconfidence that will hopefully help mecarry them forward to fruition. I thinkthe amazing Edinburgh sunshinehelped, but the overall atmosphere wasone of great optimism andempowerment. I had lots ofconversations with fellow delegatesabout how the workshop had maderesearch seem achievable, and that wewere discovering how essential it wasfor our profession and our employingorganisations. It’s not only aboutproving our worth, but showing eachother what we’re doing, what worksand what we’ve learnt along the way.We do that already locally, so why notformalise it a little and turn it intopublished research?

Emily HurtASSISTANT CLINICAL LIBRARIAN,LANCASHIRE TEACHING HOSPITALS NHS FOUNDATION TRUST

At the time of writing this article thepresentations for each session werenot yet available on the web, but I’msure if you keep an eye onhttps://eahil2015.wordpress.com,they’ll be up soon.

The National Museum of Scotland

6

In Professor David Nicholas’fantastic keynote speechhe set the tone for the day. In an information climatewhere ‘deep is dead’ andsmartphones rule howcan we respond and stayin touch with our users?And what role do eBooksplay?

Put simply - to understand ‘how peopleuse e-books we need to understand firsthow they use the web’. Humans aredigitally promiscuous, hyperactivemulti-taskers and having the internet atour fingertips suits us. Quicklysearching a keyword on Google givesus millions of hits instantaneously andwe average a measly 2.2 words perquery. We skim this information andmove on to the next source in ahorizontal movement shying away from

the vertical in-depth searching of thepast. As a result we aren’t retaininginformation in the same way and ourmemory is the worse for it.

eBooks still have issues with digitalvisibility and access but with moreoptions for consumer-friendly formatsand abstracts becoming increasinglyimportant their potential is clear andarguably unexploited in healthlibraries. Professor David Nicholas’ fullpresentation can be found herehttp://ciber-research.eu/

Opening the morning with theseshrewd insights and big questions wasa catalyst for discussion for theremainder of the day. Delegates weregiven the choice of 8 workshops toattend ranging from user needs andexpectations, promotion, usability,eBooks in the academic sector,publishing and impact. The workshopswere quite informal encouragingdiscussion and one delegatecommented that ‘it was great to see and

meet so many colleagues from anotherregion and to listen and exchangeideas’.

The workshops I attended were filledwith discussion, enthusiasm and debatewhich is I’m sure indicative of otherdelegates experience of the day. ClaireHoneybourne introduced EBSCO’s newApp and her workshop included lots ofdiscussion surrounding DiscoveryServices and their potential benefits.The importance of presentation waspinpointed reminiscent of the keynotewhere Professor Nicholas suggestedeBooks are consumer driven and can/should be displayed in a sort of eShopWindow.

Myself and Patrick Glaister’s sessionsincluded an overview of usabilitytheory looking at evaluation tools thatanyone can try such as CognitiveWalkthroughs and Heuristic Evaluationas well as more formal User Testing.Tom Kelly (E-Services Librarian)commented that he ‘liked the idea ofCognitive Walkthroughs’ as it was amethod of evaluating eBooks andwebsites that he hadn’t come acrossbefore.

We asked some of our delegates to dosmall user testing tasks and this provedhighly informative – the results gaveimmediate, crucial feedback that canbe passed on to providers to helpenhance usability. We plan on runningmore user testing over the summer andwill include the results on the eBookmatrix as well as sharing feedback with providershttp://resources.lihnn.nhs.uk/wiki/EBooks.MainPage.ashx

E-Books are we ready yet?

Maria (Elsevier) found the day ‘veryenjoyable’ and reiterated theimportance of ‘raising awareness ofhow to deliver and market e-booksservices’. She attended the University ofManchester’s workshop on their pilotproject Right Here, Right Now. Inresponse to students’ learning styleschanging some core eBooks were madeavailable in line with the ‘Hidden CostsPolicy’ and staff found usageincreased. Crucially a dialogue withtutors and students was fostered andmaintained to promote eBook offerings.Staff plan on developing this project byengaging with suppliers.

Stephen Ayre (Library Manager)attended Steve Glover’s workshop ondriving users to content which gaveuseful ideas for promotion such astweeting eBooks - an idea he felt hisown library could adopt. EmilyHopkins’ workshop ‘Bridging the Gap’offered ‘a chance to share ideas’around user needs, expectations andperceptions. Throughout the day staffalso kept up the conversation on socialmedia using the #readyyet15

The day ended with a Q and A panelformed from the leaders of eachworkshop and led by David Stewart.This allowed delegates to regroupfollowing the events of the day.Questions about the implications of‘digital by default’ as part ofKnowledge for Healthcare were raisedas well as wider questions about sharedeBook provision across NHS libraries.

So are we ready yet? The day certainlyshowcased some of the innovative wayswe are already engaging users witheBooks and strengthened crucial tiesbetween suppliers and librarians. Studydays like this help us prepare for thechallenges of digital provision andshare best practice as our roles asinformation professionals continue toevolve in a shifting technologicallandscape.

Katie NicholasMANCHESTER MENTAL HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE TRUST

Feedback:

“Professor Nicholas' talk wasthought provoking about howinformation provision is changinginformation seeking behaviour.”

“Really useful to have discussionabout the issues facing librariesand publishers with eBooks. Was good to have publishersthere as well and not just in a“selling” capacity.”

“This was an excellent event withsome really top quality speakersand workshops. It is a greatexample of how we can shareknowledge and learn from each other.”

“I got lots of ideas about how we could do things differently, particularlymarketing our eBook collection. I also picked up tips on how to evaluatewebsites which will be useful in making decisions.”

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T h i s w a s a t w o d a yresidential near Warrington,aiming to get peoplethinking about whatbranding is, what it meansto them and how theycan use the theory toimprove the branding oftheir own services.

The course started by explaining thetheory of branding: what it is, whatdifferent brands mean to differentpeople, and how a brand is differentfrom a product. Put basically, a brandis like a mental image you have of howgood or bad something is: people hadvery different mental images when theycompared a brand like Lush to one likeBodycare (without judging either, ofcourse!).

A brand is an organisational identity, aphilosophy if you like: the collective sumof an organisation, encompassing itspersonality, ethos, people andproducts, skills and experiences.

We learnt how to create Brand DNAthrough a pyramid structure:

Starting from the bottom:

Discriminating truths are thehallmarks of a unique brand;the things that people mostremember to make you/yourbrand distinctive andmemorable. They need to bedifferentiating, credible, relevantand compelling to others. Whencreating brand DNA, aroundfour of these discriminating truthsis perfect.

Benefits for customers are brought about directly by thediscriminating truths: what inherentvalue do the truths provide toprospective service users?

Brand personality: what adjectiveswould you use to describe thebrand, if it were a person?

Brand values: the centre of themoral compass that guides thebrand’s decisions and actions.

Brand proposition: what the brandoffers to the world, in a nutshell. Asingle-minded idea that explainsthe brand’s unique role.

Brand promise: this is thedistillation, the couple of words thatlie at the heart of the brand toshow its value.

We looked at brand architecture andhow we view different brands asthey’re marketed to us. There aredifferent branding levels:

Monolithic – e.g. Ryanair. There areno sub-brands such as Ryanroad orRyanrail

Sub-branded – Nivea is a brandthat contains a wide variety ofproducts, but all are firmly placedunder the Nivea banner.

Endorsed brand – Nestlé is a well-known company and brand, butmany of its products are nowbrands in their own right: KitKat,Aero, Perrier Water, Findus.

Free-standing - these brands comeunder the umbrella of an overallcompany or brand, but aren’tnecessarily associated with it andtend to be thought of as individualbrands. Quite often free-standingbrands within the umbrella areactually in competition with eachother. For example, Wall’s andMagnum are competing brandsunder the umbrella of the Unileverbrand.

The main part of the day was a fieldtrip to Warrington’s Golden Squareshopping centre, where we went roundthe shops in pairs or groups looking atthe branding, seeing what struck us,what we liked and didn’t like, and whatwe could take away with us to improveour own brands.

Day One:

Day Two:

Brand Up and Be Counted21-22 May 2015

A personalised Brand DNA pyramid

Promise

Proposition

Values

Personality

Customer benefits

Discriminating truths

9

Gil Young and I bounced ideas offeach other and it made me realisewhat directions I could take with myown service branding: showinghonesty, trust, ethics, personalisationand other attributes I’ve learnt I want tosee in brands. I was first to give a fiveminute presentation on my experiencesand conclusions when we all got back,which was nervewracking but fun atthe same time. I’m realising I canexpand my website branding and I’malready looking into other outreachservices across the country once againto see if I can make any improvementsto my own.

T h e r e s i d e n t i a l o v e r a l l w a s afascinating revelatory experience, andI must say I’m grateful to the personwho dropped out and gave me theopportunity to learn so much. I’d alsolike to thank Amanda Stearn forleading it and making it such a fun andinformal couple of days. It seemsbranding can be a positive thing afterall – you just have to use it responsibly!

Steve CollmanOUTREACH LIBRARIANCHESHIRE EAST

Mary Hill investigating GoldenSquare’s shops and services

HELP@BoltonChanging Landscapes and Revolving Doors

The year’s 2004 and library stafffrom the University of Bolton, RoyalBolton Hospital and Bolton PCTlaunch a scheme for Bolton basedhealthcare workers to accessfacilities at their respective services.The scheme was part of a widercollaborative scheme at theUniversity known as BLAG (BoltonLibraries Access Group), which alsocovered sixth forms and the publiclibraries in the borough.

Fast forward 10 years and the NHSlandscape has changed - Bolton PCTLibrary has closed, new healthfacilities such as Bolton One haveopened. Time for a new vision fornew times! So, library staff from thehospital and the University gottogether to look at refreshing andre-launching the scheme.

Following positive and energisingdiscussions with partners (includingBridgewater – thanks to Gil Swash;Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh –thanks to Cheryl Dagnall; andBolton Public Health – thanks toMichael Cook), a new scheme foranyone working in the NHS, publichealth or social services who lives inBolton was born.

Branded HELP@Bolton (standing forsomething like Health EducationLibraries for Professionals/People)and with some fresh promotionalmaterial, the main offer is:

University of Bolton LibraryAccess during staffed hours

Borrow 5 items for 3 weeks

Study spaces

Print journals for photocopying(charges apply)

Eduroam wifi (for staff who arealso students at a UK university)

Education Centre Library,Royal Bolton Hospital

Access during staffed hours

Borrow 4 items for 4 weeks

Study spaces

Print journals for photocopying(charges apply)

Broadband PCs and wifi (free)

So what’s next forHELP@Bolton? This year we plan to take HELP@Bolton into the community, raisingawareness of the scheme bymarketing it to community staff in theirworkplaces. And this is where youmight be able to HELP. If you havestaff working in your organisationwho live in Bolton, please tell themabout the scheme. A leaflet andPowerPoint slides are available from:paula.elliott@boltonft.nhs.uk

Dawn GrundyUNIVERSITY OF BOLTON

Paula ElliottBOLTON NHS FT

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WWI commemorativeLiverpool Medical Institution

From 2-4 October 2014, a WWI commemorativeevent was held atLiverpool MedicalInstitution (LMI). This wasthe culmination of threeyears’ of preparation,plotting and planning,with one or twounsuspecting friends andcolleagues who I hadenticed into helping me. It was a great success andwe had a rollercoasterof a time organising it.

It had seemed a really good ideaat the time. It was 2011 when Iattended a motivational talk onmarketing and event organisingand thought “I can do that!” Thetheme of the talk had been thatyou can organise a very bigevent if you allow yourselfenough time. Think big andthen think even bigger.

A lightbulb went on in mybrain. From nowhere camethe idea to ‘do’ somethingto commemorate the startof WWI and to celebratethe advances of militarymedicine. Why not showwhere military medicinewas in 1914 and thencompare and contrast withwhere it was in 2014? Inaddition, I wanted to puttrenches into the LMI carpark to act as a timeline.Visitors would go in at1914 and come out in2014. Sounds like aplan; all I had to do was make ithappen.

I received verbal approval of my ideasfrom the committees of the LMI butthere was no rush of support orinterest in the project. No problem. Itdid take a long time and a lot oftelephone calls to create the

framework of the event. I was fluidand open to ideas and suggestionsfrom others who had much moreexperience in this sort of thing than Ihad. I needed a partner, and Ineeded a partner who was in aposition to provide those trenches!

The British Army was the obviouschoice, but I spoke to so many armyofficers from different regiments that Iwas beginning to wonder if therewould ever be an outcome. Fate

stepped in. One of my manymessages and requests for advice orhelp had been passed to Major RonRussell via a complicated route. Ronwas looking for a partner to work with

on a WWI commemorative event andhe was based with 208 Field Hospital(Liverpool) Volunteers. We both werelooking for the same thing andrealised we were in a position to worktogether.

208 Field Hospital were able toprovide professional staff to deliver aseries of lectures and to design andcreate a trench, they had access tohistorical items in their resource centrefor 1914 displays and access to 2014military medical vehicles and

equipment. The LMI provided thevenue and items from our historicmedical collections, and I projectmanaged and co-ordinated theevent together with organising allthe publicity and promotion. Weworked very well together, andboth sides had input in the shapeof the event.

There were hiccups along theway, but we took it slowly butsurely and made our

arrangements aroundmedical staff from 208going to Afghanistanand other commitments.The three years wasonly just the rightamount of time weneeded.

Plans were made andchanged and tweakedand discarded and inthe summer of 2014 Ihad the opportunity toapply for Heritage LotteryFunding. This wouldenable us to enhance ourplans even more andprovide something lasting.I had to give it a go andapply.

Over the three days of the event wehosted an estimated 800 visitors to theLMI. The event provided a series ofeight lectures based on the theme ofThen and Now: MilitaryMedicine 1914 – 2014. Thesewere aimed at professional medics

Below: The Samaritan Hospital, 36Upper Parliament Street, Liverpool

Above: French soliders recuperatingat Royaumont. Courtesy of

Frances Ivens

11

and the public; displays of personalitems belonging to Noel GodfreyChavasse, many rarely seen in public;military uniforms from the 1914period; a hands-on collection of WWIitems to be picked up and looked at,on loan from Chester MilitaryMuseum; displays from the LMIcollections of important Liverpooldoctors of the time and theircontributions to WWI; a Home Frontdisplay; filmed interviews of staff fromthe School of Tropical Medicine talkingabout the more unpleasant side oftrench warfare. Lastly there was thetrench – the pièce de résistance of thewhole event. We even had a‘genuine’ WWI officer talking to ourvisitors about injuries and life in thetrenches and at the other end of ourtimeline we had modern soldiers andarmy medics talking about warfaretoday and how military medicine hasadvanced.

We invited VIP guests and weredelighted when the LordLieutenant and the High Sherriffaccepted.

Thanks to Heritage LotteryFunding we offered volunteeringopportunities to Liverpoolstudents and to interested peoplewho had been to the LMI for anHistoric Building Tour, we alsoadvertised for members of thepublic to come along and bepart of the team for the threedays. I trained and supported18 volunteers. I was able toemploy an event co-ordinatorwho was absolutely brilliant(Meg also volunteers with me)and who was able to take a lotof the final arrangements fromme as I still had to run thelibrary and I was only therepart-time. Meg had brilliantideas for advertising andpromoting the event.

I was interviewed live onRadio Merseyside and wasalso invited to BBC Radio4Woman’s Hour. I was surethat this was pre-recorded, butno, this was also live. Nopressure then. We knew thatthe event was unique, butMeg and Woman’s Hour sawsomething that I hadn’t. As

part of our research we had beenlooking for Liverpool doctors who hadall been members of the LMI and whohad made significant contributions tomedicine at the time. We easily foundtwo male doctors but I wanted abalance and looked for two womentoo. 1914 was a time when womenwere very much the minority in themedical world, but we found what wewere looking for, inspirational women.

Woman’s Hour was most interestedbecause I am female, the presentColonel of 208 Debbie Telford isfemale and we had discovered thestories of female Liverpool doctors andone in particular interested them,Frances Ivens. We were able to talkabout Then and Now to Women’sHour listeners and tell the stories ofmedical women in WWI and today.Oh yes, and also promote the event!

We had a lot of funand it

was over too quickly. Thanks toHeritage Lottery funding there is alasting legacy. For approximately thenext two years the lectures,photographs, interviews and more willbe available on the LMI websitehttp://www.lmi.org.uk scroll down tothe Then and Now image.

The interviews with staff from theLiverpool School of Tropical Medicinecover the topics of vermin, influenza,trench foot, health and woundinfection, shell shock and the work of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine during WWI.http://www.lmi.org.uk/LibraryAndArchives/RecentExhibitions/ThenandNowWW1Exhib/TrenchHorrors.aspx eachshort interview lasts about five minutes

Photographs are liberally scatteredthroughout the event webpages and ifyou wish to hear the Woman’s Hourinterview, there is a link to it in theFrances Ivens sectionhttp://www.lmi.org.uk/LibraryAndArchives/RecentExhibitions/ThenandNowWW1Exhib/Ivens.aspx scroll to the

bottom of the page and follow theinstructions

Thanks to our funding we havepull-up displays on our fourLiverpool doctors – Sir RobertJones, Noel Godfrey Chavasse,Frances Ivens and Mary BirrellDavies. If you wish to borrow oneof them, or all of them, then pleaseget in touch. I look forward tohearing from you.

A lot of work and a lot of fun buttotally exhausting. Would I do itagain, of course! There arealready plans afoot ….

Adrienne Mayers (Mrs)LIBRARIANLIVERPOOL MEDICAL INSTITUTION

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This year’s LIHNN BigDay Out was held at thenautically themed Linerhotel in Liverpool.

The aim of the event is to give LIHNNmembers time away from the day job toshare experience with each other, andthe programme for the day wasstructured around a series of shortpresentations from different people ona variety of subjects with time allocatedfor discussion and knowledge sharingamongst delegates.

The day started off with a session fromClaire Bradshaw from the NHS NorthWest Leadership Academy ontransferable skills. The session wasbased around getting us all to thinkabout our transferable skills, identifyingour skills, behaviours and knowledge,and thinking about how we mightapply and develop these in our careers.Claire asked us to write down threeskills, three areas of knowledge andthree behaviours that we have, doing itindividually first and then workingtogether on our tables to discuss thisfurther. It can be quite difficult to thinkabout what your skills and areas ofknowledge are and we all found that itwas much easier once we starteddiscussing this with others and had helpin thinking of some ideas! The nextpart of the session was aroundconsidering how our skills andexperience might transfer to a differentrole, sector or organisation etc., thegaps in our skills and knowledge, andwhat we might do to fill these gaps anddevelop.

Following on nicely from Claire’ssession were two short presentationsfrom Dan Livesey and Emma Child onworking in different sectors and movingacross to healthcare libraries. Danpreviously worked in Public Librariesbefore working for the NHS and duringthe presentation he reflected on aspectsof the work that were similar in bothsectors, as well as the differentchallenges experienced in the NHS andnew skills that he has developed in hiscurrent role. Emma previously workedat the Ministry of Justice department inLondon before taking up her currentrole at University Hospital Aintree. Shespoke about the type of work she did atthe MoJ, the types of enquiries that thelibrary there deal with as well as the

differences in the two environments. Itwas really interesting to hear aboutother people’s experiences in differentsectors and consider not only thedifferences, but the similarities inthe work.

Nicola Broughton spoke about usingInstagram to promote the work of theFADE Library in a colourfulpresentation which also demonstratedthe creative use of rubber ducks! Foranyone who is not aware, Instagram isa social networking site for sharingimages and videos – like aphotographic version of Twitter. TheFADE library use it to promote theirgrey literature collection using thehashtag #fiftyshadesofgreyliterature, aswell as using it for general librarypromotion.

Patrick Glaister was involved in the nexttwo presentations. The first was on thevery innovative use of competitions bythe Pennine Acute Library to engageand market the service to new users.During December PAT Libraries had anadvent calendar competition on theirwebsite. Users had to click an adventcalendar window each day for achance to win an Amazon voucher,encouraging users to visit the librarypages frequently. The Valentinescompetition invited staff to write a loveletter or romantic tweet to the Librarywith the winning entries beingpublished on the Library website andwinning a prize. Both competitions hadgood responses and gave the libraryexposure to new members. All entrieswere followed up with an email invitingparticipants to register for the library,or if they were already members,remind them of the services.

Patrick also presented with KatieNicholas from Manchester MentalHealth on the E-Book matrix projectwhich they are currently working ontogether. They gave an update on thework that has been done on the projectso far and outlined plans of what theyare doing next. They have recently sentout a new survey on the use of e-booksin NHS libraries so if you haven’talready, please fill in the survey:https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/HH7L63X

Lunch was served in the restaurant ofthe hotel and provided furtheropportunities for networking with fellow

delegates. I’mfairly new to the network

so this was a chance to talk tosome people I hadn’t met before in

an informal setting and find out moreabout both them and their libraries.The food was excellent and it was niceto take a breather to digest the learningfrom the mornings’ sessions.

The first session after lunch was withLisa Jeskins from Lisa Jeskins Trainingon the benefits of getting involved inprofessional networks andvolunteering. Lisa is an informationprofessional and freelance consultantwho has been heavily involved inprofessional networks being the Chairof the LILAC Committee and ConferenceOfficer for the CILIP InformationLiteracy Group. Lisa gave an engagingpresentation talking about the skills andexperience she has gained from hervoluntary roles and how these haveenriched her professional developmentand helped her in her career. She thendirected us to do an exercise looking atsome job descriptions for voluntaryroles which gave us the opportunity tothink about the experience we wouldgain from volunteering and how thismight assist us in developing our owncareers or gaining promotion. You cangain experience of activities such asbudgeting, people management, eventplanning and organisation andnetworking that you might not get to doin your day-to-day job andvolunteering can provide a bridgebetween your current role and the nextstep up.

Next up was Liz Hedgecock with apresentation on Randomised CoffeeTrials, a novel activity for encouragingknowledge sharing across anorganisation. Staff members apply forthe scheme and are randomly pairedup with another participant to meet forcoffee and a chat about their role in theorganisation. Liz reported that it was asimple activity to run – all she had to dowas send an email inviting people toparticipate, pair people up and theysurvey them afterwards for feedback.Nearly 10% of the organisation choseto participate and the feedback Lizreceived showed that it had a highimpact. So high impact for little effort!It sounds like a great idea forencouraging knowledge sharingthough I think it probably works better

LIHNN Big Day Out

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L i n d a w a s a l r e a d y a nestablished and well respectedlibrary manager at Blackburnwhen I first met her in early1996.

I seem to remember spending a lot ofmy early days on the phone to Linda.From the very first, she proved herselfto be generous with her help andadvice. That was the hallmark of hercontribution to the North West and tothe profession at large. If someoneneeded a draft strategy, a businessplan, a service restructure, somesuggestions for a new library build,Linda had not only already ‘beenthere, done it, and got the T-shirt’ butwas happy to share that knowledgeand expertise. The advice she gavewas always sound. She had a knackof getting right to the hub of an issue.This was a skill that Linda used togreat effect on a number ofprofessional committees, including theLIHNN Co-ordinating Committee.

Linda put her heart and soul intodeveloping the library service atBlackburn from very small beginnings,in somewhat cramped surroundings,into something that she and her teamcould be very proud of. During a

lifetime of service at Blackburn, shemade and maintained manyfriendships among the staff. It isperhaps fitting that she ended herdays at the Royal Blackburn Hospital,being treated by some of the verynursing and medical staff that she hadhelped to train.

Linda and I worked closely togetheron various committees. However, aswell as colleagues, we were‘conference buddies’. Whether inLondon, Edinburgh, Belfast or Cardiff,Linda had always scanned theconference programme in advanceand worked out where we mightpossibly just squeeze in some ‘retailtherapy’. Although Linda undoubtedlyworked hard, leading a successfulteam at Blackburn and gaining a firstclass honours degree, an MA byresearch and Chartered status alongthe way, she was someone who knewhow to enjoy herself as well. Wittyand cheerful, she was quick to laughand was generally just fun to bearound.

Those of us who were fortunateenough to have her as a close friendas well as a colleague, will know thatshe was as generous in her support

on a personal level. When I came toretire at the end of December 2013,one of the presents Linda gave to mewas a bangle inscribed with thismotto: ‘There is no gift as preciousas a friend’. For me, that perfectlysums her up. RIP, my friend.

Chris Thornton FORMERLY HEAD OF LIBRARY SERVICESAT CENTRAL MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY HOSPITALS

(Catherine) Linda Riley

in smaller organisations based at oneor two sites. My Trust covers the wholeof Lancashire over 400 sites so I think itwould be difficult logistically toimplement this myself.

John Gale spoke about tailoringresources at the JET Library with theaim of engaging hard to reach groupsand underserved areas in the Trust. Hisidea was to create a PowerPointpresentation which looks like a tabletscreen with buttons linking to websitesor further information slides. This canthen be used to make training sessionsmore engaging and participant-focussed, as participants can choosewhich button they want to click on, orfor providing tailored information onthe website. Emily Hurt gave a veryengaging presentation on using thePomodoro Technique to manage time.In essence the Pomodoro Techniqueadvocates doing 25 minutes focussedwork and then taking a 5 minute break,so that larger pieces of work arebroken into chunks and made moremanageable. During the 25 minutes ofwork you should be totally focussed on

the task you are doing – no checkingemails, eating or getting distracted bythings in the office! During the 5minutes you should do somethingactive, getting up and moving around.After scaring us all with statistics thatpeople who have sedentary lifestylesare more likely to die of ‘death from allcauses’ it really made me think abouthow I manage my time and I’ve beenloosely trying out the technique in thepast couple of weeks.

The final session of the day was fromMary Hill, newly appointed LibraryOperations Manager at The Christie,on Measuring Impact. These days it’simperative that we can demonstrate theimpact of our services, not only for theLQAF but also to evidence the value ofour services to our own organisations,and the people who run ourorganisations who may not be users ofour services or understand what we do.Impact is often intangible and it can bedifficult to show on paper. Marydiscussed some of the strategies she hasused to collect examples of impact andhow she has used these to demonstrate

value, via systematically gatheringevidence using a variety of methodssuch as surveys, case studies andstructured interviews.

The day was rounded off with furtherrefreshments and a final opportunity totalk to fellow delegates and reflect onthe day. Overall I found the event reallyuseful. It was great to hear aboutexperiences and innovative ideas fromother people within the network, andI’ve taken quite a few ideas back to theoffice with me to share with my teamand try out. But most of all it was reallyvaluable to have the opportunity tonetwork. Most of us work in smallteams, and like me, may be the onlyone in a team at a particular grade ordoing a particular role. Having theopportunity to talk to my peers, makenew contacts and learn from theirexperiences was the highlight of theday.

Cath HarrisOUTREACH LIBRARIAN, LANCASHIRECARE NHS FOUNDATION TRUST

12th January 1951 –13th May 2015

“I will always remember Linda as adedicated library professional whowanted to do the best she couldfor her Library Service but was alsowilling to share her knowledgeand experience with her colleagues.On a personal note I will missLinda's friendship, kindness andespecially her wicked sense of humour which could always be relied up on to liven up any meetingor gathering.”

Mandy Beaumont

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A healthy libraryThe perception of the roleof public libraries doesnot always include anappreciation of the workwe do supporting thehealth and well-beingagenda. Here in St Helens,we do a lot in this areaand so here is a flavourof what goes on.

As well as the public library service, Iam also responsible for Adult andCommunity Learning (ACL) and Artsand Culture within the Borough and thisopens up so many options. With 13libraries across the Borough and 96%of residents living within two miles of alibrary, we are ideally placed to offeraccess for health professionals to reacheveryone in the Borough.

Statistically, there are more people outof work in St Helens than in the restof the NW Region (24% ofhouseholds in StHe l en s

have no employed adults. Thiscompares with an average of 20% inthe North West and 17% in England asa whole). Over a quarter of children(26.9%) in St Helens live in poverty andoverall the health of children and youngpeople is worse than the Englandaverage. In addition, almost onequarter of St Helens population have aregistered disability and the mentalhealth of our population is a particularconcern. All of these statistics indicatethat there is a huge challenge for theBorough in the health arena.

So much of what library services do tomeet this challenge is aimed at endingfeelings of isolation, of having nowhereto go, nothing to do and no reason toget up! Partnership working is key tothis. We work with Public Health andAdult Social Care and Health to ensurethat what we do reaches those whomost need support. We hold major

events to support national schemes suchas World Mental Health Day and theInternational Day for Older People.We frequently combine these withauthor events and last year were luckyenough to host Matt Haig, author ofReasons to Stay Alive who citedreading as a major factor in helpinghim to overcome depression andsuicidal tendencies. We also then takethe opportunity to offer our libraries asvenues for major health checks, such asblood pressure and cholesterol checksand the opportunity to give outinformation on cancer and other majorhealth issues.

A key initiative for libraries is ReadingWell: Books on Prescription. This is anational scheme and consists of a list ofbooks recommended by professionalsin the field for common mental healthconditions including anxiety,depression, phobias and some eating

disorders. Administered by theReading Agency, in the first

year of the scheme ithas reached

15

275,000 people nationally with book-based cognitive behavioural therapy.

In January 2015, the Reading Agencylaunched Reading Well: Books onPrescription for Dementia, which againis a list of books providing help andsupport for people with dementia,carers of people with dementia andanyone who would like to find out moreabout the condition or is worried aboutsymptoms. The booklist isdivided into fourc a t e g o r i e s :information andadvice; living wellwith dementia;s u p p o r t f o rr e l a t i v e s a n dc a r e r s ; a n dpersonal stories. Italso helps peopledi s c o v e r o t h e rlibrary wellbeingservices includingR e a d i n g We l lM o o d - b o o s t i n gBooks and readinggroups. St HelensLibrary service hashad 13 completesets of the books onboth lists (one foreach library in theBorough) funded byPublic Health. In theautumn, we expect thelaunch of a furtherscheme dealing withmental health issues inyoung people.

We are about tointroduce a similarscheme called Arts onPrescription. Fundedby Public Health, this is an initiative t o e x p l o r e h o wparticipation in theAr ts can providetherapy throughcreative workshops. Healthprofessionals and partners will be ableto refer people, but individuals will alsobe able to self-refer.

Our big Arts in Libraries project,Cultural Hubs, funded by Arts CouncilEngland, has, as one of its targetaudiences, those in receipt of theservices of Adult Social Care or whoare about to access those services.Through all art forms, such as drama,music, digital and visual art, we have

been working with groups toencourage them to participate in and toattend arts events in our libraries. Asan example, through the mediums ofdrama and stand-up comedy, localgroups have been encouraged toexplore their issues around mentalhealth and dependency and to gain inself-esteem and confidence. We havealso explored the stigma attached tomental health conditions and

raised awareness to help to banish this.A highlight was the performance of JessThom, known profess ional ly asTourettes Hero, who performed her onewoman show, “Backstage in BiscuitLand”, about living with Tourettessyndrome in Central Library last year togreat acclaim.

Our Cultural Coordinator is funded byASCH and has a remit to focus on older

people and isolation. He organisessocial and cultural events and activities,encouraging group therapy,reminiscence and karaoke sessions.

In ACL, we concentrate on reachingthose who are hardest to reach in theBorough and encouraging themthrough small steps back into learning.Again, we aim to build self- confidence

and self -esteem andencourage learners to takeon new challenges.Courses on Cooking on aBudget, Stress Less,Positive Thinking andStarting Life On Line areall delivered in theBorough and we haverecently received a grantto focus learning on thosewith mild to mediummental health issues.Watch this space!

Staff in St HelensLibraries and ACL aretrained as DementiaFriends and we have aDementia Champion;

we will beexpanding numbersthis year. CentralLibrary is a refuge inthe Safer in Towninitiative and all ourlibraries arecollection points forthe Food Bank andcentres where WinterWarmth packs aregiven out to those inneed. Through ourHome Delivery Servicefor the housebound wealso act as asafeguarding channelfor the vulnerable andoften elderly citizens aswell as providing socialinteraction.

This is a lightning tourthrough some of what

we have achieved in the last year.Health support is a key area for us andone which I hope to develop andexpand, building on a rich portfolio ofactivity.

Sue WilliamsonHEAD OF LIBRARY SERVICESST HELENS COUNCIL

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Moving into ManagementLIHNN residential

Having recently returned towork following maternityleave into a new librarymanager role, the Movinginto Management residentialcourse couldn’t have comeat a better time for me.

Having spent 6 years as a ClinicalLibrarian (a role which I have lovedand could have carried on doingforever!) it is the start of a new careerchapter for me. As with all periods ofchange, it has been accompanied bymoments of self-doubt and soul-searching: Would I enjoy managing aservice as much as I’d enjoyed beingon the ‘frontline’ of the service? Howwould I make the transition from being‘one of the team’ to leading the team?Where on earth do I start? I arrived atthe two day course hoping for answersto all of these questions.

Thankfully, Deborah Dalley’s extensiveexperience and wisdom helped to steerme through these sticky issues.Covering topics such as problemsolving, time management, givingfeedback and delegating effectively, thecourse content was valuable not only tonew managers like me, but also thoselibrarians aspiring to managementpositions in the future.

Deborah encouraged us to be reflectiveabout our own personal attributes andworking style, which I found extremelyhelpful at a time when I’d beenwondering, ‘What sort of manager do Iwant to be?’. It turns out I’mpredominantly a divergent thinker,which explains why I sometimes getfrustrated with processes that arefollowed because ‘we’ve always done itthat way’. In terms of communication,I’m a high ‘feeler’ (someone who placeshigh value on people rather thanthings); which makes sense because Iusually need to discuss ideas withothers before reaching a way forward.I doubt I would have paused during myworking day to undergo such self-

analysis, so it was useful to have timeaway from work to consider theseissues.

As well as self-examination, Deborahencouraged us to consider the culture inwhich we work. Is genuine feedbackwelcomed by managers in yourorganisation? Are fun and creativityencouraged? Do you solve problemsas a team? Looking at practical waysto cultivate some of these qualities in ateam helped me to design a lengthy(some might say ambitious!) actionplan to be put into place once I wasback at work.

Fast forward a fortnight, and thelearning from the course continues toinfiltrate my consciousness on a dailybasis as I navigate my way through thefirst few weeks in my first managementrole. I’ve tried to tackle my action planhead on. I’ve introduced regular,scheduled one-to-ones with all my teammembers, which are helping meunderstand workload pressures, discussalternative ways to solve problems andlisten to concerns and suggestions. I’vealso been having scheduled one-to-ones with my line manager which aidmy understanding of organisationalpressures and strategic direction. In myfirst one-to-one with my line manager Ipresented our service priorities for thenext six months, which hopefully helpedher to understand the direction I want tomove in. It certainly helped meanticipate our potential challenges overthe next few months.

I’ve been trying to practise some of thepractical things that I learned too. Igave some positive, structuredfeedback to a team member who hadreally helped me. I’ve been asking,‘What can I do to make your lifeeasier?’ at the end of one-to-ones to tryand encourage people to give mefeedback. I’ve been using a daily ‘todo’ list in addition to my ‘master’ listand have tried ‘closing the day’ – bothworkload management techniques thatwere suggested during the course.Having identified that we could beusing our team meetings moreeffectively, I’ve scheduled a problemsolving activity for our next meetingand I’ve been delegating some adminwork to one of my team. These are justsmall changes, but I hope they’llcontinue to have an impact.

The thought processes that I workedthrough during the two day coursereally did set me up for implementingchanges practically back at work. Inaddition I met with Gil at HCLU justdays after the course, who coached methrough my next steps and action planas part of the support that HCLU areoffering to new managers. I found thatinvaluable, and sharing my action planwith someone else means that I haveeven more incentive to work through it!

Back at work, I no longer feel dauntedand overwhelmed by the new challengeahead; rather I feel energised andprepared, and part of me feels that Imight actually enjoy it as well.

Victoria TreadwayLIBRARY & KNOWLEDGE SERVICE LEADWIRRAL UNIVERSITY TEACHINGHOSPITAL NHS FOUNDATION TRUST

“I feel energised and prepared, andpart of me feels that I might actually enjoy

it as well.”

17

Nicola GregoryI graduated from my firstdegree in Philosophy in2001 and completed anMA in Philosophy inSeptember 2014.

I attained my Postgraduate Diploma inLibrary and Information Managementfrom MMU in 2008, whilst working asa library assistant at a large publiclibrary. Once qualified, I spent some timeworking as a Learning Resource Managerin a high school and from there movedinto my last most recent role asAssistant Librarian at an FE College.

My role at the College includedproviding information skills training to

staff and students, liaising withacademic staff regarding the purchaseof resources and promoting resourcesto increase usage. Working at the Collegehas given me a solid professional basisfrom which to progress into the morespecialised role of Assistant ClinicalLibrarian at Warrington and HaltonNHS Trust (WHH).

I spent seven years working at theCollege before I was fortunate enoughto attain my current position, which Istarted in May 2015. As this is the firsttime I have worked in the health sector,there is a lot to learn. It has alreadybeen a steep learning curve but I amrelishing the challenge and I love thefact that I learn something new everyday. I am excited to see what the futurein NHS libraries holds for me.

The support I’ve received from my teamat WHH and from colleagues in theLIHNN network has been invaluable.Thank you all for making me feel sowelcome!

Nicola GregoryASSISTANT CLINICAL LIBRARIANnicola.gregory@whh.nhs.uk(01925) 664214

Helen KielyI have recently started atWarrington & Halton NHSFoundation Trust as theLibrary & Resources Officer. Previously, I was already working at thetrust as Medical Education CourseAdministrator, and working as a libraryassistant at Halton Lea Library at week-ends. I am finding the experience of bothmy previous roles extremely helpful inmy new post, though still have a lot to learn!

I graduated from Lancaster Universityin 2008 with a BAHons in Media andCultural Studies and have recentlycompleted my MA in Social and CulturalTheory at Staffordshire University viadistance learning. I'm now hoping tostudy for an MA in Library & ResourcesManagement in the near future.

Helen KielyLIBRARY & INFORMATION OFFICERWARRINGTON & HALTON HOSPITALSNHS FOUNDATION TRUST

NICE Evidence Searchallows you to search forsystematic reviews froma range of sources all inone place(www.evidence.nhs.uk)

Ev idence Search inc ludessystematic reviews from Cochrane,DARE and other providers.Following the closure of the DAREservice, systematic reviewspublished in PubMed from 1January 2015 are now added toNICE Evidence Search, makingEvidence Search a good place tostart when looking for goodquality systematic reviews.

Every week we search PubMedusing the systematic review filterand apply criteria for selectingsystematic reviews. A review is

included if it is published by ajournal which conforms to thepreferred reporting items forsystematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA) standard. Ifnot published by one of thesejournals, a systematic review isdeemed reliable if the abstractreports the use of inclusion/exclusion criteria, confirms two ormore sources have been searched,and incorporates a synthesis ofincluded studies.

To find all included systematicreviews within Evidence Search,enter your search terms into thesearch engine, and then apply the‘Type of Information’ filtersystematic reviews to your results(click on the Type of Informationfilter on the left hand side of theresults screen, then scroll downand click on Systematic Reviews).

Looking for good quality systematic reviews?

N E W S T A R T E R S

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Identifying the evidencefor systematic reviews:

Morning session:

Earlier this year I was lucky to receiveHCLU funding to attend a course onsystematic reviews in the Centre forReviews and Dissemination (CRD),York. The course attendees had a rangeof experience in relation to working onsystematic reviews and I consideredmyself to be very much a new starter inthis area. I had done a few searches forsystematic reviews, ranging from beinginvolved right from the start as part ofthe project team to helping strugglingclinicians who needed assistance withreviews which were already underway,but felt that I needed a betterunderstanding of the whole processand how a librarian can contribute tothe different stages in order to workmore effectively on such projects.

The morning session started with CarolLe Febvre (LeFebvre Associates) givinga brief explanation of what asystematic review is and why it may beundertaken, referring candidates to TheCochrane Handbook and the CRD’sGuidance for Undertaking Reviews forfurther reading.

“A systematic review attempts to collateall empirical evidence that fits pre-specified eligibility criteria in order toanswer a specific research question.”(Cochrane Handbook for SystematicReviews of Interventions, 2011, 1.2.2)Through a group discussion weidentified the key opportunities andchallenges that working on a systematicreview can present for the informationprofessional.

Kath Wright (CRD, York) gave a veryinsightful presentation on the role of theinformation specialist in systematicreviews. Whilst she referred primarilyto her own experiences at CRD York,the principles were easily generalisableacross the different healthcare andeducation settings the course delegateswere drawn from.

Although information professionalinvolvement will vary according to theneeds of each project she identified thekey stages of involvement.

Before the start of theproject: being involved at the startgives you the opportunity tocontribute to the proposal, definingthe project boundaries and scope.

At start of project: as aninformation professional you canprovide expert advice on whichresources should be used whensearching and how the output willbe downloaded.

At the end of the project:librarians can produce accuratereference and bibliography listsand contribute to the searchmethods section for any reports orpublications.

The discussion which followed wasaround the need for accurate andrealistic costing and effective workloadmanagement. This was of particularinterest to me as our service at CentralManchester has recently undertaken anumber of external search projectswhich we had to ensure would notimpact negatively upon the day-to-dayworking of the service in terms offinance or productivity.

The session on systematic review searchtechniques took a rather basic look atthe steps involved in undertaking aliterature search from developing thesearch question, determining whichresources to use during the search, andputting the question into a PICO format.As this course had been advertised asbeing aimed at people who undertookliterature searches on regular basis, Ipersonally felt that this part of thecourse was unnecessary.

The practical session in which wereviewed a search strategy remindedme of the value of collaboration inorder to benefit more fully from theprofessional knowledge and expertisewe hold as librarians. This was aformal exercise in getting a fresh pairof eyes to look over a search strategy toweed out simple typos and mistakes;something which we tend to do moreinformally in our day-to-day searchactivities.

For me, the presentation onmethodological search filters wasperhaps the most interesting session, asit demonstrated the impact that usingdifferent search filters during aliterature search can have on the resultsgenerated. The sample search strategywe were shown used a database RCTlimit (2299 results), then two separateCochrane Highly Sensitive Search

CHALLENGES:

Managing the expectations of others & their understanding of what you can (realistically) offer

Managing your own workloadeffectively

Establishing trust across the team

Maintaining effective & sustainablecommunications & workingrelationships

OPPORTUNITIES:

Gain a better understanding of thesystematic review process

Raise the profile of your serviceamongst potential new user groups

Demonstrate the value of the service

Highlight staff expertise

Gain project managementexperience

Alcuin building, York University

19

An introduction forinformation professionals

strategies for RCTs (sensitivity-maximising version = 13308 results;sensitivity and precision-maximisingversion = 4307 results). When askedwhat one should do when faced withsuch different search yields, KathWright suggested that the final decisionrelating to which set of results to use inthe review would come down to thesystematic review team as a whole. Thetake-home message from this sessionwas that whilst using the database-setlimits may be useful for a quick anddirty scoping search, they were neitherrobust nor accurate enough to be usedas part of the search strategy for asystematic review.

The final session of the morning was onpeer review of search strategies inwhich Carol Le Febvre gave a briefoverview of PRESSforum. This is aregistration-only online resource which

allows librarians to submit searchstrategies for systematic reviews in thehope that other more experiencedinformation professionals will provideconstructive critiques and learn bycritiquing the searches submitted byother librarians. I registered for thisresource once I returned home, andwhilst I found things such as the searchchecklist useful for self-critiquing asearch strategy, I found the actualplatform to be a little clunky and havenot had the time to upload any searchstrategies.

The key things I took away from thisday were the need to be involved at thevery start of a systematic reviewproject, ensuring that I effectivelycommunicate what the library service

can offer (and sometimes what it cannotrealistically offer too) at each stage,and to continue to use the collectiveknowledge and expertise of the NHSlibrarian community to aid my ownprofessional development, something Ifeel that we encourage and do verywell across the LIHNN region.

Jo WhitcombeASSISTANT LIBRARIANCENTRAL MANCHESTER UNIVERSITYHOSPITALS NHS FOUNDATION TRUST.

REFERENCES

Centre for Reviews and Dissemination(2009). Systematic Reviews: CRD's Guidance for Undertaking Reviews inHealth Care. York: University of York.

Higgins J.P.T, Green S (eds) (2011).Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions Version 5.1.0 [updated March 2011]. The CochraneCollaboration, Available fromwww.cochrane-handbook.org

Afternoon Session:

One month into my role as a newhealthcare librarian I was thrown intothe deep end when a doctor asked meto carry out the search strategy, andcontribute to the sifting of results, for asystematic review. Before then I didn’treally know what a systematic reviewwas, but I quickly had to find out how itdiffered from a regular lit search anddecipher exactly what my role shouldbe. Let’s just say it was a baptism offire, so when the course at York CRDwas advertised I was definitely going toattend.

During the afternoon session we lookedin detail at the PICO model and workedin groups to design a search strategyfor a real life review protocol. We alsolearnt about different referencemanagement systems and theirusefulness for storing, sorting andremoving duplicate records – especiallyuseful when you have more than 500hits on HDAS and the removeduplicates button is rendered obsolete!

However, the highlight of the afternoonfor me was learning how to use a testset. This is when you test to see if agroup of papers that you would want,or expect, your search strategy toretrieve from a database are includedin the results. It’s a rough measure ofhow well the search strategy isperforming. If your search strategypicks up all the test set articles,fantastic! If it doesn’t then you can usethe missing abstracts to help identifyadditional keywords and enable you tomodify your search.

You could do this by downloading yourdatabase results in batches of 200 andusing Ctrl+F to search for the key titles.But try doing that for 2,000+ results –not recommended! The beauty of thetest set is its simplicity:

PROS:

Open and transparent

Supports professional development

Introduces new search concepts & resources

Benefit from knowledge ofexperienced searchers

CONS:

The time required to register & submit a search for evaluation

The time lag between upload and receipt of feedback (if any) from others

continued on page 21...

20

Background

EBSCO Discovery Service (EDS) allowslibrary users to search across all youronline content whether ebooks,ejournals, or databases, and also youronline OPAC. In late 2014 following abid to the Health Education North West(HENW) Forerunner Fund three trusts inManchester, Central ManchesterUniversity Hospitals (CMFT), SalfordRoyal Foundation Trust (SRFT), and theUniversity Hospital of South Manchester(UHSM), made a decision to trialEBSCO Discovery in 2015.

Setting up your EDS prior to going live

Once the purchase orders were raisedand we got the go ahead from EBSCOwe were handed over to their EDSsetup team in Ipswich, Massachusetts tobegin the process of setting up the EDSenvironment. This involved activatingdatabases such as Medline Complete,CINAHL with Full text, and all ouronline content from National level suchas the BMJ Journals, to regionalcollections like the Oxford MedicineOnline ebooks, and our local onlinejournal and ebook packages. We weregiven templates for holding informationand these could be populated bydownloading collections from theOCLC Knowledge Base.

The other element of setup is deciding

on the aesthetic look of your homepage which allows you to customise asearch box and place links to otherresources. It is also possible toincorporate widgets from otherproducts such as Clinical Key,UpToDate, and Twitter.

Go Live

Once you go live and the site isaccessible to users you are then

hand led by EBSCOCustomer Services who will make

any holdings updates or changes toyour landing page. From the CMFTperspective we found it easier to GoLive as soon as possible and makechanges once you are using the EDSwith your customers. At UHSM wewaited until we had overcome most ofthe technical issues with set-up beforegoing live in February 2015. We wereslow to complete the questionnaires for

customisation and content due to time-restraints. Once we were satisfied withthe content, had set up the automaticdaily updates from the physicalcatalogue (SoftLink-Liberty) and theappearance of the landing page wasacceptable we went live. At SRFT timerestraints led to delays in completingour customisation of EDS, and theloading of our electronic links, howeverwe were able to utilise the time to buy-in an automated EDS connector, OAI-PMH harvesting tool, from ourcatalogue provider Souton, whichenables an automated weekly uploadof out catalogue holdings direct to EDS.SRFT access to the EDS went live forAthens users at the end of March.Fig1. CMFT Home Page

Fig 2 – Discover eBooks via the AtoZ search or browse option

A trial of the EBSCO Discovery Service

across three large acute hospitals in Manchester

Identifying the evidence for systematic reviews:An introduction for information professionals

1. Run your search strategy

2. Create the test set using the UIs ofthe papers you want to find

3. Combine the last set in the searchstrategy with the test set using AND

4. If the number of records decreasesby 1 then 1 record from the test setisn’t being identified etc.

Working on that first ever systematicreview my nagging doubt was ‘what ifmy search isn’t robust enough?’ and‘what if I am missing prominent

papers?’ The test set helps eliminatethat doubt by proving the strength ofyour search to yourself and the rest ofthe review team.

The only danger of the test set is thetemptation to amend your strategy topick up every paper at the detriment ofa significant increase in results, but thisis something you can discuss with yourcolleagues.

Since attending the course I have beeninvolved in 3 more systematic reviews. Iam now much more confident inestablishing my role from the beginning.Now that I appreciate the amount of

work that goes into a systematic review,I am also more comfortable asking foracknowledgement of my contribution oreven authorship of papers. As a resultworking on SRs is now something Ireally enjoy working on and find veryrewarding.

The course will run again on Tuesday15th September 2015, 9.15 am - 4 pmhttp://www.york.ac.uk/crd/training-services/identifying-the-evidence/

Emma ChildCLINICAL INFORMATION SPECIALIST,AINTREE UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL

Real life example of a test set I carried out for a systematic review scoping search. It shows that out of a test set of 12papers, my search strategy included 8 papers. 4 of the papers were not retrieved by my search strategy.

...continued

21

Discovering content

In addition to housing all your resourcesin one place EDS brings your print andebook content into the results of subjectsearches across all the databases. Youalso get a comprehensive A-to-Z listingof all content, or book content if youdecide to filter. This is very useful fordiscovering ebooks as the NICEEvidence journals and databases pagedoes not provide an ebook A-to-Z thatincludes regional and local ebookholdings.

The use of widgets in our EDS can alsofast link users to specialist resourcessuch as Clinical Key at CMFT and youalso have the freedom to send users toHDAS, ProQuest OR Ovid if the prefer

to execute and advanced search on anative interface.

Similar but Different

Each of the pilot sites, CMFT, SRFT, &UHSM have got a slightly different EDSbased on local preferences. The CMFTEDS has no print books indexed whereas UHSM has their Liberty OPACincluded in search results.

At UHSM we were able to add a fieldnamed “Available in Library Print

Catalogue” so that users can searchprint only or remove them from theirsearch results. Each unsubscribedrecord in the search results has a link toour online ILLs request page. This bothreduces user frustration when they areunable to access the full text andadvertises our ILLs service.

You can also switch on searching,linking, and display preferences.

Fig 3. UHSM results showing ILL requesting function

continued...

Another option is to allow your EDS tobe accessible with or without apassword barrier and force logins atthe publishers’ site when accessing aresource once discovered. At UHSM wedecided to make the landing pagepublic but with the option to loginbefore proceeding with their search.

At SRFT IT restrictions have meant thatGuest access is not yet enabled,leading to a delay in launching EDS asour external website entry point.

Monitoring Impact and outcomes

The most important impact or outcomeat the end of the 12 month period will

be an increase in resource usage for allcontent whether it was purchasednationally, regionally, or locally. Weintend to carry out some research as tothe impact of the EDS implementationgather both quantitative and qualitativefeedback from both library staff at thethree sites and users experience ofusing the EDS environment. Anecdotal

22

A trial of the EBSCO Discovery Service across three large acute hospitals in Manchester

...continued

SRFT EDS Home page

UHSM screen shot 1 – showing login option from public EDS view

23

feedback from CMFT users has beenvery positive and there has been aquantifiable increase in ebook usage.The period January–June 2015 showeda 30% increase in Ebook usage for thesame period in 2014. At SRFT we arecollecting qualitative feedback whilst

showing readers how to access EDS asopposed to normal catalogue accessand gaining comments such as: “I loveit! That’s much better.” and have usedboth staff and reader comments topopulate a continuous projectdevelopment and maintenance plan.

Steve GloverCENTRAL MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY HOSPITALS

Valerie HaighSALFORD ROYAL FOUNDATION TRUST

Donna SchofieldUNIVERSITY HOSPITAL OF SOUTH MANCHESTER

Advanced search page

Results screen

THE LAND OF GEEK

24

METRICS AND THE MODERN HEALTH CARE LIBRARIAN

The topic of this issue's Landof Geek column is Metrics.After all those years withphotocopied forms and fivebar gates, suddenly it's neverbeen easier to count things,or to have things countedfor you.

The question is, what do you count andwhy? These are 10 metrics that youcan, or should count, that will give youa picture of your library in numbers.These will liven up your annual reportsand reviews and most importantly tellyou and your users something aboutyour library.

Twitter AnalyticsA very interesting development byTwitter, perhaps indicative of the movefrom geeky tool to mainstream mediachannel. This is metrics heaven. Aswell as Tweets, Followers, Followingyou have stats about your TwitterAccount, individual Tweets andFollowers. The most interesting factthat I thought I would never know 46%of @NWASLibrary followers are basedin the North West of England.Clearly there are dangers in havingsuch a wealth of data, it may just betoo much. Anyone you report tomight wonder what Tweet impressionswere? The result of bird attacks?However, it could be useful in justifyingthe energy you put into the libraryTwitter account, and demonstrating thereach and impact of your social mediacommunication activities.

Resource: Twitter Analyticshttps://analytics.twitter.com

DemographicsDemographic data can demonstratewho you are reaching within yourorganisation. It's useful to knowanyway. You can aim to reach such auser community and then evidence theeffect using numbers. We had so

many enquiries from department X, or region y. It can also tell you bydefault who are your low or non-users.This data is easier to collect at source,but it will be embedded in othersystems if you have the key. Typicallyan email address for each enquirerallows you to access data stored in theemail system. Just as an example. A pre-occupation for NWAS LKS is the geographical distribution of users,since one of the definingcharacteristics of the organisation is itsgeographical spread, from Crewe toCarlisle. Collecting geographical dataon enquirers, and knowing thedistribution of staff across the regionsthat comprise NWAS, allows theLibrary to demonstrate the service is evenly delivered across the North West.

Required LQAF metrics

Some metrics you have to have. I mayhave been unfortunate in missing anLQAF metric in the past, shades ofLady Bracknell. It might be useful tospell out the ones that are required forLQAF. For the record they are:

General Enquiries. For example, respond to enquiriesin person, via phone or e-mailwithin two days; 95% of the time.

Document Supply:For example, supply any document(Inter-Library Loans) within twodays or contact service users toexplain any delay; 95% of the time.

Mediated Searches: For example, respond to searchrequests in person, via phone or e-mail within two days or to anegotiated deadline; 95% of the time.

Not required, but mentioned in theadvisory note on CollectionDevelopment Policy Frameworkproduced by the LIHNN Quality

Group (www.lihnn.nhs.uk/index.php/lihnn/lihnn-groups/quality), are KeyPerformance Indicators. See thesection on Evaluation and Review.

Open AthensOpen Athens measures a core activityfor libraries, access to electronicresources. It's about us, giving usdata for our libraries and comparativedata across the North West region.Readers of LIHNNK UP will know thiswas the topic of the Last Land of Geekcolumn (Holland & Glover 2015).Just to recap, this referred tomeasuring the number of registeredusers against the total number of staff(potential users) as a percentage. Callit Reach. The suggestion here is thatwe can take this a bit further.

Frequency Distribution

Sourced from the Open AthensAdministration Module. Thisdistribution gives your distinctive usageprofile. Probably not a surprise.Some people use Open Athens a lot.Most people don't. Giving thedistinctive long tail. Or does it? Youwill have to measure it to find out.

Intensity Ratio

Well, it has to be called something. It measures the number of OpenAthens accesses each month as a ratioof the Open Athens accounts overtime. It’s easy to compile and createon an Excel spreadsheet.

There is one a basic truth. The moreregistered Open Athens users you

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have and the more accesses toresources through Open Athens thehigher your metrics will go!

LQAF Score Your LQAF Score is a metric too, butit’s a big hitter. There is somediscussion about this on the ClinicalLibrarians Blog (Holland 2015). Oneto use with care, but clearly a scorethat is externally validated is going tocarry a lot of weight.

Client FeedbackScores

Libraries provide a number of servicesto our clients such as information skillstraining, literature searches, currentawareness services, inter-lending &document supply. Gathering feedbackon impact, satisfaction, and qualityprovides quantifiable metrics that canbe gathered easily with tools such asSurvey monkey. Likert scores can beused to create comparator data thatcan be graphed on MS excel and usedwith service targets

Trust corporatemetrics

Good metrics to use with managersinclude some standard HumanResource, OrganisationalDevelopment, and Finance metrics.These are usually available to

managers from ESR or regular reports and include:

KSF Compliance (target 100%)

Mandatory Training Compliance(target 100%)

Sickness rates (usually each trustwill have a target around 4% orlower)

Budget performance (usually trustfinance departments will have aservice tolerance)

Resource usemeasured by value

When we purchase resources locallyor via a consortium you can create a“cost-per-use” metric for ejournals,ebook, and database usage. Thiscost-per-use metric can be used toassess whether the resource has beena value for money purchase comparedwith sourcing the information fromalternative sources such as documentsupply or loan. These metricscalculated at journal title or book titlelevel can be useful in aiding renewalor purchasing decisions.

Resource usemeasured by uptake

In situations where usage data isavailable but cost-per-use data is noteasily ascertained due to resourcesbeing purchased regionally ornationally you can use downloads andcompare quarterly figures to see ifusage is increasing or decreasing overtime. These usage figures areavailable for most national productssuch as CINAHL, ProQuest, and theBMJ journals as well as regionalcollection data on the LIHNN website.

CollectionDevelopment metrics

There are a number of metrics that canbe used for collection development inaddition to usage data. There arebenchmarking such as the BMA CoreBooks list to assess the quality of yourcollection. You can also have servicemetrics such as time from acquisitionto the stock being processed andmade available.

References

Holland, M., 2015. It’s qualityassurance Jim, and it’s pretty much asexpected. [Blog Post]. Available from:https://lihnnclinicallibs.wordpress.com/2015/04/17/its-quality-assurance-jim-and-its-pretty-much-as-expected-by-matt-holland/[Accessed 02 July 2015].

Holland, M. & Glover, S., 2015.Count me in: using Open Athensregistrations as a performance metric.Spring 2015, 8-10. Available from:http://www.lihnn.nhs.uk/images/Documents/LIHNN/LIHNNK-Up/LIHNNK_47.pdf [Accessed 02 July 2015].

Matt HollandOutreach Librarian, NWAS LKS Matt.Holland@nwas.nhs.uk

Steve GloverHead of Library Services, CentralManchester University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Steve.Glover@cmft.nhs.uk

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26

Supporting a researcher with their

meta-ethnography!

Recently I was asked by

one of my Psychology

academics for support

with a meta-ethnography

she was conducting.

I of course said an enthusiastic

“yes!” but then realised that I had

no idea what a meta-ethnography

was…. As this type of research is

becoming more common,

particularly in health areas, I

thought it would be useful to share

my experiences, and how I

supported the researcher with their

search strategy.

The very first thing I did was to do

some of my own research. I ran

some simple searches on our

catalogue and discovery system to

find out first, what a meta-

ethnography was, and then for tips

on searching for studies.

So… what is a

meta-ethnography?

To over-simplify, it’s a way of

comparing qualitative research

studies against each other,

synthesising to find new conclusions

and research questions. As

qualitative studies generally can’t

be compared due to the differing

methodologies and interpretation.

Noblit and Hare theorised a

“translation theory of explanation in

which the metaphors or themes of

each study would be translated into

the terms of the other studies”

(Noblit, in Given, 2008), allowing

comparison. The meta-ethnography

entry in the Sage Encyclopaedia of

Social Science Research Methods

(Lewis-Beck, 2004) is useful for

further quick explanation. The key

thing to remember, though, is that

the studies used need to be

sufficiently similar for the research

outcome to be meaningful. This

presents challenges when searching

for studies.

What’s special or

different about searching

for studies for a meta-

ethnography?

There are a number of difficulties in

searching for qualitative literature vs

quantitative. One is that qualitative

studies generally don’t have the

same format of title and abstract

that you will find for most clinical

studies. So your keywords may not

appear in the title or abstract – the

title might be something irrelevant

and flowery rather than descriptive.

Keyword searching is thus less

effective than it is for other types of

search so you may need to be more

creative or widen your search to

full text.

There are two approaches to

searching for studies for a meta-

ethnography – either data

saturation (whereby you search and

scan articles until you 'feel' you've

reached the limits of what's out

there) or systematic (logging

keywords and looking through

databases in a systematic and

replicable way). For librarians

searching on behalf of clients, the

second option would seem to be the

most useful.

Top tips

The top tips I gleaned from my

research are:

Need to select databases

carefully, consider coverage to

ensure getting a good range –

not just using clinical databases

Think carefully about keywords

used and where to search for

them – you might need to search

full text rather than just title and

abstract, use free text as well as

thesaurus terms

Need to search grey lit, hand

search journals, use personal

contacts and citation/reference

searching to ensure full coverage

How can I find out more?

There’s a book by Noblit and Hare

(1998) called Meta-ethnography:

Synthesizing qualitative studies,

which I found useful as a starting

point. The following articles I also

found helpful, particularly the article

by Atkins et al.

Atkins, S., Lewin, S., Smith, H.,

Engel, M., Fretheim, A. and

Volmink, J. (2008) Conducting a

meta-ethnography of qualitative

literature: Lessons learnt. BMC

Medical Research Methodology,

8(21).

Britten, N., Campbell, R., Pope, C.,

Donovan, J. Morgan, M. and Pill, R.

(2002), Using meta ethnography to

synthesise qualitative research: a

worked example. Journal of Health

Services Research & Policy, 7(4),

209-215.

Wright, J.M., Cottrell, D.J., and Mir,

G. (2014) Searching for religion

and mental health studies required

health, social science and grey

literature databases. Journal of

Clinical Epidemiology, 67(7), 800-

810.

A final point – whilst, like me, you

may not have heard of a meta-

ethnography before, searching for

studies for one is well within the

skillset of librarians. I researched

and learned this within an afternoon

so I’m sure you can too. My

researcher has yet to get back to me

to confirm her article has been

accepted, but I’m keeping my

fingers crossed!

Michelle Bond

LIBRARIAN FOR FACULTY OF

SCIENCE, LIVERPOOL

HOPE UNIVERSITY

27

Since 2013 we have beencollecting statistics whichlet us know what thematerial we supply viathe inter library loansscheme is being used for.

You are probably used to the emailsfrom Keyll Darree asking for a bit moreinformation about the requests. Thankyou to everyone who takes the time toreply!

Why do it?At Keyll Darree we think it’s importantto know how our service is working, sothat we can continually improve it. Bylooking at these statistics we are able toassess the ways in which our resourcesare being used, and attempt to targetrelevant library users in a more directway - promoting it to those who areundertaking relevant activities to thegroups most likely to use the system,and those who are underusing theloans system too.

Gathering the Information:When sending inter-library loans amessage is attached by all libraryassistants (this was initially trialled byone library assistant, until April 2014).

It reads:“As part of our library service evaluation,if possible could you please tell us howthis resource will be used?”

So far, we have received replies to38.5% of books, articles, and otherresources sent. Although this isrelatively small it still provides us withan insight into the ways in which theresources we provide are being usedby those to whom we supply them, andthe users we are supplying to.

When emails are returned withinformation about how a resource willbe used, staff then classify this andrecord it on the inter library loansspreadsheet, there are monthly, yearly,and cumulative statistics.

The Results:

Inter Library Loans UsageStatistics for Keyll Darre Library:November 2013 - March 2015

The above graph represents thebreakdown of uses for 305 of the 792inter library loans requests we filledbetween November 2013, and March2015.

229: Nov 2013 – March 2014

563: April 2014 – March 2015

792: Total period

It is clearly visible that study andresearch are our largest areas forinter library loans – representing53% of the replies we receivedcumulatively.

Patient care also represents asignificant portion of the responses,totalling 19%.

We initially hypothesised that researchand study would be the most regularlyused areas, which is clearly the case,however we did not realise thesignificance of other areas such aspatient care, and personal development.

Limitations:

Although this process is useful, thereare some limitations which have beenevident through our collection.

Sometimes the staff requesting itemsdo not know what resources arebeing used for, and thereforecannot respond.

Sometimes, replies are not clear asstaff are only given a vague idea ofwhat resources are being used for.

We have a system in placewhereby three staff are classifyingthe information and it is thereforeopen to interpretation. To attempt tolimit this issue, we developed theinitial categories using the wordingin the responses, and most repliesabout the usage of statistics fit intoone of these areas.

Some responses can be for multiplereasons – literature reviews forstudy, for example. In this case theprimary aim needs to be assessedso that the response can beclassified on the statics form.

This is a self-selecting group ofrespondents, and therefore there ismuch more information availablethan we receive.

Conclusion:Looking back over our data, we havefound it particularly useful tounderstand the different types ofrequest we are receiving, and how thisinformation is being used. It is positiveto know the areas that our resourcesare useful for, and to consider anupdate of resources in areas wherethere is lowest usage.

Next time you use Keyll Darree, pleaseconsider letting us know how theresource will be used if the informationis available.

Stacey AstillSENIOR LIBRARY ASSISTANT

INTER LIBRARY LOAN STATSAT K E Y L L DA R R E E

Study26%

Reasearch27%

Patient Care17%

Personal

DevelopmentInterview: 1%Presentation

ServiceDevelopment

Literat

ure

Revie

w

Mentor

ing

5%4%

5%2%

13%

28Design & Print by Heaton Press Ltd Stockport Tel: 0161 442 1771

Editor’s Column

How you can contribute to the NewsletterAll members of LIHNN are welcome tocontribute to LIHNNK Up. We particularlyencourage contributions from para-professional staff and anyone who has notpreviously written for publication. Membersof the Editorial Board would be pleased to“mentor” new writers and provide adviceon what makes a good readable contribution.

What could you write about?Really it is up to you as we are looking fortopics of interest to health library staff. It could be:

something new that you have used oryour library has introduced

an overview of a piece of software suchas a social media tool

lessons learned (good or bad) fromdoing something differently in the library

good news that you want to share with LIHNN

an account of events and coursesattended. For conferences and coursesplease include what you found mostvaluable and what you will dodifferently from having attended theevent or course.

Format of contributions and other “rules”1. Please send your documents as Word

(i.e. either .doc or .docx) files.

2. Photos and artwork should be submittedin JPG format. Please don’t embed themin the Word documents. They should besubmitted as separate files with ameaningful caption.

3. Don’t forget your name, location, title ofarticle and date of article.

4. Please give full details of events, coursesand conferences attended. This shouldinclude:

The name of event and location

Date of event

Name of organising or sponsoring body

Details of how any support materialscan be obtained e.g. website urls

Full references to any publishedreports, articles etc.

5. All acronyms should be written out in full for the first occasion they are used in the text.

PDF copies of back issues and indexes to the newsletter are available at:http://www.lihnn.nhs.uk/index.php/lihnn/lihnnk-up/read-the-newsletter

Contributions should be submitted to:lihnnkup@lihnn.nhs.uk For queries please contact:Andrew.craig@lthtr.nhs.uk Tel: 01772 524763

About Library andHealth Network NorthWest (LIHNN)Website: http://www.lihnn.nhs.ukfor details of the groups and their activities

LIHNN Chair: Graham Haldane (East Lancashire Hospitals),graham.haldane@elht.nhs.uk

LIHNN Co-ordinating Committee:lihnn_committee@lihnn.nhs.uk

GROUP CHAIR (S ) E -MAIL

Cheshire & Merseyside Librarians Chair alternates around the Group

Clinical Librarians Eva Thackeray eva.thackeray@lthtr.nhs.uk

Rosalind McNally rosalind.mcnally@mmhsc.nhs.uk

CPD Committee Caroline Timothy caroline.timothy@nhs.netk

Cumbria & Lancashire Librarians Chair alternates around the Group

Greater Manchester Librarians Emily Hopkins emily.hopkins1@nhs.net

Information Governance Tracy Owen tracy.owen@nhs.net

Inter-Library Loans Steve Glover steve.glover@cmft.nhs.uk

LIHNN Co-ordinating Committee Graham Haldane graham.haldane@elht.nhs.uk

Mental Health Libraries Carmel Smith Carmel.Smith@lancashirecare.nhs.uk

Newsletter Andrew Craig Andrew.craig@lthtr.nhs.uk

NWOPAC Tracy Owen tracy.owen@nhs.net

Primary Care/Community/ - Michael Cook michael.cook@bolton.gov.ukCommissioning Librarians

Quality Laura Drummond lauradrummond@nhs.net

Trainers Jane Roberts jane.roberts@srft.nhs.uk

Emma Child childe@edgehill.ac.uk

L I H N N C H A I R S

Andrew Craig (Chair)Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHSFoundation Trust andrew.craig@lthtr.nhs.uk

Jenny DoranRoyal Liverpool & Broadgreen University Hospitals NHS TrustJennifer.Doran@rlbuht.nhs.uk

Linda FergusonHCLU linda.ferguson@nhs.net

John GaleMid Cheshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trustj.gale@chester.ac.uk

Steve GloverCentral Manchester University HospitalsNHS Foundation Truststeve.glover@cmft.nhs.uk

Matt HollandNW Ambulance Service NHS Trustmatt.holland@nwas.nhs.uk

Katie NicholasManchester Mental Health & Social Care Trust katie.nicholas@mhsc.nhs.uk

Gary SuttonWarrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust gary.sutton@whh.nhs.uk

L I H N N E D I T O R I A L B O A R D