BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS
ten-year limit on periodical title holdings, owing to lack of storage space. In preparation for establishing such a policy and for converting to microform as needed (Meiboom [3]; Daghita [4]), the Brockton Hospital Library undertook a study of the retrospective use of its journal collection during the one-year period of January 1 to December 31, 1976. The data were the sum of requests made to the library staff for photocopies ofjournal articles where permitted by the publishers, or for those articles read in, or borrowed from, the library when photocopying was restricted. The Brockton Hospital is a 320-bed community teaching hospital, associated with Boston University School of Medicine and other collegiate educational programs, and has its own three-year diploma School of Nursing. Of the 204 journal titles currently held by the hospital library, a significant number (33) were regularly requested (several requests per year per title with only occasional omissions of any year) from the earliest holdings (1947 for a few) to date. Of the other 171 titles, some have been held for too few years for us to establish valid patterns of use. Of the remainder, a five-year (1972-1976) file was enough to satisfy most requests. Those journals that were found to have consistent use from the earliest volumes held to the present are shown in Table 1; excluded from the table are a few titles that had one or two TABLE 2 JOURNAL TITLES REQUIRING A RUN OF AT LEAST 10
YEARS BUr NOT MORE THAN 15 Earliest year from which started* regular use occurred
Year
Title
Acta Chir. Scand. Am. J. Nurs. Am. J. Med. Sci. Arch. Otolaryngol. Arch. Surg. Br. J. Radiol. Br. Med.J. J. Clin. Endocrinol. Metab. Lancet Mayo Clin. Proc. Nurs. Res.
Radiology Surg. Clin. North Am.
*AIl
run
1956 1950 1947 1947 1956 1955 1961 1960 1962 1952 1958 1953 1960
runs essentially complete or missing
volume. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
1966 1962 1962 1962 1966 1966 1962 1966 1963 1964 1963 1962 1965
only
one
requests for a very early year but then a long gap before subsequent articles were needed. Other titles, while not used for as many years as those in Table 1, had issues consistently requested from the years 1962 to 1967. These would no longer be held if an arbitrary ten-year retention policy were to be implemented; they are shown in Table 2. Having made this study, the Brockton Hospital Library found it vitally important to evaluate the use of each journal title before making a decision about length of retention or purchase of microform; the study also suggests that for some titles initially purchased in the 1970s, back runs on microform might be well worth obtaining. REFERENCES 1. ANNAN, GERTRUDE L., AND FELTER, JACQUELINE W., eds. Handbook of Medical Library Practice. 3d ed. Chicago, Medical Library Association, 1970. 2. BLOOMQUIST, HAROLD, et al., eds. Library Practice in Hospitals: A Basic Guide. Cleveland, The Press of Case Western Reserve University, 1972. 3. MEIBOOM, ESTHER R. Conversion of the periodical collection in a teaching hospital library to microfilm format. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64: 36-40, Jan. 1976. 4. DAGHITA, JOAN M. A core collection of journals on microfilm in a community teaching hospital library. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64: 240-241, Apr. 1976.
SDILINE Service in a Hospital Library* PATRICIA A. WILLIAMS, Senior Librarian
Health Sciences Library Hennepin County Medical Center Minneapolis, Minnesota S PECIAL libraries have for a number of years been in the forefront of providers of specialized information services to their patrons. In dealing with well-defined areas of knowledge for relatively cohesive groups of people, these librarians have been able to recognize client needs and to develop means of meeting these needs. Selective dissemination of information (SDI), the process of retrieving limited numbers of citations pertinent to a specified topic and distributing these to the client, is one such method. The purpose of this paper is to describe the *Presented June 16, 1976, at a poster session at the Seventy-fifth Annual Meeting of the Medical Library Association, Minneapolis, Minnesota.
447
BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS Patrons were initially made aware of the service development, growth, and recent status of an SDI service in a hospital library, utilizing the National through memos sent to each department head, medical staff member, and nursing staff coordinaLibrary of Medicine's SDILINE data base. tor. Profile forms on which patrons could submit HISTORY their desired topics were attached. Since that In 1973 the Health Sciences Library staff of time, the memo and profile form have been Hennepin County Medical Center, a 450-bed combined into pamphlet form and made available teaching hospital, recognized the library patrons' in the library. A copy is sent to incoming needs for a means of remaining current with residents, interns, and other new personnel. After receiving the profile form from the client, knowledge in their respective fields without having to spend much time in the library. After some re- the librarian formulates the search strategy based search, a selective dissemination of information on the client's expressed area of interest. MeSH service was begun, based on a service at the and MEDLINE computer operations are used. The formulated search is recorded on a four-byMissouri Institute of Psychiatry Library [1]. The procedure was to take a statement of interest six-inch card along with the client's name, departfrom the client and determine which Index ment, and phone number. This card serves as a Medicus subject headings were appropriate to it. record of the patron's formulated search and is Each month, references under these headings referred to each month when the search is being were photocopied from the monthly Index run on the terminal. The original profile form is Medicus and mailed to the patron, who would filed for future reference. A record of printouts check desired articles and mail the list back to the sent and number of articles requested each month is kept on the back of the card. These data are library. The SDI process at the Hennepin County used in evaluating the service and determining Medical Center Health Sciences Library, called whether or not the search formulation is meeting the Current Awareness Service, began in October the client's needs. The evaluative study-using questionnaires 1973 with fifty patrons. It was originally performed manually by photocopying pertinent mailed to clients-is made every six months. main headings from the current month's Index Through it, we attempt to measure whether the Medicus and sending these to the client. In client's needs are being met and also to give paDecember 1973 access to MEDLINE was made trons an opportunity to modify their topics or deavailable and a terminal installed. At that time, cline the service. the manual SDI service was converted to the comSTATISTICS puter utilizing SDILINE (Selective Dissemination of Information on-Line), a monthly-updated From 1973 to April 1976 the SDI service grew MEDLINE file containing the current month's ci- to serve ninety-nine patrons. The average number tations. of searches requested per person was two. In cases where two or three patrons have requested PROCEDURE the same topic, one search is run on the terminal, then photocopied for the other patrons. Library To participate in the SDI service, clients submit staff now runs 123 original computer searches of topics interest. After converting the topics to appropriate MeSH (Medical Subject Headings), monthly, taking ten and one-half hours of comlibrary staff, with the aid of SDILINE, scan the puter time. The average amount of computer time current month's literature and note relevant cita- per search is four minutes and seven seconds. tions. Each month, the client receives a printout of Each client has requested an average of five articitations. After designating desired references, he cles per month. For the Hennepin County Medical returns the list to the library, where access to arti- Center Health Sciences Library, 39% of these cles is provided through photocopy, interlibrary requests have been filled using interlibrary loans, loan, and borrowing privileges. Whenever possi- while 61 % have used photocopies. ble, copies are supplied, so that users of the COST OF THE SERVICE service need not enter the library. Since SDILINE updates occur some two to three The direct monthly cost of this service, includmonths before the printed Index Medicus is ing terminal rental, computer search time, labor, received, we are now able to send information and materials was $198.81 in April 1976. This figearlier than we could with the manual method. ure is based on ten and one-half hours of a li-
448
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS
brarian's time, three hours of clerical time, the average amount of computer time used, and a portion of the terminal rental. Since the terminal is also used for regular MEDLINE searching, only that percentage attributable to SDILINE searching is included here. The direct cost per search was $1.62. Indirect costs, also covered by the library, include the costs of providing photocopies and interlibrary loans for SDILINE requests. These factors, depending upon a library's situation, would substantially increase the total cost.
CONCLUSION In spite of increased costs and workload, library staff has found SDI to be stimulating and rewarding. Analysis of the evaluative studies along with verbal comments from patrons consistently indicate high user satisfaction. The fast rate of growth of the service, and the fact that many of our patrons share their searches, attest to these results and the service's popularity. On the basis of this feedback, the library staff feels that, with SDI, a good start has been made in meeting the needs recognized in 1973.
EVALUATION REFERENCES From its start, the SDI service has been extremely popular. Virtually all clients regard the 1. YUNIS, SUSAN S. The implementation, evaluation, and refinement of a manual SDI service. Bull. service as highly valuable, and 94% rated many to Med. Libr. Assoc. 61: 4-14, Jan. 1973. most of the citations as relevant. A surprising result is that 41% of our patrons share their lists of citations with colleagues and other members of their departments.
EFFECTS Since initiating the service, we have experienced sharp growth in library workloads for interlibrary loans and photocopies. Before starting SDI, the library was borrowing items at the rate of 204 items per month and photocopying 615 articles (5,568 exposures) per month. With the advent of SDI, these statistics increased to the rate of 506 items borrowed per month and 1,164 articles (8,489 exposures) photocopied per month. The 47% increase in photocopying and the 60% increase in interlibrary loans result not only from the initiation of the SDI service but also from initiation of MEDLINE, which occurred at the same time. By selecting a random sample of months and comparing the number of interlibrary loans and photocopy requests due to SDI to those due to other sources within the library, it was determined that SDI service has caused a 14% increase in monthly photocopy volume and a 24% increase in interlibrary loan work loads. The greatest effect of SDI service, however, has been that the library has reached more types of hospital employees. Before we began the service, library resources were being utilized primarily by physicians and nurses. SDI, once begun, appealed not only to medical and nursing staff, but also to many allied health professionals such as dietitians and pharmacists. The library now provides more service not only for medical and nursing staffs, but also for professionals and employees from many other departments. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
Predicting the Impact of Copyright Specifications on Interlibrary Borrowing By DALE R. MIDDLETON, Assistant Directorfor Operations Pacific Northwest Regional Health Sciences Library University of Washington Seattle, Washington
IN order to determine whether compliance with the new copyright law (PL 94-553) would be likely to pose major difficulties or occasion significant additional costs for the requester or for the library, an analysis was made of interlibrary loan items obtained during 1976 for requesters at the University of Washington Health Sciences Center. Of the total of 1,006 filled requests, 795 were filled by photocopies (79%). These 795 items were checked against the CONTU guidelines* developed to explicate Section 108 of the new law, which is the section pertinent to interlibrary borrowing.
After identifying the requests for items published in the last five years (taken to be *The guidelines were developed by the National Commission on New Technological Uses of Copyrighted Works (CONTU) and may be found in the Conference Report to Accompany S. 22, House Report No. 94-1733, p. 72-73, and in Appendix II, p. 22-24, "Librarian's guide to the new copyright law," reprinted in ALA Washington Newsletter, 28: no. 13, Nov. 15, 1976.
449
ten-year limit on periodical title holdings, owing to lack of storage space. In preparation for establishing such a policy and for converting to microform as needed (Meiboom [3]; Daghita [4]), the Brockton Hospital Library undertook a study of the retrospective use of its journal collection during the one-year period of January 1 to December 31, 1976. The data were the sum of requests made to the library staff for photocopies ofjournal articles where permitted by the publishers, or for those articles read in, or borrowed from, the library when photocopying was restricted. The Brockton Hospital is a 320-bed community teaching hospital, associated with Boston University School of Medicine and other collegiate educational programs, and has its own three-year diploma School of Nursing. Of the 204 journal titles currently held by the hospital library, a significant number (33) were regularly requested (several requests per year per title with only occasional omissions of any year) from the earliest holdings (1947 for a few) to date. Of the other 171 titles, some have been held for too few years for us to establish valid patterns of use. Of the remainder, a five-year (1972-1976) file was enough to satisfy most requests. Those journals that were found to have consistent use from the earliest volumes held to the present are shown in Table 1; excluded from the table are a few titles that had one or two TABLE 2 JOURNAL TITLES REQUIRING A RUN OF AT LEAST 10
YEARS BUr NOT MORE THAN 15 Earliest year from which started* regular use occurred
Year
Title
Acta Chir. Scand. Am. J. Nurs. Am. J. Med. Sci. Arch. Otolaryngol. Arch. Surg. Br. J. Radiol. Br. Med.J. J. Clin. Endocrinol. Metab. Lancet Mayo Clin. Proc. Nurs. Res.
Radiology Surg. Clin. North Am.
*AIl
run
1956 1950 1947 1947 1956 1955 1961 1960 1962 1952 1958 1953 1960
runs essentially complete or missing
volume. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
1966 1962 1962 1962 1966 1966 1962 1966 1963 1964 1963 1962 1965
only
one
requests for a very early year but then a long gap before subsequent articles were needed. Other titles, while not used for as many years as those in Table 1, had issues consistently requested from the years 1962 to 1967. These would no longer be held if an arbitrary ten-year retention policy were to be implemented; they are shown in Table 2. Having made this study, the Brockton Hospital Library found it vitally important to evaluate the use of each journal title before making a decision about length of retention or purchase of microform; the study also suggests that for some titles initially purchased in the 1970s, back runs on microform might be well worth obtaining. REFERENCES 1. ANNAN, GERTRUDE L., AND FELTER, JACQUELINE W., eds. Handbook of Medical Library Practice. 3d ed. Chicago, Medical Library Association, 1970. 2. BLOOMQUIST, HAROLD, et al., eds. Library Practice in Hospitals: A Basic Guide. Cleveland, The Press of Case Western Reserve University, 1972. 3. MEIBOOM, ESTHER R. Conversion of the periodical collection in a teaching hospital library to microfilm format. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64: 36-40, Jan. 1976. 4. DAGHITA, JOAN M. A core collection of journals on microfilm in a community teaching hospital library. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64: 240-241, Apr. 1976.
SDILINE Service in a Hospital Library* PATRICIA A. WILLIAMS, Senior Librarian
Health Sciences Library Hennepin County Medical Center Minneapolis, Minnesota S PECIAL libraries have for a number of years been in the forefront of providers of specialized information services to their patrons. In dealing with well-defined areas of knowledge for relatively cohesive groups of people, these librarians have been able to recognize client needs and to develop means of meeting these needs. Selective dissemination of information (SDI), the process of retrieving limited numbers of citations pertinent to a specified topic and distributing these to the client, is one such method. The purpose of this paper is to describe the *Presented June 16, 1976, at a poster session at the Seventy-fifth Annual Meeting of the Medical Library Association, Minneapolis, Minnesota.
447
BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS Patrons were initially made aware of the service development, growth, and recent status of an SDI service in a hospital library, utilizing the National through memos sent to each department head, medical staff member, and nursing staff coordinaLibrary of Medicine's SDILINE data base. tor. Profile forms on which patrons could submit HISTORY their desired topics were attached. Since that In 1973 the Health Sciences Library staff of time, the memo and profile form have been Hennepin County Medical Center, a 450-bed combined into pamphlet form and made available teaching hospital, recognized the library patrons' in the library. A copy is sent to incoming needs for a means of remaining current with residents, interns, and other new personnel. After receiving the profile form from the client, knowledge in their respective fields without having to spend much time in the library. After some re- the librarian formulates the search strategy based search, a selective dissemination of information on the client's expressed area of interest. MeSH service was begun, based on a service at the and MEDLINE computer operations are used. The formulated search is recorded on a four-byMissouri Institute of Psychiatry Library [1]. The procedure was to take a statement of interest six-inch card along with the client's name, departfrom the client and determine which Index ment, and phone number. This card serves as a Medicus subject headings were appropriate to it. record of the patron's formulated search and is Each month, references under these headings referred to each month when the search is being were photocopied from the monthly Index run on the terminal. The original profile form is Medicus and mailed to the patron, who would filed for future reference. A record of printouts check desired articles and mail the list back to the sent and number of articles requested each month is kept on the back of the card. These data are library. The SDI process at the Hennepin County used in evaluating the service and determining Medical Center Health Sciences Library, called whether or not the search formulation is meeting the Current Awareness Service, began in October the client's needs. The evaluative study-using questionnaires 1973 with fifty patrons. It was originally performed manually by photocopying pertinent mailed to clients-is made every six months. main headings from the current month's Index Through it, we attempt to measure whether the Medicus and sending these to the client. In client's needs are being met and also to give paDecember 1973 access to MEDLINE was made trons an opportunity to modify their topics or deavailable and a terminal installed. At that time, cline the service. the manual SDI service was converted to the comSTATISTICS puter utilizing SDILINE (Selective Dissemination of Information on-Line), a monthly-updated From 1973 to April 1976 the SDI service grew MEDLINE file containing the current month's ci- to serve ninety-nine patrons. The average number tations. of searches requested per person was two. In cases where two or three patrons have requested PROCEDURE the same topic, one search is run on the terminal, then photocopied for the other patrons. Library To participate in the SDI service, clients submit staff now runs 123 original computer searches of topics interest. After converting the topics to appropriate MeSH (Medical Subject Headings), monthly, taking ten and one-half hours of comlibrary staff, with the aid of SDILINE, scan the puter time. The average amount of computer time current month's literature and note relevant cita- per search is four minutes and seven seconds. tions. Each month, the client receives a printout of Each client has requested an average of five articitations. After designating desired references, he cles per month. For the Hennepin County Medical returns the list to the library, where access to arti- Center Health Sciences Library, 39% of these cles is provided through photocopy, interlibrary requests have been filled using interlibrary loans, loan, and borrowing privileges. Whenever possi- while 61 % have used photocopies. ble, copies are supplied, so that users of the COST OF THE SERVICE service need not enter the library. Since SDILINE updates occur some two to three The direct monthly cost of this service, includmonths before the printed Index Medicus is ing terminal rental, computer search time, labor, received, we are now able to send information and materials was $198.81 in April 1976. This figearlier than we could with the manual method. ure is based on ten and one-half hours of a li-
448
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS
brarian's time, three hours of clerical time, the average amount of computer time used, and a portion of the terminal rental. Since the terminal is also used for regular MEDLINE searching, only that percentage attributable to SDILINE searching is included here. The direct cost per search was $1.62. Indirect costs, also covered by the library, include the costs of providing photocopies and interlibrary loans for SDILINE requests. These factors, depending upon a library's situation, would substantially increase the total cost.
CONCLUSION In spite of increased costs and workload, library staff has found SDI to be stimulating and rewarding. Analysis of the evaluative studies along with verbal comments from patrons consistently indicate high user satisfaction. The fast rate of growth of the service, and the fact that many of our patrons share their searches, attest to these results and the service's popularity. On the basis of this feedback, the library staff feels that, with SDI, a good start has been made in meeting the needs recognized in 1973.
EVALUATION REFERENCES From its start, the SDI service has been extremely popular. Virtually all clients regard the 1. YUNIS, SUSAN S. The implementation, evaluation, and refinement of a manual SDI service. Bull. service as highly valuable, and 94% rated many to Med. Libr. Assoc. 61: 4-14, Jan. 1973. most of the citations as relevant. A surprising result is that 41% of our patrons share their lists of citations with colleagues and other members of their departments.
EFFECTS Since initiating the service, we have experienced sharp growth in library workloads for interlibrary loans and photocopies. Before starting SDI, the library was borrowing items at the rate of 204 items per month and photocopying 615 articles (5,568 exposures) per month. With the advent of SDI, these statistics increased to the rate of 506 items borrowed per month and 1,164 articles (8,489 exposures) photocopied per month. The 47% increase in photocopying and the 60% increase in interlibrary loans result not only from the initiation of the SDI service but also from initiation of MEDLINE, which occurred at the same time. By selecting a random sample of months and comparing the number of interlibrary loans and photocopy requests due to SDI to those due to other sources within the library, it was determined that SDI service has caused a 14% increase in monthly photocopy volume and a 24% increase in interlibrary loan work loads. The greatest effect of SDI service, however, has been that the library has reached more types of hospital employees. Before we began the service, library resources were being utilized primarily by physicians and nurses. SDI, once begun, appealed not only to medical and nursing staff, but also to many allied health professionals such as dietitians and pharmacists. The library now provides more service not only for medical and nursing staffs, but also for professionals and employees from many other departments. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 65(4) October 1977
Predicting the Impact of Copyright Specifications on Interlibrary Borrowing By DALE R. MIDDLETON, Assistant Directorfor Operations Pacific Northwest Regional Health Sciences Library University of Washington Seattle, Washington
IN order to determine whether compliance with the new copyright law (PL 94-553) would be likely to pose major difficulties or occasion significant additional costs for the requester or for the library, an analysis was made of interlibrary loan items obtained during 1976 for requesters at the University of Washington Health Sciences Center. Of the total of 1,006 filled requests, 795 were filled by photocopies (79%). These 795 items were checked against the CONTU guidelines* developed to explicate Section 108 of the new law, which is the section pertinent to interlibrary borrowing.
After identifying the requests for items published in the last five years (taken to be *The guidelines were developed by the National Commission on New Technological Uses of Copyrighted Works (CONTU) and may be found in the Conference Report to Accompany S. 22, House Report No. 94-1733, p. 72-73, and in Appendix II, p. 22-24, "Librarian's guide to the new copyright law," reprinted in ALA Washington Newsletter, 28: no. 13, Nov. 15, 1976.
449
