To mark the CILIP Health Libraries Group celebrations of their 75th anniversary, this year's Virtual Issue brings together Health Information and Libraries Journal manuscripts that have been particularly influential or generated most interest in our readers, or represent a significant event in the journal's own history, while still having relevance to contemporary health library and knowledge service practice.
Quality assurance (QA) is an important process in ensuring that systematic reviews and other evidence syntheses are supported by a high-quality search. This paper describes how the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) in the UK established a development pathway to ensure its information specialists had the skills, knowledge and confidence to undertake search QA. The key component of the pathway is that it blends technical knowledge with interpersonal skills. The pathway develops technical skills in the early steps before using peer support activities to build confidence while undertaking a range of searches. QA is effective when the search lead communicates the contextual information that has influenced search development. QA is treated as a collaboration to get the right search for the review. The key requirements for search QA, alongside technical knowledge, are communication, collaboration and negotiation skills.
This study investigated the topic of the academic integrity among medical students and postgraduate trainees in the teaching hospitals of South Punjab, Pakistan. A cross-sectional survey was conducted involving 318 medical students and postgraduate trainees of teaching hospitals. The results found that medical students of pre-clinical years engaged in unethical behaviour, that is, exam cheating and plagiarism to cope with internal and external evaluation and the range of subjects needed to be studied. For postgraduate trainees, results showed trainees unintentionally engaged in the practice of plagiarism due to lack of understanding about what constitutes plagiarism, coupled with externally perceived pressures associated with expectations of research publication, promotions and tenured positions. To address these concerns, it is recommended that information literacy sessions for undergraduate and postgraduate medical students on plagiarism prevention and ethical practice be designed and facilitated by medical librarians in collaboration of faculty members.
Health science libraries have been using information technology since the late 1960s, shaping both the profession and the mission of these libraries. To explore the impact of technology, a series of articles has been commissioned for the HILJ Regular Feature, International Perspectives and Initiatives. This editorial sets the scene for this series of articles, which starts in this issue. These articles, written by health science librarians from around the globe, will explore the impact of technology on the way health science libraries provide information in the digital age. Some articles will look at national trends and others will focus on a particular library. A key theme is how technology is being used to support the mission of health science libraries and whether technology has altered that mission. This editorial provides a brief overview of the technologies libraries have adopted, from the 1970s to the present day. From this, it is clear that information technology has transformed the way health information is collected, catalogued, and disseminated to users. And it is certain that in the coming decade new technologies will be incorporated into health science libraries, which will pose challenges for both users and librarians. However, librarians will continue to find ways to adapt and use these tools to meet the needs of their users.
National Health Service (NHS) knowledge and library services in England are integrating digital advances into their systems and services. Health Education England (HEE) leads on the development of NHS library services. A key workstream focuses on (1) improving the infrastructure to enable discovery and management of digital knowledge resources; (2) collaborating with local teams to establish regional library management systems that are integrated with the new national discovery service for healthcare staff and learners. This article explores initiatives on resource discovery as well as the need for system-wide partnership working to ensure that biomedical knowledge in computable form is findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable. Low levels of health and digital literacy pose a significant barrier to using health information and accessing health services. A range of interventions are aimed at enhancing citizens' digital and health literacy skills. The education and life-long learning needs of the knowledge and library services workforce are considered. Working with CILIP and higher education institutions, HEE delivers a range of educational offers through its Learning Academy. As Artificial Intelligence and automation are implemented in health systems, knowledge and library staff form a crucial bridge between technology and those who use it.
Increasing affordability, accessibility and penetration of internet services worldwide, have substantially changed the ways of gathering health-related information. This has led to the origin of concept infodemiology that allows the information to be collected and analysed in near real time. Globally, oral diseases affect nearly 3.5 billion people; thus, volume and profile of oral health searches would help in understanding specific community dental needs and formulation of pertinent oral health strategies.
To review the published literature on infodemiological aspects of oral health and disease.
This scoping review was conducted in accordance with PRISMA-ScR guidelines. Electronic search engines (Google Scholar) and databases (PubMed, Web of science, Scopus) were searched from 2002 onwards.
Thirty-eight articles were included in this review. The infodemiological studies for oral health and disease were mainly used in two domains. Out of 38 articles, 24 accessed the quality of available online information and 15 studied online oral health-related information seeking behaviour.
The most commonly searched oral diseases were toothache, oral cancer, dental caries, periodontal disease, oral maxillofacial surgical procedures and paediatric oral diseases. Most of the studies belonged to developed countries and Google was the most researched search engine.
Studies on information behaviour related to companion animal's (pet) health have been carried out in different contexts and there have been attempts to modify and idealize these information behaviours.
The purpose of this study is to apply the Pet Health Information Behaviour Intervention model in an empirical context and elaborate the theoretical contribution of the model to information behaviour research in the context of pet care and management.
All the variables of the proposed model were quantified and tested through case study research involving 20 participants. Each case consisted of a guardian who participated in the information intervention program with their cat(s) and/or dog(s) in a small animal hospital, with a follow-up interview after 2 weeks.
The information prescription helped both the experienced Internet searchers and the less health literate guardians. The pet guardians were particularly appreciative of the advice on evaluating and using online health information. The higher guardian-pet bond, the more the participant used the tips to search online information. The information prescription helped the relationship with the veterinary professional through improved data gathering and perception of the professional-guardian partnership.
The model will assist both information professionals and animal health providers to better design and evaluate information interventions that support pet welfare.
As many people relied on information from the Internet for official scientific or academically affiliated information during the COVID-19 pandemic, the quality of information on those websites should be good.
The main purpose of this study was to evaluate a selection of COVID-19-related websites for the quality of health information provided.
Using Google and Yahoo, 36 English language websites were selected, in accordance with the inclusion criteria. The two tools were selected for evaluation were the Health on the Net (HON) Code and the 16-item DISCERN tool.
Most websites (39%) were related to information for the public, and a small number of them (3%) concerned screening websites in which people could be informed of their possible condition by entering their symptoms. The result of the evaluation by the HON tool showed that most websites were reliable (53%), and 44% of them were very reliable. Based on the assessment results of the Likert-based 16-item DISCERN tool, the maximum and minimum values for the average scores of each website were calculated as 2.44 and 4.25, respectively.
Evaluation using two widely accepted tools shows that most websites related to COVID-19 are reliable and useful for physicians, researchers and the public.
Invitation to health information students and early career health information workers new to writing for publication to share evaluations of existing services or investigations into service improvement.
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