Legal Medical Resources On The Internet: Links And Sources Of Information
Submitted By Jenny Garcia

The program for the next meeting will be on health law on the Internet, presented by Wanda McDavid, Marcy Dunning and Judy Goater from Access Information, a Denver research and information consulting firm.

This presentation will focus on Medical and Health Law resources on the Internet:

• U.S. government agencies, state and local government agencies offering information services, and organizations partnering with government agencies to provide information to the public
• National voluntary, nonprofit, and professional organizations serving the public interest
• Universities, other educational institutions, and libraries
• Online journals
• News Web sites

For more information about the program, Access Information and the speakers, see our web site at http://www.ccmlnet.org

The August 22 membership meeting will be held at AORN and will be our first afternoon meeting of the year. We will have networking time at 1:00 p.m. with the program beginning at 1:30. The meeting will begin at 2:45.

Journal Locator
Submitted By Gene Gardner

The 25th edition (2001) of the Journal Locator : Colorado-Wyoming will be published after January 2002, in time for the February meeting of CCML. Since the information can be downloaded whenever we wish, it is more logical to time the publication of the Locator with the beginning of a new calendar year to accommodate journal deletions and additions.

Please make sure that all of your holdings are up to date in SERHOLD so that when the information is downloaded, it will be as accurate as possible. The Journal Locator committee will determine an exact cutoff date to be announced in the next issue of Council Quotes. If you have not updated your holdings and have questions about the process, you may call Gene Gardner at 303-315-0294 for assistance.

CCML Annual Picnic
Submitted By Paul Blomquist

It's time to refresh, relax, and enjoy friendships at the CCML annual potluck picnic being hosted at Paul Blomquist's house on Saturday, August 11, 2001, beginning at 5 P.M. Drinks and table service will be provided. Let's come together to share summer adventures, vacations, and activities on a relaxed summer afternoon as we renew old friendships and make new friends.

The picnic will be held at 5307 South Cimarron Road, Littleton, CO. To reach Paul's house, drive south on Santa Fe and turn west on Belleview. Continue on Belleview for about two miles. Turn south on Perry from Belleview and continue for four blocks to South Cimarron-South Perry and South Cimarron meet at this intersection. Paul's house is on the southeast corner of this intersection. Please RSVP by August 3rd to Paul Blomquist if you plan to attend (Paul.Blomquist@uchsc.edu; 303-315-6434).

NN/LM Training In Denver
Submitted By Amanda Enyeart

If the June CCML meeting presentation by Dr. Scott Phillips sparked your interest in learning more about navigating toxicology information, register today for NN/LM's TOXNET on the Web class to be held on Tuesday, November 6th at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center.

TOXNET on the Web:
This one-day class is designed to convey the basics of searching the National Library of Medicine's TOXNET, a Web-based system of databases in the areas of toxicology, environmental health, and related subjects. Students will learn the content and structure of files covering toxicology data, toxicology literature, toxic releases, and chemical searching and nomenclature. Among the databases highlighted will be TOXLINE, the Hazardous Substances Data Bank, the Integrated Risk Information System, the Toxic Release Inventory, and ChemIDplus. TOXNET on the Web is awarded 7 MLA continuing education credits.

Also offered by NN/LM in November:
Keeping Up With NLM's PubMed, the NLM Gateway and ClinicalTrials.gov (1-day) November 5, 2001
Introduction to Web-Based Searching: Using PubMed, the NLM Gateway and ClinicalTrials.gov (2-days) November 7-8, 2001

Registration is free and available to all who are interested. Register or get more information about any of these classes at http://nnlm.gov/mar/online/request.html

Expect Meeting Changes
Submitted By Jenny Garcia

Last year several members suggested trying a few new changes with the CCML membership meeting and we are trying them out on an experimental basis. Some people found morning meetings difficult to attend and suggested afternoon meetings. Someone else suggested that the August out of town meeting might be conflicting with vacation times of members and their staffs and may be better attended if they were held in a non-vacation month. We are trying out both suggestions. In the coming year, a few meetings will be held in the afternoons and the out of town meeting will be held in October. Please let us know if the changes are good or bad for you or if you have any suggestions that we have not considered. I can be contacted at 303-450-3568 or jenny.garcia@healthonecares.com

Here is the meeting schedule for the upcoming year:

August 22
AORN
Afternoon Meeting
Program: Health Law On The Internet

October 31
Penrose Hospital, Colorado Springs
Morning Meeting
Program: Sports Medicine's Involvement In Preparing For The Olympic Games

December 19
Denver Medical Library
Afternoon Meeting
Joint Meeting With SLA
Program: CCML Will Challenge SLA To A Library Trivia Bowl

February 27
Denver Public Library
Afternoon Meeting
Program Pending

April 23 or 25 (date pending)
UCHSC
Annual Meeting And Teleconference
Time Pending
Program Pending

President's Column: Prove It! Part II
Submitted By Jerry Carlson

In the last issue I said I had an idea of how to prove my library's value to Administration, which I will share with you.

By coincidence, yesterday's quote in my quote-a-day calendar was from John Ruskin: "Education [in which I would include self-education with library resources - J.] does not mean teaching people what they do not know. It means teaching them to behave as they do not behave". How true and apropos. Our value - our impact - is in improving the behavior of care providers in order to improve the care they provide. So we need to know whether we're improving their behavior.

• 29.3% reported changing diagnosis
• 50.5% reported changing choice of tests
• 45.2% reported changing choice of drugs
• 19.2% reported reducing length of hospital stay
• 71.6% reported changing advice given to patients
• 19.2% reported avoiding patient mortality
• 8.2% reported avoiding hospital-acquired infection
• 21.2% reported avoiding surgery
• 45.1% reported avoiding additional tests or procedures
• 28.3% reported avoiding additional outpatient visits
• 85% reported that library services saved them time

The study does have some limitations, as Joanne Marshall admitted in her conclusion. Most notably, the data is based on yes-no questions. We know that 45.2% of the participants changed drugs because of library information; we don't know what drugs were changed, or how they in turn changed the outcome or costs. A 1994 study at the Children's Hospital of Michigan3 tried to quantify that fourth item: impact on length of stay. It showed that of "patients for whom MEDLINE searches were conducted during hospitalization, those whose searches wereconducted earlier had statistically significantly lower costs, charges, and lengths of stay than those whose searches were conducted later."4 But this merely shows a correlation between library services and one end of the patients' care and financial outcomes at the other end. It doesn't prove cause and effect in between; other unmeasured factors may have intervened - as any hostile administrator would be happy to point out. Not to mention the fact that these studies are 10 and 8 years old, respectively - "before everything was on the Internet".

My approach is more direct, detailed, and bottom-line oriented, if more anecdotal: Ask the providers themselves what impact their library use had. What I envision (I haven't done this yet) is a brief questionnaire that would accompany each search printout or photocopy I send out. These would be color-coded for the type of material - searches, in-house articles, and ILL's (one of the battles I'm fighting now is for in-house journal subscriptions).

The ideal survey would be about half a page of questions geared toward the purpose the patron gave when making the request. Since most don't do this, the most common survey would start with the question, "What is the purpose of the search?" and give several choices. After each choice would be a list of which of the numbered questions the patron should answer, so it would hopefully become less intimidating that rapidly.

I would also send surveys to those whom I had seen in the library, or who left other evidence of their presence. In this last case I would ask what materials and resources they used.

For direct patient care the key questions would be:

• What did you do as a result of reading these articles?
• What would you have done if you hadn't read these articles?
• What changes did your action bring about in the patient?

For current awareness, policy/procedure development, etc., "did" would change to "will", and the third question would be, "How often do you deal with this condition?" or something similar. If for teaching, I would ask for the date of the program, then follow up by asking for the number of students (presumably, this would multiply the impact).

Other growth areas would involve surveying end users working outside the library. I'm sure many wouldn't be using PubMed if I hadn't told them about it, and of course there are subscription services that they wouldn't have free access to if I wasn't footing the bill.

I'd like to hear from you if you've already done or are doing this sort of thing, or if you have other ideas for how to do it. If you'd like to try it yourself, all I ask is the presentation rights (unless, of course, you're already doing it and so have a prior claim). For that matter, maybe we could be the ones to update the Rochester study. It involved 15 hospitals (some urban, some rural); we represent about 30 in a variety of settings and specialties. Please e-mail me at gmc@gwdom.pvh.org if you're interested.

1 http://www.mlanet.org/resources/value.html

2 Joynt RJ, Marshall JG, McClure LW. Financial threats to hospital libraries. JAMA 1991 Sep 4;266(9):122; Marshall JG. The impact of the hospital library on clinical decision making: the Rochester study. Bull Med Lib Assoc 1992 Apr;80(2):169-78

3 Klein MS, Ross FV, Adams DL, Gilbert CM. Effect of online literature searching on length of stay and patient care costs. Acad Med. 1994 Jun;69(6):489-95. PMID:8003169

4 Ibid., Abstract.

Membership News
Submitted By Sue Mcguinness

The membership committee wishes to congratulate four of our members. First, to Nancy Meyer, Chief Librarian, who retired from the Denver VA Medical Center in June, best wishes! We are also very happy for Linda Van Wert, who is moving from her position as Library Manager at Children's Hospital, to a part-time position at Gambro, Inc. We hope you enjoy your newly acquired free time, Linda, as well as your new role at Gambro. Heartiest congratulations to Amanda Enyeart, who is taking over as Library Manager at Children's. Finally we bid farewell to Kelly Near, who is moving to Virginia to take on the position of Outreach Librarian at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. We will miss you!

Please contact Sue McGuinness at smcguinness@westwood.edu, with any changes to your contact information.

[NOTE: For complete information see printed Council Quotes.]

Online Marketing Course
Submitted By Suzanne Kaller

Once again, the Colorado Library Marketing Council is pleased to offer the popular online course on library marketing: "Creating Change in Challenging Times: Marketing Tools for Librarians and Information Professionals." The online course will be held from September 12 to November 21, 2001. Registration deadline is August 31, 2001.

You will gain the following skills from the course:

1. 1) How to become personally and professionally more confident, proactive, and powerful in influencing positive changes in your organization;
2. 2) How to do marketing research (aka "ask questions") to find out exactly what your clients and library users need and want--and how you can provide services, programs, and products to respond--thereby ensuring you will never become "obsolete."

Never taken a course online? Don't let that stop you . . . Pat Wagner, library consultant and motivational speaker, and one of the course's instructors, tells how the online course format provides an open setting for problem solving and getting feedback from colleagues. She writes:

"Participants praise the class for helping them see, hear, and understand people and situations differently, and to actually use that information immediately in practical situations. Claudine Paris and I, the two instructors, are available for personalized help, as you think, write, and talk online with your colleagues about the tough issues facing libraries - and what to do and how to do it. This is a friendly forum for experienced and new library workers, professionals and parapros. We have had every possible kind of library represented: school, public, academic, government, medical, legal, corporate, state libraries, plus institutions from one-person to multi-site, rural, suburban, and urban."

Dates for the course are September 12, 2001 to November 21, 2001. The registration deadline is August 31, 2001. The cost is $190.00. Two graduate credits may be obtained from Adams State College for an additional $60.00 tuition payment. For information about the course and a printable registration form, please visit the Web site: http://www.clmc.org/online_course.htm

Or, please contact one of the Colorado Library Marketing Council Co-Chairs, if you have questions:
Marti Cox, Information Consultant, Library Research Service, Colorado State Library, marticox@rmi.net
Eileen Dumas, Aurora Public Library, edumas@ci.aurora.co.us

Colorado Library Leadership Institute

The High Plains Regional Library Service System will be hosting the next Colorado Library Leadership Institute August 17-18 in Greeley. The two-day program provides participants the opportunity to think and write about issues that affect their roles as potential and current leaders in their libraries, institutions, and communities. The content revolves around the themes of influence, risk, decision-making and vision. The specifics are decided after applicants are interviewed, but some of the topics will include:

1. The differences between management and leadership roles
2. When good leaders go bad - or stale
3. Ethical political influence inside and outside the library
4. Killing the sacred cows - or at least not letting them take up valuable parking spaces
5. The technological future of information - what's after the Internet?
6. Designing the charter library of 2010
7. The Five-Minute Strategic Planning Model and the mantra to chant when the Plan goes astray
8. Evolutionary leadership when things are impossible today and probable only tomorrow
9. Finding your champion - being a champion
10. A leadership toolkit: What to do when you don't know what to do
11. What if you were your community or institution's CIO/CTO?

Past participants report that they have found it easier take chances, make difficult decisions, think outside the box, ask hard questions and become influential in their workplace and profession.

Participants include anyone who works in or for a library, including support staff and trustees. Public, academic, school and special library personnel are invited; the mix of different types of library backgrounds make for interesting conversations. For those of you who have take the class before, the content is 50% new.

For more information about registration, please contact: Eileen Seris, Consultant, High Plains Regional Library Service System, 1-800-332-7335, eser@psd.k12.co.us

If you would like to discuss the content and format of the program, please contact:
Pat Wagner, Pattern Research, 303-778-0880, pat@pattern.com

CCML Business News
Submitted By Jerry Carlson

The Executive Committee approved a 2001-2002 budget of $14,645 in expenses, $8850.00 in income. The biggest change is a $432 increase in our website expenses. You may view the budget as a zipped Excel file at http://www.ccmlnet.org/0102.ZIP or as an Acrobat PDF at http://www.ccmlnet.org/prop0102.pdf

In case you missed the June Membership Meeting, Barb Wagner agreed to serve as our Colleague Connection representative. I'm still working on getting a Marketing Council representative; volunteers for the post are still welcome. Additional members are also still needed for the Membership and Journal Locator Committees.

While we won't be sending a representative to the Colorado Library Political Action Committee, at the suggestion of someone at the June membership meeting we have invited them to send information to CCMLNET and CQ.

The deadline for Serhold updates will be later in the year; the Locator will then be made available at the February meeting. In this way the Locator will reflect annual journal cancellations and additions.

The Executive Committee sent a $50 memorial to the Orphan Train Heritage Society of America in honor of Teresa Martin.

Musings From Maxwell
Submitted By Dick Maxwell

Thousands of laboratory-quality mice may soon find themselves out of work, according to a recent story in Science. A team of scientists has come up with a computer program that they think will eliminate some of the tedious first steps in identifying quantitative trait loci (QTLs), or regions on chromosomes likely to contain genes which contribute to specific traits. Feverish breeding (among the mice), producing, ultimately, "hundreds of thousands of offspring," who eventually become large piles of data which might take years to analyze, makes this a painfully slow and expensive process. The new software would use extensive database files of information about many different Mickey and Minnie strains, eliminating much of the need for the actual rodents. "In vitro" experiments would be replaced by what they term "in silico." G5S54985a, spokesmouse for Treating Rodents As Partners (TRAP), agreed to stop by for an interview. G5, as he is known to friends, is a chain-smoking, obese, nude, tumor-riddled, drug-dependent, maze-conquering, genetically-engineered eight-month old with an IQ of 147. He has been a crucial part of experiments conducted by several branches of the National Institutes of Health, and recently received a pardon from President Bush, saving him from what the lab folks like to call "sacrifice."

"What the hell," he squeaked between hacking coughs, "ever happened to job security? When my great-great-grandfather died last month, he'd been with the same lab for his whole life-all 3 months. He was a breeder, I'll tell you...unbelievable...and now what? Now they don't even need that kind of specialty? They're going to do it with computer programs? Don't make me laugh. Where's the mammal element? Where's the warmth? What does a computer know about romance? When you turn my strain loose to reproduce, we don't waste any time, and you don't have to worry about power failures or bad programming. We'll get you what you need! Oh yeah! And I'll tell you something else: we don't have to just sit back and take this. We've looked at our options, and we've hired a lawyer to protect our interests. I don't suppose you computer geeks have heard of Johnnie Cochran? Yeah, you'd better sweat! IF THERE'S A QTL NEED, YOU MUST LET THEM BREED! You got any beer? Lord it's hot in here! What was the question?"

Less experimentally challenged representatives added that there is a committee looking at retirement options, to include mandatory sterilization, government-paid rehab, and relocation to cluttered garages in up-scale neighborhoods throughout the greater Washington, D.C. area.

In a marginally related development, G. Horvath and L. Visnyei report on a "Questionnaire assessment of the welfare of pigs" in Acta Veterinaria, saying that "a questionnaire study was performed involving 76 farms with a total of 380,207 pigs...."
Some of the results:

• 82% of the pigs responded "yes" to the question "Do you frequently feel crowded, filthy, speechless, and undervalued?"
• 67% agreed that they had a strong sense that cows on the same farm were treated with much more respect.
• 92% strongly agreed that the food they were offered was "not much better than slop."

In the open-ended comments section, the polled porkers apparently felt free to express their innermost feelings:

• "How did you know we could read?"
• "How do you expect me to hang onto and write with this skinny little (illegible)
• "I am sick to death of being dirty all the time. What in the world makes you think we enjoy wallowing in gallons of cold mud?"
• "Where do the older ones go when they take them through that gate over there? Why don't they come back?"
• "Never mind that idiot! WE DO NOT WANT TO BE SLAUGHTERED AND EATEN! YOU GET IT? NOTNOTNOTNOT! WE KNOW WHAT YOU'RE UP TO! YOU'RE NOT FOOLING ANYBODY! JUST STOP IT! The grocery stores are full of meat, for gosh sakes."
• "Was that movie 'Babe' cool, or what?"
• "Things seem pretty OK to me. What?...oh, OK. Gotta go, I guess some of us are going to move to a nice new place...called Hormel or something like that. Bye!"

Discussion List Change
Submitted By Mary Walsh

Our discussion list is changing. This change is necessary because our Internet Service Provider was going to start charging us a monthly fee - something CCML decided that we weren't willing to pay. So, thanks to the kindness of the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center network administrator, Jim Adams, we will have our list hosted here at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center. Listed below are the new address for you to add to your email address book, and two aspects of the new list that you ought to know about:

• There is no need to subscribe to the new list, if you were subscribed to the old list, you were registered for the new list
• The new address to post to is (use this for sending messages to the membership): ccmlnet@lists.uchsc.edu
• The web address for further instructions (unsubscribing and subscribing) is at: http://www.ccmlnet.org/listserv.html
• The list is not moderated (i.e., your email is not censored)
• The list is closed (you must be a subscriber to post to it). Since it is a closed list, we will no longer be receiving unsolicited emails from various distribution groups (e.g.., BCR).

You should have received a "test" message to confirm that you are receiving messages from the new list. If you did NOT receive the test message or if you have questions, please don't hesitate to contact Mary Walsh, Mary.Walsh@uchsc.edu.

Teresa Martin, CCML Founding Member
Submitted By Rosalind Dudden, Margaret Bandy, And Pat Perry

Teresa Binder Martin, a founding member of the Colorado Council of Medical librarians, died June 17, 2001, in Hays, Kansas at the age of 95. Many long-time CCML members remember her good humor, boundless energy, and supportive spirit. Teresa was the medical librarian at Mercy Hospital in the 1950s and 1960s. She was Porter Hospital's first librarian and retired in 1982 after 13 years of service at age 76.

Teresa was the first children's librarian in Hays, Kansas where she worked for 19 years. After that, she moved to Denver where she lived and worked in medical libraries for 30 years.

In a "Thumb Nail History" of CCML Teresa sent to a CCML member in 1978, she recalls the founding members as a "very close knit group" that were very helpful to each other. She stated that CCML "started in a small work room at the Denver Medical Society Library in the later part of 1955 from the result of Helen Walker, Teresa Martin and others calling Isabelle Anderson and Maxine Beaton for help." Teresa was always helpful to younger librarians as she had been helped in the early days of CCML.

She is remembered as someone who was a life-long learner. In her published obituary, it was noted that even at 95 she was a member of the Orphan Train Heritage Society of America, the Ivanhoe Club, Toastmasters Club, and the Ellis County Historical Society.

Teresa was an emeritus member of CCML. Every year when she got her renewal notice, even though her membership was complimentary, she sent a check for $25 and designated it for the Isabelle T. Anderson collection, a collection named after a woman she knew and greatly admired.

She goes on to recall a specific meeting: "One summer evening in 1956, they met at Mercy Hospital. This evening they gave Teresa Martin a standing ovation for having received 100% rating from the M.L.A. Accreditation. This was good luck due to the wonderful help she received from the group. She made some of her own books by looking through duplicate journals and tearing out subjects needed for her library. She made sure that every area was covered and up-to-date." This story recalls that in 1956, MLA accredited the library for membership and not the librarian. At that time, it was an association of institutions and not individuals. Also remember, there were very few photocopy machines in 1956.

Born in New York City, Teresa was placed in the New York Foundling Orphanage nine days after her birth. In 1910, at the age of four, she was a passenger on an orphan train that went to Kansas, where she was placed in the home of Conrad Bieker. Teresa is listed on the website, "Index of Children Who Rode the Orphan Trains to Kansas," for 1910 - http://kuhttp.cc.ukans.edu/carrie/kancoll/articles/orphans/or_child.htm

In her adult life, Teresa was widowed twice. Many in Denver may remember Lawrence "Frenchy" Martin, who died in 1978. Teresa is survived by 2 daughters, 14 grandchildren, 31 great-grandchildren, and one great-great grandchild.

The Colorado Council of Medical Librarians has sent a contribution to the Orphan Train Heritage Society of American in her memory. Individual members who wish to honor Teresa's life are also encouraged to give: Orphan Train Heritage Society of America, 614 East Emma Ave., #115, Springdale, AR 72764-4634, 501-756-2780

An Eclectic Guide To
NLM Medical Subject Classifications
Submitted By Doug Stackhouse

CCML Demographics
Submitted By Sue Mcguinness

As the CCML membership database coordinator, it is interesting to observe the diversity of our organization, so I tabulated some facts and figures about our membership. There are currently 102 members, with 11 members living and working outside of Colorado. We have four members from Wyoming, not including one who lives in Cheyenne and works in Fort Collins. We also have one member each from Florida, North Carolina, Montana, Texas, Washington, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts. Ninety-three people (91%) are regular members, two members are associates, two members are students and five members are emeritus.

CCML has seen a slight decline in membership since 1995, when we had 134 members. However, we have gained 13 new members since the year 2000. Seventy-six of our members joined in the eighties and nineties (29% and 46%, respectively.) We have eleven members who joined in the seventies and two members who joined in the sixties.

While CCML members share interests in medicine and health sciences, we represent a wide variety of professional institutions. Almost half of the CCML members work in hospital (29%) or academic (20%) libraries. The remaining membership hold positions in public libraries, information services, healthcare management companies, subscription services and other private businesses. For simplicity, I have grouped all of these institutions under the category of "special," in the table below. In my opinion, the greatest benefit of membership in CCML is the opportunity to network with librarians from with various backgrounds and a broad diversity of experience.

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This page was last updated on 24 APRIL 2003.
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